Borel, Pierre. Tresor de recherches et antiquitez gauloises et françoises, reduites en ordre alphabetique. Et enrichies de beaucoup d'origines, epitaphes, & autres choses rares & curieuses, comme aussi de beaucoup de mots de la Langue Thyoise ou Theuthfranque. Paris, Augustin Courbé, 1655. 4°, circa 22,3 x 17 cm. 52 ff., 611 (recte 609) pp., 11 ff., with engraved vignette to title engraved vignette in text and 1 engraved initial Marbled full calf with richly gilt spine (18th century).

- Brunet I, 1112: "peu commun"; Graesse I, 495: "livre curieux"; Zaunmüller 150. A rare first edition of one of the first etymological French dictionaries, a store-house for the linguist containing numerous quotations from mediaeval sources and poetry. The work also includes two valuable biographies of alchemists: Nicolas Flamel (pages 158-166) and Michael Sendivogius (pages 474-489 followed by a letter by Des Noyers and further material on alchemists; in the additions there is a French translation of this Latin vita, pages 581-586). Pierre Borel (ca. 1620-1671) was a reputed alchemist, physician, botanist and philologist, born in Castres, Midi-Pyrénées. He is also the first bibliographer of chemistry (Bibliotheca chimica, 1654) and the first biographer of Descartes (1656).

- Some browning, title-page laid down on thin paper and with small old marginal repair without loss of text. Apparently an old owner s inscription has been removed and then added again (in the 19th cent.) in manuscript: "ex musaeo du Tilliot (sic) anno 1700" - possibly misspelling for "du Tillot", the famous politician and bibliophile. Binding with hardly visible, excellently executed repairs to corners and hinges, but still decorative.