Histoire de la Revolution Francaise. [History of the French Revolution].

THIERS, Marie Joseph Louis Adolphe.

$750.00

Item Number: 137208

Societe Typographique Belge: Bruxelles, 1840.

Finely bound example of the first major work on the French Revolution. Quarto, two volumes bound in full contemporary polished and diced calf with gilt titles and tooling to the spine, illustrated, tissue-guarded frontispiece portrait of Thiers. In very good condition. A very attractive binding.

Thiers' first major work, The History of the French Revolution was highly praised by French critics. It was the first major history in French of the Revolution, and won Thiers a seat as the second-youngest elected member of the Académie Française, and in addition was a major commercial success. It condemned the violence of the Terror and the most radical leaders, including Marat, Robespierre, and Saint-Just, and glorified the ideals and the more moderate leaders of the French Revolution, including Mirabeau, Bailly and Lafayette, though at the time the book was published France was still a monarchy, and the singing of the Marseillaise was still forbidden. The work did much to undermine public support for the last Bourbon king, overthrown in the Revolution of 1830.