AMYRAUT, Moïse.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

La vie de Francois, seigneur de La Nouë, dit Bras-de-fer. First edition of the first significant - and conspicuously scarce - biography of the "Huguenot paladin" François de La Noue (1531-1591), one of the great Protestant captains of the 16th-century Wars of Religion; an attractive copy with an appealing naval provenance.The distinguished American historian John Lothrop Motley described La Noue as "not only one of the most experienced soldiers, but one of the most accomplished writers of his age" (Motley, p. 480). At the siege of Fontenay in 1570 his left arm was shattered by a bullet and a mechanic fitted an iron limb that earned him the sobriquet of "Bras-de-fer" - "Iron Arm". He was a correspondent of Sir Philip Sidney and acknowledged by Montaigne in the Essais "for his goodness, gentleness of manner and scrupulous courtesy. He is an important figure with regard to his political and religious affiliations as well as with regard to his Discours politiques et militaires (1587)" (Heitsch, p. 134).The author Moïse Amyraut (1596-1664) was one of the leading French Protestant theologians of his day, who numbered William Penn among his many students.The book is decidedly uncommon commercially and thinly represented institutionally: Library Hub cites 10 copies in British and Irish institutional libraries (we have also located a copy at the Royal Collection); WorldCat locates no copies outside of European libraries.Provenance: armorial Elden Hall bookplate of Augustus, Viscount K

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