Rare books, manuscripts and ephemera from five centuries

[ACADEMIES - FRENCH REVOLUTION]. RÉGLEMENT DE L'ACADEMIE DES SCIENCES, Agriculture, Commerce, Belles-lettres et Arts du Département de la Somme. A Amiens: [De l’Imprimerie de Fr. Caron-Berquier], An II [1793/4]. £285 

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FIRST EDITION. 8vo, pp. 16; light foxing to foot of a few leaves, not affecting text, but otherwise clean and fresh; in printed blue stitched wrappers; a very good copy. 

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A lovely copy of this set of regulations governing the Academy of Sciences, Agriculture, Commerce, Belles-lettres, and the Arts in the Somme department, established, along with the academies in the other departments, to take the place of the ancien régime academies that had were suppressed in 1793. 

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The Réglement consists of 56 short articles, establishing the arrangement of the academy (composed of 36 members, both resident and correspondent), the roles of the office-holders and the procedures for their election, the order of business for meetings, the keeping of records, the requirements of academicians (they must be of good morals, good spirit, academically fit, and at least 25 years old), and the behaviour expected of them: they should only, during assemblies, occupy themselves with academic questions, and not be diverted either by matters of politics or religion or by licentiousness or satire. Further articles set out the details of the vacation time taken by the academy, prizes offered, and the necessity of a 75 per cent vote for any change to the rules. 

The volume ends with a list of members, opening with the Protecteur, Neapoléon (sic) Bonaparte, and the Honorary Academicians (five, including Joseph Bonaparte). The academy in this form was short-lived, being refounded once again in 1799 as the Société libre d’Agriculture du département de la Somme. 

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Not in OCLC; CcFr locates no copies outside Amiens.