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An important early work on Deism: on the comparison of Indian religion and civilisation and those of the Jews and Greeks

CRÉQUINIÈRE, Sieur de la.
Conformité des coutumes des indiens orientaux, avec celles des Juifs & des autres Peuples de l'Antiquité, Par Mr. de la C.***.

With 12 full-page engraved plates by Jacobus  Harrewyn (1662-173?), 11 of which in the text, with festivities such as processions, dancers, snake charmers, and a battle scene with elephants and camels.

With 12 full-page engraved plates by Jacobus  Harrewyn (1662-173?), 11 of which in the text, with festivities such as processions, dancers, snake charmers, and a battle scene with elephants and camels.

With 12 full-page engraved plates by Jacobus  Harrewyn (1662-173?), 11 of which in the text, with festivities such as processions, dancers, snake charmers, and a battle scene with elephants and camels.

With 12 full-page engraved plates by Jacobus  Harrewyn (1662-173?), 11 of which in the text, with festivities such as processions, dancers, snake charmers, and a battle scene with elephants and camels.

With 12 full-page engraved plates by Jacobus  Harrewyn (1662-173?), 11 of which in the text, with festivities such as processions, dancers, snake charmers, and a battle scene with elephants and camels.



Brussels, George de Backer, 1704. 12mo. Contemporary publisher's boards, handwritten title on spine, uncut copy. With 12 full-page engraved plates by Jacobus  Harrewyn (1662-173?), 11 of which in the text, with festivities such as processions, dancers, snake charmers, and a battle scene with elephants and camels. (12), 252, (6) pp. (Collation: **, A-K12, L6, M4).

Rare second edition of a description of the folklore, customs and religion of the native inhabitants of India in comparison with those of the Jews and other ancient peoples by Le Sieur De la Créquinière. The work contains accounts on the river Ganges, on circumcision, metapsychosis, eating grashoppers, women's make-up and perfume, etc. At the end, on pp. 237-52, is an essay on the rules a traveller has to obey: "Reflexions sur les voyages, et sur les principales regles, que se doit prescrire un voyageur".
The even rarer first edition (we could trace only one copy) appeared a year earlier, also in Brussels with the same publisher. In our edition a double-leaf (f. *2 with the title and p. (11-12), the last 2 pages of the preface) is folded around quire **4 containing the first 8 pages of the preface; f. A1 is a cancel. A third edition was published in Amsterdam in 1735. An English translation by John Toland was published by W. Davis in London in 1705 (second edition in 1724; both editions reprinted in 1997 and 1999 (New York, Augustan reprints, 271 and 276)).

The eighteenth century French scholar, M. de la Créquiniere, travelled to India in search of religion in its 'natural' or pure form. He spent several years among 'inland peoples whose traditions had not been overtly affected by contact with outsiders' in an effort to clarify antiquity. Indeed, Crequiniere believed that the practices he observed among these people were aspects of religion in its pristine (or almost-pristine) state. Believing that the Jews, too, had remained true to their religion in its original form, Crequiniere attributed the similarities between Hinduism and Judaism to common origins.
Being the first essay of this kind towards the explaining of several difficult passages in Scripture, and some of the ancient writers, by the present Oriental  customs, it seeks to prove the universal persistence of God's revelation to the first humans, a revelation deformed but never lost amid the permutations of human beliefs. On the other hand, it is an endeavor to re-examine established dogma, wishing to discredit religious belief by demonstrating that its foundation is linked intrinsically to myth. But these differing perspectives employ the same method: the meditation on Christianity is based on a comparison between the native Indians and the people who founded western civilization, the Greek and Jewish religion and civilisation. Our book is very important as an early work on Deism and ethnography.

Fine uncut genuine copy with ownership's entry on title: 'Polier'.- (Fol. 1, which is a cancel, upper part strengthened; some minor foxing throughout).
Querard IV, 372; Cioranescu 35431.

Related Subjects: Classical Antiquity  East Indies  Folklore  India  Judaica  Religion 

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