Mémoire sur les ouvrages de terres cuites et particulièrement sur…

8vo (210 × 120 mm), pp. 95, [1]. Uncut, stitched in original blue wrappers. Slightly dusty, cords lightly loose, but a very good, unsophisticated copy.

First edition of an influential pamphlet by a well-known French ceramicist, considering contemporary pottery from a hygenic point of view, and recommending his own newly-developed ‘hygiocerames’. Surveying the existing methods of production and glazing, he identifies numerous health risks in underfired pottery and in glazes using metal oxides. Wedgwood’s Etrurian pottery and his hugely-successful white Queen’s Ware come in for particular censure, though its popularity is conceded. The pamphlet was part of major enquiry into ceramic production in France initiated by the Sèvres factories.