Item #108 Traicté du Chasteau ou Demeures de l’âme. Teresa of Ávila.
Traicté du Chasteau ou Demeures de l’âme
Traicté du Chasteau ou Demeures de l’âme
Traicté du Chasteau ou Demeures de l’âme

Traicté du Chasteau ou Demeures de l’âme

Publisher: Paris: Guillaume de la Noue, Rue Saint Jacques, à l’enseigne du nom de Jesus, 1601.

Illustration: ngraved allegorical title-page showing Teresa of Ávila with IHS device and symbolic figures.

Edition: Early French edition (Paris, Guillaume de la Noue, 1601).

Binding: Contemporary limp vellum with manuscript spine title; vellum wrinkled and stained, as typical.

Description: An important early French edition (1601) of St. Teresa of Ávila’s Interior Castle (El Castillo Interior), one of the greatest works of Catholic mysticism. Composed in 1577, Teresa’s Interior Castle describes the soul’s journey toward God as a progression through “mansions” within a mystical castle, guided by prayer and contemplation. It became the central text of Discalced Carmelite spirituality and one of the masterpieces of Christian mystical literature.

This French translation, printed in Paris by Guillaume de la Noue in 1601, is among the earliest versions to bring Teresa’s visionary theology to a wider European readership beyond Spain. It is enhanced by an elaborate engraved allegorical title page, depicting Teresa flanked by personifications of prayer and silence, with the IHS emblem radiant at the center.
The book is preserved in contemporary limp vellum, with manuscript titling on the spine. An early ownership inscription, “J. Jacques Menant”, appears on the engraved title — an appealing provenance linking the copy to a 17th-century French reader of mystical works. Internally, the text is clean and legible, with occasional annotations in the margins.
Teresa of Ávila was canonized in 1622 and declared a Doctor of the Church in 1970 — one of the few women to hold that title. Her Interior Castle remains her most celebrated work. Copies of this 1601 Paris edition are scarce in commerce and highly desirable for collectors of Christian mysticism, Counter-Reformation spirituality, and women authors of the Renaissance.

Condition: Vellum binding wrinkled and soiled, with signs of age but structurally sound; engraved title page with ownership inscription; text block clean with minor marginal notes; overall very good for a devotional book of this era.

Annotation: Early ownership inscription “J. Jacques Menant” on engraved title page; contemporary limp vellum binding with manuscript spine title.

Item #108

Price: $1,350.00

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