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Tag Archives: engravings

Book of the Week — Home Thoughts from Abroad

29 Monday Apr 2019

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Albion press, Arab treadle platen, Basingwerk parchment, Beetham, Bodoni roman, Christian Barnes, Cumbria, engravings, Robert Browning, Simon King Press, woodcuts


And after April, when May follows,
And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!
Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the hedge
Leans to the field and scatters on the clover
Blossoms and dewdrops—at the bent spray’s edge—
That’s the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!
And though the fields look rough with hoary dew,
All will be gay when noontide wakes anew
The buttercups, the little children’s dower
Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!

Home Thoughts from Abroad
Robert Browning (1812-1889)
Beetham, Cumbria: Simon King Press, 1984

Simon King opened his press in 1981 with an Arab treadle platen and two Albion presses. One of his first projects was a series of single poems, illustrated with his own woodcuts. Edition of 250 numbered copies. Rare Books copy is no. 91.

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A Recipe for Disaster

12 Tuesday Jun 2018

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Abraham Lincoln, Arctic, Arctic expeditions, Arthur Conan Doyle, bones, botany, British, British Isles, Brontë sisters, Canada, cannibalism, Captain William Parry, Charles Dickens, Coppermine River, Dante, deer, diarrhea, Dr. John Richardson, Edgar Allan Poe, Elisha Kent Kane, England, engravings, Esquimaux, exhaustion, explorers, exposure, Fort Enterprise, Frankenstein, fungus, geology, ichthyology, Inuit, Jane Austen, John Murray, Jules Verne, Junius, lead poisoning, lichen, literature, London, Lyuba Basin, Mary Shelley, Melville Sound, moosehide, Murder, national identity, naval prowess, nineteenth century, nineteenth-century polar fiction, North America, Northwest Passage, notebooks, Nunavut Territory, overland exploration, partridge, pemmican, polar expeditions, poles, racial prejudice, rare book collections, rare books, rations, rock tripe, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, scurvy, Sir John Franklin, Slave Lake, soup, starvation, tin cans, tripe de roche, Wilkie Collins, willows, winter

“At two P.M we set sail, and the men voluntarily launched out to make a traverse of fifteen miles across Melville Sound, before a strong wind and heavy sea. The privation of food, under which our voyagers were then laboring, absorbed every other terror; otherwise the most powerful persuasion could not have induced them to attempt such a traverse. It was with the utmost difficulty that the canoes were kept from turning their broadsides to the waves, though we sometimes steered with all the paddles.”


And now there came both mist and snow,
And it grew wondrous cold:
And ice, mast-high, came floating by,
As green as emerald.

And through the drifts the snowy clifts
Did send a dismal sheen:
Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken—
The ice was all between.

The ice was here, the ice was there,
The ice was all around:
It cracked and growled, and roared and howled,
Like noises in a swound!

  • “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”, Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea …
John Franklin (1786 – 1847)
London: J. Murray, 1823
First edition
G650 1819 F8

Throughout the shelves of the rare book collections, there are glimpses of a body of literature that remains largely overlooked: nineteenth-century polar fiction. Have you heard of it?

If you have ever read the works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Edgar Allan Poe, Jules Verne, Wilkie Collins, Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, the Brontë sisters, Arthur Conan Doyle or Mary Shelley (among many others), you might have glimpsed the brooding nature of the poles, where men become violent and mad, and the true horrors of humanity are displayed. As in Shelley’s Frankenstein; or, the Modern Prometheus, framing the stories in the Arctic allowed the writers to explore the themes of the dangerous pursuit of knowledge and the sublime, in addition to developing haunting allusions of Dante’s frozen inner circle of hell.

“We encamped at seven and enjoyed a substantial meal. The party were in good spirits this evening at the recollection of having crossed the rapid, and being in possession of provision for the next day. Besides we had taken the precaution of bringing away the skin of the deer to eat when the meat should fail. The temperature at six P.M. was 30.”

