VIEWS OF ROME
BONNARD, Camille Marie.
Le pélerin, ou souvenirs de Rome. Tome premier [all published].
Paris, Camille Bonnard, 1829.
8vo, pp. 152; with 30 coloured plates signed ‘C.B.’; some foxing and browning to text, closed marginal tear to pp. 13–14; otherwise a good copy in contemporary green calf-backed boards with marbled sides, spine lettered and decorated in gilt, marbled endpapers; some wear and splitting to joints, extremities rubbed; with autograph presentation note signed ‘C. Bonnard’ and dated ’20 8bre 1830’ pasted to front flyleaf.
Rare first and only edition of this handsomely illustrated work on Rome by the French painter and engraver Camille Bonnard (1794–1870), with his autograph presentation note pasted inside.
A native of Toulouse, Bonnard worked in Rome between 1820 and 1827. The text of Le pélerin is presented as the souvenirs of a young Austrian disguised as a pilgrim, which the preface claims were entrusted to Bonnard for publication. While it makes for an interesting read, the real charm of the volume lies in the beautiful hand-coloured engravings of views, costumes, and customs. Some of the treasures of Rome depicted include the Ponte Milvio, Castel Sant’Angelo, the Forum, the Column of Antoninus Pius, the Piazza di Spagna, the Villa Medici, St Peter’s, and Sant’Onofrio church. Other plates illustrate the Pope and cardinals, Jesuits, hooded penitents in procession, a street singer, a rustic family cooking polenta, an unfortunate young woman chained up in a mental asylum, a cattle drive, and a fight between two rival gangs wielding stones and knives.
Bonnard’s autograph note in this copy hopes that the recipient (‘mon cher Monsieur’) will find a place in his library for the writer’s Pélerin.
OCLC records only one copy, at the BnF.
