Thomas Jefferson was arguably the greatest of all American book collectors. His first collection became the nucleus of the Library of Congress, after the original was destroyed by fire. But after selling his library to Congress, he found that he could not be without his books—so he set about building another library from scratch. He devoured books, recommended them to friends and colleagues zealously, and “spared no pains, opportunity, or expense” to acquire more. According to Arthur Bestor, his collections and his painstaking organization of them form “a blueprint of his own mind.”
We are pleased to offer Jefferson’s very own eight-volume set of the Duc of Sully’s Memoires, a fascinating work penned by a key advisor to King Henry IV that was “usually included in Jefferson’s lists of recommended historical reading” (Sowerby). It was Jefferson’s unique custom to write his ownership initials in among a book’s pages—as he has done in each of these eight volumes. Books from Jefferson’s personal collection are exceptionally scarce on the market. To find such a set of books that he thought of so highly is rare indeed.