NAPOLEON BOANAPARTE (1769-1821) The 'Little Corporal' whose brilliance in the field of battle and as Emperor of France has made him perhaps the most important figure of post-Renaissance Europe. Very rare book once belonging to Bonaparte: 'Arabesques Mythologiques, ou les Attributs de Touts les Divinites de la Fable' by Madame de Genlis (Paris: Chez Charles Barrois, Libraire), 1810. First edition, 166pp. 8vo., with 54 hand-colored plates. A remarkable, ingenious, and beautiful book by the famous pedagogue Genlis, who created these beautiful drawings herself as a means of instructing the young in mythology. Each plate represents the attributes of a deity with symbolically encircling the name -- and the names are mirrored symmetrically. 'Their names, always doubled for symmetry, are written in such a way as to make it impossible for a child to read them as seen 'normally'; so he'll be forced to guess its identity by the attributes, and once he has named the deities, the image is turned in the direction of the writing, to read the name.' The book is lavishly bound in red leather with gilt title on the spine and gilt trim, and with Bonaparte's very large weapons imperial coat of arms embossed on the front cover. Pencil note of provenance on the verso of the front flyleaf reads: 'aux grandes armes[?] de Napoleon 1iere Olivier 2652'. Fine condition. From the personal collection of one of the world's largest private collections devoted to the French Revolution and Napoleon I, as well as the First and Second World Wars.