A HIDDEN MINIATURE DIARY IN A BOOK-FORM BOX
[MINIATURE BOOKS.]
‘Hebdomadaire, ou bibliotheque secrete’.
France, c. 1800.
Seven vols, 64mo (56 x 38 mm), each approx. [40] ff., blank; bound in calf (one plain, two in tree calf, the remainder mottled in various colours), borders filleted or roll-tooled in gilt, spines gilt with coloured morocco lettering-pieces (with the days of the week in French), edges stained and speckled in various colours, endbands painted on folded paper, marbled endpapers, together in a red straight-grained morocco book-form box, spine gilt in compartments and lettered ‘Hebdomadaire ou bibliotheque secrete’ directly in gilt, boards gilt to a geometric design, turn-ins roll-tooled in gilt with a Greek key motif, endbands from gilt red and green morocco, marbled endpapers, a single page with printed border (from a roll-tool?) pasted to a sliding cover concealing the box’s contents; case a little dusty and minimally rubbed at extremities, Dimanche and Mercredi supplied at a later date (early twentieth century?), otherwise an excellent set; ink inscriptions dated September or October 1806 to 3 vols.
A charming miniature diary in seven volumes, hidden within a compartment of a book-form box.
The seven volumes are each bound in calf to an individual but complementary design, with different methods for marbling or mottling the leather and a range of tools accompanied by a variety of edge-decorations and marbled endpapers. They are housed together in a book-form box, whose ‘textblock’ must be slid outwards over the fore-edge to reveal the volumes within; to lend credibility to the pretence, the front free endpaper is followed by a page with a ‘printed’ border, seemingly made with a binder’s roll.
