Histoire et monuments des emaux byzantins.

"A masterpiece of the Russian printing industry"

First and limited edition, number 24 of 200 copies printed in French; a very fine copy of this lavish and sumptuously illustrated celebration of the Zwenigorodskoi collection of Byzantine enamels, "one of the most luxurious publications of the 19th-century" (Federov, pp. 200-1). The portrait frontispiece, included only in those copies given by the collector to a select few, is present.

The wealthy Russian art patron Alexander Zwenigorodskoi spent most of his life assembling a spectacular collection of early medieval Byzantine enamels from the 10th and 11th centuries. For the publication of his masterwork he hired expert illustrators and worked with renowned Russian art historian Kondakov to produce a superlative work, intended to rival Napoleon's L'Imitation de Jésus-Christ (Paris, 1855). "This book is undoubtedly a masterpiece of the Russian printing industry. It has no equals either in terms of workmanship or in terms of the funds involved (it cost 120,000 roubles in gold approximately 200,000 by the exchange rate for 1892)" (Vengerov). Zwenigorodskoi's collection was subsequently purchased by J. P. Morgan in 1910, who donated them to the Metropolitan Museum, New York.

There were 600 copies printed of the Histoire, 200 each in Russian, French, and German, all of which were designated for presentation rather than sale. The presence of the portrait frontispiece of Zwenigorodskoi was "a special mark of favour which identified his friends or individuals whom he held in particular esteem" (Boeck, unpaginated).