Oeuvres de Montesquieu.
Paris: Chez Plassan, Régent-Bernard, et Grégoire, 1796. 5 volume set, 12 1/2 inches tall. A tall and spectacular very early 19th century full morocco binding with gilt raised bands and very fine gilt tooling to the panels. An elaborate series of gilt fillets and rolls frame the boards. Gilt dentelles and all edges. With the armorial bookplate of Lt. General Thomas Graham, Lord Lynedoch (1748-1843) and that of Robert Maxtone Graham. This set is embellished with the frontispiece in the first volume, 2 folding maps and a plate in volume 3. The number of plates seems to vary with each set, but in this case no further plates were bound in. There is some foxing to the tissues and a degree of staining to the preliminaries and plates, otherwise the text block is clean with wide margins. Montesquieu was an intellectual, historian, and political philosopher, his 'Spirit of Law', quickly rose to influence political thought profoundly in Europe and America. A splendid set of this celebrated edition, in the original French.