Dubroca

1806 · 7234 — Mexico City: Juan López Cancelada en la oficina de Mariano de Zuniga y Ontiveros 1806. First Mexican edition and first with the plates. Quarto 20.5 x 14.8 cm pp 4 1-10 1-18 2 19-106 with frontispiece and nine engraved plates. The plates are by Jose Simon de Larrea and Manuel Lopez Lopez and consist of portraits of the leaders of this famous slave revolt and some scenes of the atrocities committed. The rebellion against French rule in Haiti St. Domingue is painted in the worst light part of the French propaganda about this revolt but the facts were indeed grim. Jean-Jacques Dessalines fought alongside L'Ouverture for HaitiÂ’s freedom became the first emperor of the new nation: his bloodthirsty ways were notorious even in his time. The engravers depict their subjects as virtual caricatures of themselves with overly large lips and noses and bulging eyes and engaging in brutal atrocities while the whites are shone in the most humane forms. The plates are unique to this edition and appear nowhere else and have a nightmarish quality. Emperor Maximilian owned a copy of this book. Dubroca the author wrote an equally disparaging life of Toussaint L'Ouverture. The publisher Juan López Cancelada was a Spanish-born emigrant who became a well-known polemicist and political agitator in Mexico: he may well have published this book as a warning about what could happen in Mexico with its huge "caste" population. Binding is contemporary full Mexican tree calf with leather spine label spine gilt marbled endpapers sprinkled edges. The final leaf of text has some old repairs. Very good copy. <br/><br/> Juan López Cancelada en la oficina de Mariano de Zuniga y Ontiveros hardcover books