HÉMART, Caroline, owner. ~ Chronologie. [France, early nineteenth-century, probably before 1815].
Manuscript, 4to (205 × 156 mm), pp. [123], including title, plus numerous blanks at rear. Text in French in a small but legible hand throughout. The calligraphic title with some ink corrosion. Contemporary red half morocco, gilt panelled spine, sides with red straight grained paper, upper cover lettered with the owner’s name in gilt. Rubbed, but very attractive.
A Napeoleonic-era manuscript course in classical and modern French history made for a woman or girl, Caroline Hémart. Probably prepared by a tutor, the texts are enthusiastically neo-classical in tone: the opening ‘Élements de chronologie’ serve as a grounding in ancient history (with definitions of terms such as ‘Olympiade’) of Europe and the near East, based on the text of Napoleonic scholar, Luc de Lancival. The manuscript concludes with 27 stanzas of a heroic poem, ‘Ode à Clio’ by M. Le Comte François de Neufchateau (published c. 1807), which is, again, a glorious version of history seen through still-rosy Napoleonic lenses.