[DALVIMART, Octavien or d'ALVIMAR(T)]. CLARK. - Lot 55

[DALVIMART, Octavien or d'ALVIMAR(T)]. CLARK. The Military Costume of Turkey illustrated in a series of engravings from drawings made on the spot... London, published by Tho(mas) Mc Lean, January 1, 1818. Small folio (ca 36 x 26 cm). 4 ff. (engraved title, title, table), VIII-(30) pp. 30 black aquatints finely watercolored in contemporary style (including frontispiece). Contemporary English green morocco, spine with 4 faux nerfs decorated with gilt roulette and gilt fillet, gilt title, triple gilt and cold fillet and roulette framing the boards, gilt roulette on the endpapers, gilt edges (spine faded, binding slightly rubbed with discreet stains on the boards, freckles, leaves very slightly oxidized). Exceptional engraved suite, complete with plates, in its contemporary binding. First edition in this form. Drawn from life in 1798 by d'Alvimar, then engraved in aquatint by John Clark (very discreet signature engraved at the foot of each figure), this suite features a full-length portrait of the Greek Antonaki Ramadani Enfendi, Turkish ambassador, who is said to have posed in London for this portrait, as frontispiece, an engraved title page with a large vignette depicting the Grand Vizier on horseback at the head of his marching army, a title page, a dedication, a preface, a table of plates, and each plate accompanied by a text explaining the rank, role and uniform details of the figure, by William Miller. An artist's copy, the only one with the engravings retouched by d'Alvimar himself. With a handwritten note pasted to the first endpaper. "This work, of which I am the author, had first appeared on my return from Egypt with my other costumes from Turkey. I do not know why the bookseller Mac Lean made this new edition, from which he removed my name"; "I bought this copy in London in 1837 during my last stay in England; and, on my return to Paris, I retouched the engravings...". Often cited under the name of Wageman, this suite is the work of d'Alvimar and allows us to specify here that this 1818 Mc Lean edition is both a reprint, since the figures appeared with Miller within his 1802 suite of plates, and the first edition in this form, dedicated to Antonaki Ramadani, "Minister Plenipotentiary of the Ottoman Porte to the Court of London". Publisher's note to the reader informing that he has acquired all costume book plates previously published by Miller. Gaëtan-Octavien Souchet d'Alvimart (1770-1854), sometimes known as Souchet as a military man, was an atypical figure of the late 18th century, at once a military man close to Napoleon Bonaparte, with whom he was at Brienne and with whom he fought, an artist, a writer and a traveling adventurer. Colas, 2059. Abbey Travel II, 373. Blackmer, 1125. Hage Chahine, 3211. [Turkey]. [Costumes - Militaria].