CORNEILLE (Pierre). The Theatre of P. Corneille. Reveu & corrigé par l'Autheur. Imprimé à Rouen et se vend à Paris, chez Augustin Courbé et Guillaume de Luyne, 1660. 3 volumes small in-8 cream post vellum, title and tomation handwritten on spine. I. Engraved frontispiece (cartouche borne by two loves wearing a laurel wreath, dated 1660), xc-[2]-704 pp. 8 pieces each illustrated with a full-page copper-engraved figure: Mélite, Clitandre, La Veuve, La Suivante, Place Royale, L'Illusion. II. Engraved frontispiece (cartouche borne by two loves sounding trumpets, dated 1660), cxviii-[4]-720 pp. 8 pieces each illustrated with a full-page copper-engraved figure: Le Cid, Horace, Cinna, Polyeucte, Pompée, Théodore, Le Menteur, La suite du Menteur. III. Engraved frontispiece (cartouche surmounted by a basket of flowers, dated 1660), lxxxiii-[1]-[2]-632 pp. 7 plays each illustrated with a full-page copper-engraved figure: Rodogune, Héraclius, Andromède, Don Sanche, Nicomède, Pertharite, Œdipe. In 1660 Corneille revised his theatre once again. He enlarged the format he had previously adopted, made his volumes more symmetrical, and placed at the head of each of them a "Discourse" specially written for the edition and "Examinations" in which he reviewed each of his plays. An important collective edition, the first in in-8° format and the first illustrated edition of P. Corneille's theatre, containing 3 frontispieces and 23 figures by Chauveau and Spirinx. The earliest editions have the merit of including the original Cornelian punctuation, which is less abundant than that adopted subsequently (it fragments the sentence less often and less brutally). (source notice of the previous owner). A fine copy. Ex-libris J.M. (Picot n°106.)