During the nineteenth century, polar expeditions and the search for a Northwest Passage enticed the people of England to the point that people sang polar-themed songs, had polar-themed dinner parties and even staged polar expedition reenactments, and read every single piece of polar-themed literature they could find. The uncharted territory and theories of the mysterious open, polar seas also provided England yet another opportunity to show off their naval prowess and further exert their national identity upon the world.

“My original intention, whenever the season should compel us to relinquish the survey, had been to return by the way of the Copper-mine River, and in pursuance of my arrangement with the Hook to travel to Slave Lake through the line of woods extending thither by the Great Bear and Marten Lakes, but our scanty stock of provision and the length of the voyage rendered it necessary to make for a nearer place.”

The explorers who were successful returned to the British Isles with stories of their adventures and went on to publish narratives of their journeys. In 1821, Captain William Parry published a best-selling account of that voyage which propelled him on a book tour, while Elisha Kent Kane’s 1856 Arctic Explorations sold 200,000 copies, which would be the equivalent of two million books today. When Kane died, his funeral procession was the second largest of the nineteenth century, following closely behind Abraham Lincoln.

“The reader will, probably, be desirous to know how we passed our time in such a comfortless situation: the first operation after encamping was to thaw our frozen shoes, if a sufficient fire could be made, and dry ones were put on; each person then wrote his notes of the daily occurrences, and evening prayers were read; as soon as supper was prepared it was eaten, generally in the dark, and we went to bed, and kept up a cheerful conversation until our blankets were thawed by the heat of our bodies and we had gathered sufficient warmth to enable us to fall asleep.”

Of all the Arctic expeditions, Sir John Franklin’s 1845 journey was, without a doubt, the most famous, due to the loss of 128 crew members and their two ships, the Erebus and the Terror. It took more than one hundred years to solve the mystery behind this fateful voyage, and once the ships were found, artifacts and skeletal remains proved the rumors of cannibalism that had been circulating since Captain Franklin and his crew originally went missing. Researchers have speculated that the ships were trapped in ice and that the men aboard likely died from a combination of scurvy, starvation, exposure and lead poisoning from the poorly soldered tin cans which held their rations for three years.

“We had already found that the country, between Cape Barrow and the Copper-mine River, would not supply our wants, and this it seemed probable would now be still more the case; besides, at this advanced season, we expected the frequent recurrence of gales, which would cause great detention, if not danger in proceeding along that very rocky part of the coast.”

Over the course of the century Franklin’s crew was among many that had perished. However, it is important to note that this area was home to the Inuit, or Esquimaux, as they are described in the journals: generations of people who have lived and thrived in the Arctic, raising children, hunting, and tending to their elderly. Unfortunately, racial prejudice of the colonial powers restrained the British explorers from imitating and learning the indigenous ways of traveling, hunting, eating and staying warm.

“Their spirits immediately revived, each of them shook the officers cordially by the hand, and declared they now considered the worst of their difficulties over, as they did not doubt of reaching Fort Enterprise in a few days, even in their feeble condition. We had indeed every reason to be grateful, and our joy would have been complete were it not mingled with sincere regret at the separation of our poor Esquimaux, the faithful Junius.”

Franklin first explored the Arctic in a series of three expeditions between 1819 – 1822. Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea was published the following year by John Murray in London, a publishing company that took particular interest in the poles. The book discusses the four-year journey, revealing the hardships of the overland exploration in the Northwest territories of Canada, specifically around the Coppermine River of the Nunavut Territory. This publication also includes detailed color engravings depicting the landscapes and the many Intuit interpreters who helped along the way. Sadly, this voyage did not prove to be entirely successful either.

“Everyone was on the alert at an early hour, being anxious to commence the journey. Our luggage consisted of ammunition, nets, hatchets, ice chisels, astronomical instruments, clothing, blankets, three kettles, and the two canoes, which were each carried by one man. The officers carried such a portion of their own things as their strength would permit; the weight carried by each man was about ninety pounds, and with this we advanced at the rate of about a mile an hour, including rests.”

