FIRST ILLUSTRATED EDITION - De la signification des notes hieroglyphiques des Aegyptiens - Orus Apollo (Horapollo) - Jacques Kerver - 1543

"De la signification des notes hieroglyphiques des Aegyptiens"

-Orus Apollo (Horapollo)

-FIRST ILLUSTRATED EDITION of this celebrated work on Egyptian Hieroglyphics

-Printed in Paris by Jacques Kerver on 23rd November 1543

-8^o (145 x 90 mm approx). 104 leaves (of 104 - complete) (a-n8)

-197 woodcuts, including 7 repeats

-18th Century French Full calf with marbled end papers (rebacked)

“Orus apollo (Horapollo) of Egypt - on the meaning of Hieroglyphics - the scripture in which they write their secret mysteries and their holy and divine sayings”

Horapollo’s work was an Ancient Greek text which tried to find the lost meanings for Egyptian hieroglyphics. This is the first illustrated edition with woodcuts commissioned by Jacques Kerver. A later edition was published in Latin and Greek in 1551 and reused these woodcuts.

The book, the “Hieroglyphics of Horapollo”, was reportedly written in the 5th century and is the earliest book attempting to decipher the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic symbols. The translations are mostly inaccurate and symbolic, but the work was hugely popular during the renaissance, and It’s popularity led to the spread of emblem books which used images as symbols.

This early French edition contains 197 woodcut illustrations which were reported to decipher ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics and their “secret mysteries”. The translations were fanciful, but often gave moral interpretations. "The finest of these cuts are by an extremely skilful artist, probably one of the artists of the 1546 Kerver Hypnertomachie, and have been attributed to Jean Cousin or Jean Goujon" (Mortimer)

USTC 37805 (19 copies - Including 5 in USA and 5 in UK)

Copies of this edition sold in Christies in 2013 for $7500 USD and at Sothebys for $8225 USD  in 2023