639. POUQUEVILLE (François-Charles). Voyage de la Grèce. Paris, chez Firmin Didot, 1826-1827, 6 vol. in-8, raspberry calf, ribbed spine decorated with gilt roulettres and cold fleurons, cold roulette framing the boards, large central cold fleuron, interior roulette and on the edges, gilt edges (period binding). "Second edition revised, corrected and enlarged. 36 plates, often folded, 9 engraved maps and plans and 27 lithographs of costumes, views and epigraphs. Very rare copies include 2 large maps of Greece not shown here. The first appeared in 1820, under a longer title. "This work contains well-treated sections, exact descriptions and useful statistical insights" (Quérard). It was a great success in the context of the dramatic circumstances in Greece. The son of the Pasha of Egypt had just reconquered Morea, and the citadel of Missolonghi was being blown up rather than surrendered to the Turks. The French public was taking up the cause of the Greeks; taking an interest in Homer's homeland was no longer just a matter of tourism, but also an impulse to defend patriotism. Following on from Baron de Beaujour's Tableau du commerce de la Grèce (1800) and Colonel Leake's Researches in Greece (1814), Pouqueville (1770-1838), a former physician on the Egyptian expedition and then Consul General in Jannina, combines his own research with that of the most accredited travelers. In-text tables (itineraries, population, agricultural and industrial products, merchant marine) and several lists of terminology (botanical, entomological or ornithological) reflect the seriousness of his information. In addition to the maps - without the two-part map of modern Greece, which is missing - the illustrations include 27 lithographed plates by Motte or Engelmann, including several costumes - some after the painter Louis Dupré - 2 plates of epigraphy and views. The latter, often folding, were engraved, with two exceptions - the Antre de Trophonius and the Propylaea of Athens - from drawings by Mlle Robineau, a pupil of the painter Jean-Baptiste Regnault. A very fine copy. Some foxing.