Item #66944 Mexico y sus Alrededores. MEXICO.
Mexico y sus Alrededores
Mexico y sus Alrededores
Mexico y sus Alrededores

"The Most Important Work Illustrating Mexico in the 19th Century" (-Mexico on Stone)

MEXICO.

Mexico y sus Alrededores. Collecion de Monumentos, Trajes y Paisajes Dibujados al Natural y Litografiados por los Artistas Mexicanos..., Bajo la Direccion de Decaen.

Mexico City: Establecimiento Litografico de Decaen, Editor, 1864.

Third edition. The first is 1855-1856 with twenty-eight plates; the second is 1858 with thirty-eight plates (varying from copy to copy). Folio. [ii], 37 pages text. Lithographic frontispiece portrait of Benito Juarez mounted on blank leaf, additional tinted emblematic title-page (dated "1855 y 1857"), tinted folding plan of Mexico City (dated 1863), and thirty-nine colored or tinted lithographic plates, four with two images. Captions in Spanish, English, and French. The artists involved were Casimiro Castro, Juan Campillo, Luis Auda, and G. Rodriguez.

Three-quarter black morocco over green linen. Spine decorated and lettered in gilt. Title panel (dated 1862) from front cover of original cloth binding laid down on front pastedown. Spine and edges scuffed, front cover detached, covers soiled, backing sheet of frontispiece portrait cracked along gutter and one edge of plate. Light dampstaining affecting some images. Still a very good copy of this very rare and important work.

Michael Mathes in Mexico on Stone calls this work "one of the most significant lithographic productions in the history of the art... This is the most important work illustrating Mexico in the 19th century." The normally restrained Abbey cataloguer declares "the draughtmanship and lithography [are] of a very high standard." The marvelous plates depict views and specific structures and parks in Mexico City and its environs, as well as several depictions of regional costumes. The majority of plates in this copy are colored, primarily in shades of brown and green, with numerous details in additional colors. Previous owner's pencil inscriptions in several places (from 1864).

Abbey, Travel, 672 (miscounting the plates). Colas 547. Hiler, p. 586. Lipperheid 1624. Mathes, Mexico on Stone, 29ff. Palau 167505. Sabin 48590.

HBS 66944.

$6,000.

Price: $6,000.00

Item #66944

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