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412 - [LULLY (Jean-Baptiste)]. Theseus. Tragedy. Set to music. By …
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Estimate €600 - €800
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Description
[LULLY (Jean-Baptiste)]. Theseus. Tragedy. Set to music. By the late Mr de Lully, Knight, Councillor, Secretary to the King, to the Crown of France and to the Treasury, and Superintendent of His Majesty’s Music. Second edition. Engraved by H. de Baussen. Paris, at the entrance to the Royal Academy of Music at the Palais Royal, Rue Saint-Honoré, 1711. Folio, [2] folios. (title page and licence) and 230 pp. of engraved music, illustrated with 6 fine headpieces engraved by Scotin after Gillot. Grained calfskin, decorated ribbed spine, title page (contemporary binding). Binding worn, cap bands torn off, joints split, corners worn. First section A detached. From the library of Bruny de Saint Cannat, Baron de La Tour d’Aigues, with his gilt superlibris on the front cover reading ‘La Tour d’Aigues’. Second edition, engraved by Baussen, of the score for this musical tragedy, featuring ballet interludes, stage machinery and scene changes, comprising a prologue and five acts, based on a libretto adapted from Ovid’s *Metamorphoses*. It was premiered at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, in the Salle des Ballets, in the presence of the King, on 11 January 1675, and subsequently at the Théâtre du Palais Royal in April. The success of *Thésée* led to the publication of a very large number of librettos, the numerous variations of which – linked to revivals, changes in staging or the constraints of the venues – allow us to trace the work’s evolution. In 1688, a year after Lully’s death, Christophe Ballard published the first score of Thésée, using movable lead type, but without the usual care taken by the composer, to the extent that numerous errors had to be corrected by hand; produced from an old manuscript copy, it mistakenly retained verses from the first prologue that had been deleted as early as 1675. Our second edition of 1711, engraved on copper as a reduced score, and numerous handwritten copies – more complete but less precise rhythmically – subsequently circulated, whilst only three 18th-century working copies have survived to the present day. Thésée, the third musical tragedy by Jean-Baptiste Lully and Philippe Quinault, was the work by these two authors that enjoyed the greatest number of revivals, in Paris and at Court, from its premiere (January 1675) until its final performance at the end of the 18th century (1779). The longevity of *Thésée* is partly due to the favour in which it stood with Marie Leczinska.
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About the sale Bibliophilia (sale without a live event)
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Auction time 09/09/2026 at 1:00 PM
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