The final chapters describe the last months of the journey as the crew traversed the harsh Canadian landscape back to the Coppermine River. In addition to Captain Franklin, Dr. John Richardson, who kept notes and wrote the sections on geology, botany and ichthyology, included his own experience, during the time in which the party had split into three. Their final notes both emphasize the failing morale of the crew, the dropping temperatures, and the absence of food. Plagued by an early winter, the menu became scant: a small variety of berries before the frost; deer and musk-oxen, when possible; fish, until the nets were destroyed; a small supply of pemmican, a paste of dried and pounded meat mixed with melted fat; and partridge combined with tripe de roche.

“We supped off a single partridge and some tripe de roche; this unpalatable weed was now quite nauseous to the whole party, and in several it produced bowel complaints. Mr. Hood was the greatest sufferer from this cause.”

Tripe de Roche is the Canadian term for rock tripe, a type of lichen that grows on the rocks of North America. Although not at all nutritious, this edible fungus became the main source of food for the explorers and was often boiled with willows dug up beneath the snow. The taste is bitter and often causes severe stomach cramps and diarrhea and, combined with the extreme cold and deep snow, led to higher levels of exhaustion. A day’s worth of walking diminished from twelve miles to five, depending on the conditions.

“In the evening we encamped at the lower end of a narrow chasm through which the river flows for upwards of a mile. The walls of this chasm are upwards of two hundred feet high, quite perpendicular, and in some places only a few yards apart. The river precipitates itself into it over a rock, forming two magnificent and picturesque falls close to each other.”

To their dismay, even the lichen was all but plentiful in this barren country. Because of this, the men were sometimes forced to eat the leather from their moosehide shoes and scavenge the carcasses of rotting deer, boiling the bones in a soup only to retrieve the smallest amount of marrow. Desperation and despondency took hold of the party and in the final weeks, with many of the men becoming too weak to hunt or even walk. Towards the end of the journey, the group had separated into three, with Captain Franklin leading the pack to Fort Enterprise to find provisions and help from the Inuits. Unfortunately, only seventeen out of the twenty-eight party survived and suspicions of murder and cannibalism began to circulate among the survivors.

“At length we reached Fort Enterprise, and to our infinite disappointment and grief found it a perfectly desolate habitation. There was no deposit of provision, no trace of the Indians, no letter from Mr. Wentzel to point where the Indians might be found. It would be impossible for me to describe our sensations after entering this miserable abode, and discovering how we had been neglected.”

Leaving the men who were too weak to travel behind, Franklin went forward to look for provisions and help. The hunger, cold, and seemingly bleak chance of survival created hostility among some of the remaining crew, particularly between Dr. Richardson and Michel. In his final entry, Dr. Richardson recounts confronting Michel, who “reported that he had been in chase of some deer… and although he did not come up with them, yet that he found a wolf which had been killed by the stroke of a deer’s horn, and had brought part of it.” The meat was eaten with satisfaction but as time went on Michel’s strange and erratic behavior led Dr. Richardson to believe that Michel had either murdered two of the missing men, or found the bodies in the snow and took their flesh. After another man was mysteriously murdered, Dr. Richardson began to fear for his own safety and shot Michel point-blank without any further questions.

“A small quantity of tripe de roche was gathered; and Credit, who had been hunting, brought in the antlers and back bone of a deer which had been killed in the summer. The wolves and birds of pretty had picked them clean, but there still remained a quantity of the spinal marrow which they had not be able to extract. This, although putrid, was esteemed as a valuable prize, and the spine being divided into portions, was distributed equally. After eating the marrow, which was so acrid as to excoriate the lips, we rendered the bones friable by burning, and ate them also.”

Even in the coldest hour, Franklin and the explorers who came before and after saved the pages of their notebooks from the fire so that the people of the world could come to know their adventures. Murder, cannibalism, treacherous landscapes and perilous seas. It is no wonder that, upon returning to England, these narratives, the successes and failures of the Arctic Expeditions, excited the people to the point of inspiring a new genre of literature, one that has for so long been neglected.

