Jan 29, 2015 | Videos
First edition, first impression, published on 6 July 1861, one of 1,000 copies thus. The first edition was divided into five impressions, with distinct title pages labelling them as five editions, perhaps to imply rapid sales. The modern bibliographical authority is generally agreed to be the table given in Appendix D to the Clarendon edition, 1993, based on line-by-line collation of six 1861 copies, with additional spot checks from other copies, in which Margaret Caldwell agrees with the traditional conclusion that the same setting of type was used for all five impressions: “there is no warrant for treating the five impressions as distinct editions” (p. 491). However, she deduces that the impressions were sequential and that minor corrections and gradual deterioration of type can be shown across the five impressions. This copy has the great majority of Caldwell’s points for the first impression,
This item is now sold, but you can view all of our catalogued works by Dickens by clicking here.
Jan 29, 2015 | Videos
First complete collected edition of Dostoevsky’s works, preceded only by two partial editions published during his lifetime, in 1860 (2 volumes) and 1865–70 (4 volumes). The present edition, begun the year after Dostoevsky’s death, was edited by Orent Miller and Nikolai Strakhov, and its text served as the standard for a number of subsequent editions.
All our catalogued works by Fyodor Dostoevsky can be viewed online here.
Jan 29, 2015 | Videos
The rare first edition of the first book with coloured plates to include American birds.
Bird books were popular in eighteenth century England, both as works of scholarship and as splendid collectables for the libraries of wealthy connoisseurs. The naturalist Mark Catesby (1683-1749) born in Essex, produced one of the most lavish of these with this magnificent work, the result of a series of voyages to North America.
Though this item is now sold, all our catalogued works on natural history can be viewed online here.
Jan 29, 2015 | Videos
… Leviathan, or the Matter, Forme, & Power of a Common-wealth Ecclesiastical and Civill.
True first edition of one of the foundation works in the field of political theory, with the winged head ornament on the title-leaf. There are three editions with title-pages bearing 1651 imprints. The second, with a bear ornament, was printed outside England (probably at Amsterdam), and the third, with a triangular type ornament, is generally considered to date from c.1680.
Though this item is now sold, all our catalogued works by Thomas Hobbes can be viewed online here.
Jan 29, 2015 | Videos
First edition of this famous treatise on how the perfect house should be built, furnished and run. Organised as a thematic dictionary, it contains separate sections devoted to different parts of the house, including the kitchen, library, aviary, stable, and nursery, and moves on to more general discussion, elucidating terms relating to construction, gardening, and the domestic arts.
All our catalogued works on architecture can be viewed here.
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