DE L'ORIGINE ET DES PRODUCTIONS DE L'IMPRIMERIE PRIMITIVE EN TAILLE DE BOIS.
- Paris: J. Barbou, 1759.
- 8vo
- Full period French binding in Calf, five raised bands, gilt ornamentation on spine, author and title in gilt on red leather spine label in second compartment
- 263 pages
- ISBN: none
Price: $2,800.00 other currencies
Order Nr. 137120
First edition (Bigmore and Wyman p.228). Minor soiling to the text block, else a fine copy.
In this volume, Fournier sets out to prove that Gutenberg was not the inventor of the printing press by examining the history of printing. He believes that the technology Gutenberg made popular existed long before the German printer's work.
"Peter Simon Fournier, a French engraver and letter-founder, was born at Paris, 1712, and died 1768. He studied under Colson, painter of the Academy of Saint Luc, and devoted himself first to the art of wood-engraving; he afterwards, as an engraver on steel, rendered himself famous in all countries. In some of his works he seeks to prove that Gutenberg is not the inventor of printing, and maintains that long before Gutenberg engraving on wood had been employed for printing images and inscriptions; that during his residence in Strasburg, Gutenberg attempted the application of this art to the printing of books, and that on his return to Mayence he first printed the Donatus and the Catholicon of Johannes de Janua with engraved and solid blocks. Fournier's ingenious theories were ably refuted by Baron Heinecken in his "Idée Générale d'une Collection complette d'Estamples" (Leipsic: 1771)" Bigmore & Wyman, p 229.