Antique folios presented in Mir Castle
Visitors to the Mir Castle can enjoy a wonderful opportunity to get acquainted with unique book rarities
An exhibition from Vitaly Kornev’s private collection – Treasures of One Library – is on show at the castle, featuring antique folios printed in French in Paris. These include three volumes of The Modern Popular History of France of 1864-1865, with 1,040 engravings, of which 17 were made by Gustave Dore — the most famous French engraver and painter of the 19th century. Dore illustrated Byron's poems, Rabelais' Gargantua and Pantagruel novel, Balzac's Mischievous Stories, also making engravings for Dante's Divine Comedy, Milton's Paradise Lost and other works.
Visitors to the exhibition will also get acquainted with six volumes of Louis Moreri's Great Historical Dictionary, or Entertaining Mixture of Spiritual and Secular Events of 1725. This book once enjoyed Europe-wide popularity due to its interesting historical and biographical articles.
Among other valuable exhibits are Plutarch’s two volumes of Biographies of Ancient Greek and Roman Great Men of 1558 and two volumes of Complete Works published in the year of St. Bartholomew's Night by the Archbishop of Paris and dedicated to King Charles IX of France. The Archbishop's handwritten notes are still seen on the book margins.
The unique book treasures are available for public until November 8th.
