Rare first edition of a treatise on descriptive geometry, perspective, and the mechanism of vision, complete with the atlas volume. The work is dedictated to Gaspar Monge (1746-1818), the inventor of descriptive geometry, and is the first to adapt his ideas for artists. It explains how to use descriptive geometry to draw perspective, projections, and shadows, without the help of mathematical analysis. The concepts are illustrated in the atlas volume on 60 engraved plates.
Louis Léger Vallée (1784-1864) was a student of Monge at the École Polytechnique and engineer of the Ponts et Chaussées at Paris. He continued Monge's teachings and presented the present work to the Académie Royale des Sciences. His work, and especially his set of plates was approved by the Royal Academy, and the report, signed among others by Arago, the accepted authority on the subject within the Academy, is added to the preliminaries. It explains that "experience had led early on to the methods by which architects, stonemasons, and carpenters construct their drawings; but these methods have only recently been codified into a body of doctrine and freed from all empiricism. This is thanks to Mr. Monge." Monge's classes were nevertheless unsatisfactory for artists unfamiliar with mathematical methods, and the present work seeks to remedy this deficiency, notably through the use of perfectly drawn plates offering "in the smallest detail, all the constructions that must be executed to arrive at the final solution."
With the bookplate of the "Bibliothèque de l'École Régimentaire du Génie" mounted on the front pastedown of both volumes, the library stamp of the "Ecole des Mineurs et Sapeurs. Corps Royal du Genie" of Metz on the title page of both volumes and in the lower outer corner of all the plates, 2 later stamps of the "Kaiserliche Fortification zu Metz" on the first flyleaves of both volumes, an annotation ("Mit titelbild") and number ("568") on the title page of the text volume. The boards are somewhat rubbed, the lower outer corner of the front board of the text volume is bumped. The leaves and plates are lightly foxed. Otherwise in good condition. Poggendorff II, 1168; Vagnetti FIb31; cf. Kemp, p. 231.