Livre indispensable aux Enfans de la Liberté, ou ils trouveront: 1°. Le tableau moral et raisonné des symboles de la République; 2°. Un précis historique et moral de quelques fondateurs, et des rapports des actions héroïques de quelques martyrs de la liberté; 3°. Des moralités générales sur la nécessité des bonnes moeurs, et l'émulation des armes dans la République. Avec figures. Par les citoyens Dusausoir et G*****, Suppléant à la Convention Nationale, du Département du Mont Blanc
Paris, F. Dufart, Langlois and others, [1793] ('Seconde édition, corrigée et augmentée ... L'an second de la république française').
Duodecimo, 94, [2] (Table des matièrs) pages plus three engraved plates (symbols of the Republic; 'Fondateurs de la liberté', including Rousseau, Voltaire, Francklin [sic], William Tell, Brutus etc; and 'Martyrs de la liberté', including Marat).
Early paper wrappers incorporating some interesting printer's waste (see below); scattered foxing and discolouration; a few unobtrusive chips, marks and tears, but overall in excellent condition.
A rare children's book explaining revolutionary and republican values, published around the beginning of the Reign of Terror. Interestingly, the binding incorporates printer's waste, including a revolutionary broadside from the War of the Pyrenees (Guerre du Roussillon). It is the Spanish edition of a series of ordinances published by the Committee of Public Safety for the inhabitants of the province of Guipuzcoa (Gipuzkoa) in the Basque country of northern Spain, and carries the imprint 'En Bayona [Bayonne]. En la Oficina de Racle, Impresor del Exercito'. The citizens of Gipuzkoa were considered broadly sympathetic to the French. An early reader has scrawled a fragment from a revolutionary song on the front cover, and has left extensive marginalia in a mixture of French and Spanish on the half title and the table of contents. He has certainly absorbed the message of the book: 'il ne faut pas renoncer a la Patria. il est plus dificile qu'entre el error en muchos que en un solo, es mas natural que todos han poshedores que uno solo como el Rey. [Esto?] lo dice la razon, la notoriedad publica de hechos' [sic].
Item #96606
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