Beschreibung:

SOUTH SEA BUBBLE Het Groote tafereel der dwaasheid, vertoonende de opkomst, voortgang en ondergang der actie, bubbel en windnegotie, in Vrankryk, Engeland, en de Nederlanden, gepleegt in den jaare MDCCXX . [Amsterdam: D. Onder de Linden], 1720 [?but later, cf. Kress]. 2° (450 x 267mm). Title printed in red and black. Engraved 'Register' of the plates. 74 engraved plates and maps, 46 double-page and 15 folding, some with letterpress text, 2 plates neatly dissected and bound in as 4 separate plates. Extra-illustrated with one plate bound in, 4 loosely-inserted duplicate plates, one coloured by an early hand, and 6 loosely-inserted plates from other works. (Occasional light spotting or browning, a few plates misbound, one plate with printing flaw caused by creasing, small hole in another, 3 plates with minor tears, 2 neatly reinforced on versos, one loosely-inserted plate dissected and laid down.) Contemporary Dutch half calf over speckled-paper covered boards, the spine gilt in compartments, gilt leather lettering-piece (lightly rubbed and scuffed, spine neatly repaired at head and tail). FIRST EDITION OF THIS CELEBRATED SATIRICAL WORK ABOUT THE 'MISSISSIPPI BUBBLE' AND ITS INSTIGATORS JOHN LAW AND ANTOINE CROZAT. 'This great Theatre of Folly, representing the origin, progress, and downfall of the South Sea Bubble in France, England, and Holland, is an exceedingly curious collection of emblematical plates and caricatures on the scheme of J. Law [whose portrait appears as the third plate] and the Mississippi Company [between 1718 and 1720] and the imitations of it in Holland, with fatal results. Not a few of the scenes here depicted have been reproduced in the New York Exchange. The engravings, which illustrate the rise and fall of the great speculation, are full of humor; many of them are exceedingly ludicrous, and some very obscene. They are finely engraved on copper, and are accompanied with full descriptions in prose and poetry' (Sabin). The present copy contains the full complement of 74 plates called for by the 'Register'; Sabin notes the number of plates can vary from 60 to 74 (although the Kress copy contains 85 plates). Goldsmiths' 5879; Kress 3217 ('there are various reasons for believing that the actual date of first publication was later than 1720'); Sabin 28932.