[Manuscript - ARBORICULTURE]. DORSAN, M. (Jean-Baptiste III - Lot 51

Lot 51
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[Manuscript - ARBORICULTURE]. DORSAN, M. (Jean-Baptiste III - Lot 51
[Manuscript - ARBORICULTURE]. DORSAN, M. (Jean-Baptiste III d'Orsan?). Abrégé de la culture des arbres fruitiers tiré de plusieurs auteurs et de l'expérience, Charmailles, 15 mars 1722. In-8, 74-(6) pages. Contemporary speckled basane, spine ribbed (rather modest binding). Corners dulled, spine a little rubbed at foot; first and last leaves a little soiled and foxed; small angular lack to title, without affecting the text; a few small marginal wormholes. A very interesting unpublished manuscript which makes the link with the botanical garden of Marnoz, in the Jura (16th century garden); it is an unpublished treatise on the cultivation of fruit trees from the beginning of the 18th century (1722). However, it was in Franche-Comté that the very first botanical gardens were created in the 16th century, "successively in Marnoz (Jura), Besançon (Doubs) and Montbéliard, then in Etupes (Doubs) and Porrentruy (Swiss Jura)" (see Bernard Millet. " Les jardins botaniques francs-comtois ", Les Nouvelles Archives de la Flore jurassienne, n° 4, 2006, p. 43-48). A handwritten bookplate on the first leaf informs us that "This book belongs to Mr. Dorsan who copied it on the one of the late Mr. De Gilley, very skilful in his time for the knowledge of trees. A Charmailles, 25 aoust 1722. The table is dated March 15 of the same year. There is a very old D'Orsan (or D'Orsans) family, originally from Franche-Comté, which owned by marriage in the 18th century one of the two secular fiefs of Charmoilles, a village in the province of Champagne under the Ancien Régime. The spelling of this village having undergone many variations in the course of history, from Charmoille to Chermoilles, passing through Charmailles and Charmeilles, it is probable that the address of this manuscript is indeed Charmoilles. According to the date of writing of this manuscript, the member of the d'Orsan(s) family who could be the author would be Jean-Baptiste III d'Orsan(s) (1696-1737), lord of Roset (cf. Léon Viellard, "Notes généalogiques sur la Maison d'Orsans", Mémoires de la Société d'émulation du Doubs, 5e série, vol. II, 1877, pp. 247-275). The author states that he copied this manuscript "on the manuscript of the late Monsieur De Gilley". Now Jean de Gilley had established in Marnoz in the middle of the 16th century one of the first botanical gardens in Europe. Jean de Gilley was a baron of the Holy Roman Empire and of Franquemont, historian, poet and naturalist. This garden, which has now disappeared, was often visited by the great botanists Jean and Gaspard Bauhin, a friend of Jean de Gilley (see Bernard Millet). We have not found any work on arboriculture published under the name of Gilley. But perhaps "Monsieur Dorsan" had in his hands and copied an unpublished manuscript written by Jean de Gilley or another member of his family, "very skilled in his time for the knowledge of trees".
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