~Contributed by Lyuba Basin, Rare Books

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Book of the Week — Atlas céleste de flamsteed…

13 Tuesday Mar 2018

Posted by rarebooks in Book of the Week

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atlas, cartography, celestial, Edmund Halley, engineer, English, engravings, French, Isaac Newton, Jean Nicolas Fortin, John Flamsteed, maps, Paris, stars


“Newton’s design was to make me come to him, force me to comply with his humors, and flatter him and cry him up as Dr. Halley did. He thought to work me to his ends by putting me to extraordinary charges. Those that have begun to do ill things never blush to do worse to secure themselves. Sly Newton had still more to do and was ready at coining new excuses and pretenses to cover his disingenuous and malicious practices… I met his cunning forecasts with sincere and honest answers and thereby frustrated not a few of his malicious designs. I would not court him, for, honest Sir Isaac Newton (to use his own words) would have all things in his own power, to spoil or sink them; that he might force me to second his designs and applaud him, which no honest man would do nor could do; and, God be thanked, I lay under no necessity of doing.” – John Flamsteed

Atlas céleste de flamsteed…
John Flamsteed (1646-1719)
Paris: Chez F. G. Deschamp [et chez] l’auteur, 1776
Second edition in French, the third edition after the first in English of 1729
QB65 F5 1776

John Flamsteed was England’s first Astronomer Royal. He was a lecturer at Gresham College. Flamsteed used a telescope with an aperture smaller than the smallest modern telescope, including those we might give to a child today. Telescopes used by the most casual amateur astronomers have apertures ten times that of Flamsteed’s telescope.

When first published, this altas represented a new era in celestial cartography, recording the 3000 stars John Flamsteed observed using equatorial and ecliptic coordinates. Flamsteed quarreled bitterly with Isaac Newton and Edmund Halley about his findings. His own findings often contradicted those of Christiaan Huygens. The sky was a battleground, fought over with primitive instruments and by the best minds of the day. 

For the French edition, engineer Jean Nicolas Fortin reduced the size of the maps, and fixed the location of the stars for 1780 instead of 1690, the date at which they had been fixed by Flamsteed. Fortin also added new discoveries to this edition. Illustrated with thirty double-page engraved plates.


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On Jon’s Desk – The Golden Cockerel Press Conquers an Anonymous Chronicle of the First Crusade

31 Wednesday Jan 2018

Posted by Jonathan Bingham in On Jon's Desk

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11th Century, 1945, Bee Blackburn, Christopher Sandford, Clifford Webb, Council of Clermont, Crusades, Ekkehard, engravings, Ethelwynne (Gay) Stewart McDowall, fine press, Francis J. Newbery, Gesta Francorum et aliorum Hierosolimitanorum, Golden Cockerel Press, Harold (Hal) Midgley Taylor, Jerusalem, Jon Bingham, Owen Rutter, Pran Pyper, Robert Gibbings, The First Crusade, The First Crusade: The Deeds of the Franks and other Jerusalemites, Thomas Yoseloff

 

 

 

 

 

 

Title: The First Crusade: The Deeds of the Franks and other Jerusalemites

Author: Anonymous

Publisher: London: The Golden Cockerel Press, 1945

Call Number: D161.1 G42 1945

The story of the Crusades is one of conquest. Although participants saw themselves as pilgrims, the endeavor quickly became an enterprise of establishing a new kingdom (that of Jerusalem). Setting out on the journey of reading the Crusade chronicles is often like starting a bibliographic pilgrimage that will invariably become something else. These accounts can become a collection of narratives needing to be conquered. And that is just what one group of talented book makers did with one account of the First Crusade recorded by an anonymous participant: the Golden Cockerel Press took the chronicle and mastered it — completely.

