3 volumes, folio (470 x 330 mm). Titles printed in red and black, engraved vignettes on title-pages, engraved initials and tail-pieces, engraved dedication, 276 FINE ENGRAVED PLATES, comprising two frontispieces, the 212 plates called for (29 double-page, 183 full-page) by Gerard Hoet (119), Houbraken (27), and Bernard Picart (64), engraved on copper by Duflos, Thomassin, Gouwen, Folkema, and others; and EXTRA-ILLUSTRATED WITH 62 DOUBLE-PAGE COPPERPLATE ENGRAVINGS by Johannes Luyken from Icones Biblicae Veteris et N. Testamenti. (A few plates with faint marginal dampstains, occasional minor foxing and browning to text.) Contemporary blind-stamped vellum, covers with multiple plain rule borders, central arabesque, raised bands, manuscript titles in compartments (light soiling).

FOUR MAGNIFICENT SUITES OF BIBLE ILLUSTRATIONS FROM THE EARLY 18TH CENTURY. The engravings by Hoet, Houbraken, and Picart were created between 1705 and 1720 and sold as individual prints, and the Luyken suite which extra-illustrates this text were used to illustrate the contemporaneous Covens and Morier edition of Icones Biblicae Veteris et N. Testamenti (ca 1729). Each illustration from the first three suites is accompanied by a Dutch text that discusses the context and import of the illustrated Biblical moments. The bibliography of this work does not seem to have been completely explored, and it appears that copies were issued with slight variations in both the number of plates (and, too, perhaps also the selection of plates) and in the presence of certain prelims. The present copy is superbly printed on Super-Royal paper and contains strong impressions of the plates. Suites of the plates in this book were offered on four different qualities of paper, and both Brunet and Cohen-de Ricci are in accord that Super-Royal copies such as the present produced the best impressions of the plates.
This present copy is distinctive, and possibly unique, for extra-illustrating the text with Luykens monumental double-page plates. A historically significant imprint presenting the grandest and most notable achievements in Bible illustration from the early Enlightenment period. Ebert 20371; Cohen-de Ricci 940-41.