Select Views of the Antiquities and Harbours in the South of France;

£3,750 · Offered by Shapero Rare Books

rare in colour A lively survey of the South of France, giving special attention to the classical architecture of the cities and surrounding areas, with 12 accomplished hand-coloured views. Abbey describes its copy as uncoloured, and suggests the coloured plates are an earlier state. "Jean François Albanis Beaumont, (1755–1812), engraver and landscape painter, may have been a son of, or related to, the Piedmontese artist Claudio Francesco Beaumont (1694–1766). He was born at Chambéry, entered the engineering school at Mezières, and in 1775 joined the Sardinian army as an engineer. At this time Sardinian territory extended into what is now Provence, and Beaumont was working as a hydraulic engineer at Nice, where he met the duke of Gloucester. In 1780 the duke engaged him as a teacher of mathematics and fortifications to his children; Beaumont then accompanied the duke on his travels in the Alps. Beaumont himself made several crossings of the region, and on one occasion travelled westwards along the Mediterranean coast into French territory. A few years later he travelled through the maritime Alps from Cuneo in Italy to Nice by the newly constructed road across the pass of Lanslebourg. In the 1790s he went through the Lepontine Alps, from Lyons to Turin. Beaumont's accounts of these journeys show a lively interest in the classical history of the area. He comments on benefits he has received from the works of other scientists active in the region, such as de Saussure, de Luc, and

• Binding: Hardcover

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