Egypt.- Description de l'Egypte, ou Recueil des observations et des recherches qui ont été faites en Egypte pendant l'expédition de l'armée française, 38 vol. (24 text vol. in 26 and 12 plate vol.), second edition, 1 plate vol. with hand-coloured frontispiece, another with engraved title and portrait of Louis XVIII, 967 engraved plates, many folding or double page, a few folding with small tears at central folds, some foxing to plate margins but generally outside plate mark, contemporary quarter morocco, some wear to spines including small tears and chips at ends, [c.f. for first edition; Atabey 343; Blackmer 476; Hilmy I, pp 239-245] 8vo and elephant folio (670 x 540mm.), Paris, C.L.F. Panckoucke, 1821-30.

⁂ The rare "Panckoucke" edition, complete with all plates. This monumental work was the fruit of the scholarly enterprise envisioned by Napoleon during his invasion into Egypt in the late 1790s. Over 160 scholars and scientists, known as the "savants", accompanied the French army - including figures like Monge, Berthollet, Fourier, Geoffroy-Saint-Hilaire, Redoute, and Savigny - their aim being to produce the first ever scientific survey of Egyptian antiquities, culture, language, natural history, geography, ethnography etc. Defeated by the British and forced to relinquish the expedition's physical bounty, famously including the Rosetta stone, the French nonetheless negotiated to retain their scholarly notes. More than a decade later of careful collaboration, these notes emerged as this landmark collection. Not only arguably one of the most beautiful plate books of the nineteenth century, Le Description de l'Egypte established a new academic discipline, becoming the foundational work of Egyptology, and similarly sparked the vibrant wave of Egyptomania across Europe. The first edition appeared beginning in 1809, and this second edition, produced by the Charles Louis Fleury Panckoucke, was begun nearly before the first was completed, reproducing the plates of the first in full, without the hand colouring. This copy includes the hand-coloured frontispiece often missing.

The plate volumes comprise: (i) Antiquities, 5 vol. [hand-coloured frontispiece, 3 additional engraved plates ("Medailles trouvees en Syrie," "Tableau synoptique des constellations" Plate A, "Produits de la machine a graver"), 16 numbered engraved plates of the Rosetta Stone (on 8 sheets), 419 numbered engraved plates, plate 103 of Etat Moderne (misbound)]; (ii) Etat Moderne, 2 vol. [1 additional engraved plate ("Canevas trigonometrique du Kaire/d'Alexandrie"), 169 numbered engraved plates (see above, plate 103 bound in Antiquities V)]; (iii) Histoire Naturelle, 3 vol. [244 engraved numbered or lettered plates]; (iv) Atlas Geographique (spine title) [52 engraved maps and plates]; (v) Grande Atlas [engraved title, featuring portrait of Louis XVIII, 63 oversized plates].