Lot n° 165
Estimation :
600 - 800
EUR
SONNET (Thomas, sieur de COURVAL). Satyre contre les charlat - Lot 165
SONNET (Thomas, sieur de COURVAL). Satyre contre les charlatans, et pseudomedecins empyriques. [Paris, Jean Milot, 1610.
In-12 of [16] lim. ff. (including fine full-page copper-engraved portraits of the Comte de Flers and the author, and one blank leaf), 335 pp. Jansenist red morocco, ribbed spine, gilt title, place and date, gilt edges, int. lace (Hardy).
Very rare first edition of this satyrical text by Thomas SONNET, sieur de Courval, medical doctor and poet, born in Vire in 1577, and died in 1627. Following in the footsteps of the Norman satirical poets of the 16th and early 17th centuries (Vauquelin, Sigogne, Garaby de la Luzerne, Du Lorens, Angot de l'Éperonnière and Auvray), he wrote several satirical pieces, notably against women (although this did not prevent him from marrying and having several children of his own).
In this violent pamphlet, Thomas Sonnet de Courval promotes academic medical knowledge as the only legitimate one, deploring the success of "charlatans" among his contemporaries. Considering them criminal and dangerous to the health of the most gullible, he takes particular aim at spagyrists, followers of the physician, astrologer and alchemist Paracelsus, a heterodox thinker who founded modern pharmacology.
A very fine copy in a signed binding, complete with the often-missing portrait of the Count of Flers (not cited by Frère). Ex-libris G.-R. Piclin. Bookplate J.M. (Frère II, 538; Caillet 10266.)
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