The Club Fortsas was founded in Paris in late 1840 by nine bibliophiles from Paris, Ghent, Brussels, Liège, and London, on their return from a now infamous iter to Binche, Belgium in search of volumes from the renowned collection of the Comte de Fortsas, each book said to exist in only a single exemplaire. The founding members were:
- MM. Brunet, Crozet, de Noortdonckt, Duplessis, Nodier, et de Chênedollé
- M. le Baron de Reiffeberg
- M. le Marquis de Château-Gison
- Sir Phillips de Middlehill
The purpose of the Club was, formally, to console and sustain the spirits of the members of said society in the wake of any further bibliophilic debacles, and to celebrate the successes of any such enterprise in the future.
Since that time, the Club has grown into one of the oldest and most respected bibliophilic societies in the world, mounting outstanding exhibitions, lectures and symposia. The Club was named for Jean Népomucène Auguste Pichard, Comte de Fortsas, the legendary collector of singular books. The club membership, limited to seventy, includes men (and, since 1949, women) whose interests extend through the most distant and unusual avenues of the bibliophilic world.
The Clubhouse, an historic Haussmannian edifice, 145 rue la Fayette, Paris 10, has been home to the Fortsas since 1868, when it was moved from its original location in the rue Roy in the eighth arrondissement.
In spite of its restricted membership, the Club maintains, in addition to its great exhibition hall, a library, a famous dining room, and five bedrooms to receive the visits of out-of-town members.
The library of the Club Fortsas contains a wide-ranging collection about collecting and collectors, but its ancient core consists of the original library of the Comte de Fortsas, purchased in 1858 from the Bibliothèque Communitaire de Binche through the generosity of M. le Prince de Brocéliande, and installed in the old clubhouse, rue Roy, in the following year.