[India] Les Hindous, ou description de leurs Moeurs, coutumes, Cérémonies, etc.

Dessinés d'apres nature dans Le Bengale, et représentés en 252 planches par F. Balthazard Solvyns, Paris, 1808. Folio, half leather, pasted title. Text in French and English on unnumbered pages; with 49 copperplates, 7 of which double-page, all beautifully hand-coloured. This is the first of 4 volumes.

The work appeared in separate issues, without title page. Here, the cover of one of the issues serves as title page. Solvyns's Hindous depicts a remarkable portrait of life in Bengal at the end of the 18th century in a beautiful series of engravings, printed under supervision of the willful author and shows the manners and customs, professions, feasts and scenes from daily life of the Bengal people. Artistically, the work was a huge success, but financially a disaster. Rare.