Bosse, Abraham

BOSSE, Abraham (1602-1676). Traicté des manieres de graver en taille douce sur l'airin. Paris: Abraham Bosse, 1645.
8 o (171 x 104 mm). 21 full-page engraved plates printed on 14 leaves, including 2 additional engraved titles, engraved dedication leaf, and 18 numbered engraved illustrations, most printed on rectos and versos of the leaves, numbers 5 and 6 repeated as usual. (Owner's name deleted on title, a few spots.) Contemporary green-stained vellum (front joint cracked, but cords sound). Provenance: G. Rover (red ink stamp); acquired from Walter Schatzke, 1965.
FIRST EDITION OF THE FIRST TREATISE ON INTAGLIO PRINTMAKING. Bosse was a prolific engraver and author of several works on the arts of painting, drawing, and perspective. His treatise on the intaglio techniques, dedicated to "Messieurs les Amateurs" of the arts of engraving and etching, contains a lengthy and detailed series of instructions touching every aspect of engraving with a burin and etching on both hard- and soft-grounds. Several chapters are devoted to preparation of the plates and the varnishes, others cover the actual techniques of engraving and etching, and the final section is devoted to printing. Each process is illustrated with finely engraved plates by Bosse. The frequently reprinted and widely translated work was "not only the first on its subject but for more than a century it remained the standard" (Ivins, Prints & visual communication, Cambridge, 1969, p. 75). Bigmore and Wyman, p. 72; Blum, pp. 403-421; Brunet I, 1127; Cicognara 251; Norman 279.