Histoire Philosophique et Politique, Anonymous (Diederot). Amsterdam 1770 - Very 1st Ed. 4/6 Vols.

Highly collectable & extremely rare: Histoire Philosophique et Politique; Des eatbilissemens & du commerce des Europeans dans les deus Indes. Published anonymously in Amsterdam 1770 - Very 1st Ed. 4 Vols (2, 4, 5, 6) out of 6. Attributed to Guillaume Thomas Francis Raynal. 

In 1770, Raynal published the first edition of his Histoire philosophique et politique... In this effort, he had the assistance of various members of the philosophe côteriesindeed, Denis Diderot is credited with a third of this work. The other chief collaborators were Pechméja, Holbach, Paulze, the farmer-general of taxes, the Abbé Martin, and Alexandre Deleyre. Banned in 1772, a new edition was published by Raynal in 1774, which was immediately placed on the index of banned books by the Roman Catholic church. 

Raynal's work was banned since it was first distributed in France. Its sale was forbidden by royal decree on December 19, 1772, and it was listed in the Index as of August 29, 1774 (Aquarone, 1972, p.88). The persecution of its author began in 1780 when the revised and expanded edition published that year bore Raynal's name and portrait. On May 19, 1781, the Paris Parliament issued a decree banning the work and ordering Raynal's arrest. He decided to go into exile, initially in Prussia,9 only returning to France in 1787, initially on condition that he did not live in Paris. The French Revolution rehabilitated him, and was summoned to appear before the National Assembly in January 1790, but the letter he wrote the following year condemning the movement once again put him in the position of a renegade. He died on March 6, 1796 (Israel, 2011, p.442; Aquarone, 1972, p.90).

Available are four volumes (2,4,5 and 6). 251 years old. Some staining etc as per usual for such an old book. Bindings all good, no loose pages.

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