Operating between 1920 and 1961, the Golden Cockerel Press was initially a privately owned press (and then later a publishing house) that specialized in producing fine press editions of works completely by hand. The press printed on handmade paper using hand-set type, and often illustrated the works using hand-engraved woodblocks. The Golden Cockerel Press was founded by Harold (Hal) Midgley Taylor (1893-1925) in 1920, but was set up as a cooperative with three other partners in addition to Taylor: Bee Blackburn, Pran Pyper, and Ethelwynne (Gay) Stewart McDowall. After Taylor was no longer able to supervise the press due to suffering from tuberculosis it was sold to Robert Gibbings in 1924. Gibbings published 71 titles at the press, with the size of a run normally between 250 and 750 copies. The press enjoyed a brief period of strong success before once again succumbing to faltering markets and in 1931 it was taken over by Christopher Sandford, Owen Rutter, and Francis J. Newbery. It was at this point that the press transitioned from a privately owned press to a publishing house. 120 works were published during the Sandford era. In 1959 Sandford, for whom the financial pressures of keeping the press going had become too much, sold the publishing business to Thomas Yoseloff, an American publisher and at the time director of University of Pennsylvania Press. Yoseloff completed the publication of two titles in 1960 that had been previously commissioned by Sandford, and then the following year published two more titles before continuation of the business proved impractical. By the end of 1961 Yoseloff ceased operations, as the resources and fine bookcraft skills necessary for production of Golden Cockerel titles became too difficult and costly to obtain.

The illustrations in some Golden Cockerel titles, although tame by modern standards, were considered risqué for the time and necessitated the press taking precautionary measures against possible prosecutions for obscenity or provocation, such as disguising the names of translators and illustrators. The woodblock engravings for The First Crusade: The Deeds of the Franks and other Jerusalemites were done by Clifford Webb (14 February 1895 – 29 July 1972), who was an English artist, illustrator, and author. He primarily illustrated books for children, which makes his engravings for The First Crusade that much more interesting by comparison. The scenes captured by Webb in this work are striking, both artistically and from a standpoint of subject matter.

The anonymous chronicle Gesta Francorum et aliorum Hierosolimitanorum, the translation of which appears in the Golden Cockerel work The First Crusade, was written by a participant of the events for which it is named. Who wrote this account and why would The Golden Cockerel Press want to publish it? Let’s take a little closer look at it, shall we?

Shortly after the conclusion of the First Crusade, in 1101 CE, Ekkehard (d. 1126), later abbot of Aura, went to Jerusalem on pilgrimage and saw there what he described as “a little book,” in which an account of the three years preceding the taking of Jerusalem was given. Several other accounts refer to this “little book,” which was often described as rustic and written in an unpolished style. This account is accepted as the earliest chronicle of the First Crusade to be completed following the events of 1099, which included the capture of Jerusalem by the western Christians (i.e. pilgrims). It came to be known as the Gesta Francorum et aliorum Hierosolimitanorum (in translation, The Deeds of the Franks and the other Pilgrims to Jerusalem), and is now commonly referred to as the Gesta.

This chronicle is comprised of an account which begins with the Council of Clermont in November 1095 and ends with the Battle of Ascalon in August 1099. The account consists of ten books, of which the first nine are believed to have been written before the anonymous author left Antioch in November 1098 and the tenth at Jerusalem shortly after the Battle of Ascalon (certainly before the beginning of 1101). This work became an important source for other chronicles which followed. The Gesta also influenced, either in its original form or through those who used it as a resource in their own work, most of the chronicles written during the twelfth century. Its influence on the historical writings of the time has cemented it as an important source alongside even the more “polished” of its contemporary peers.

The anonymous author of the Gesta had little interest in autobiography and little is known about him beyond what can be discovered indirectly through the context of his account. Contextual evidence suggests that he was a vassal, most likely a mid-level knight, of Bohemond and that he came from southern Italy. This is made clear due to his description of the beginning of the Crusade and the position from which he participated in the battles up to June 1098. He identified a number of undistinguished men in Bohemond’s army while confusing the names and titles of important and powerful northern leaders.

Perhaps the most telling evidence of the author’s identity, however, is that throughout the first nine books he refers to Bohemond as “dominus” (in the feudal sense of “overlord”) and usually attached a laudatory epitaph such as “sapiens,” “prudens,” or “bellipotens” when describing him. This suggests that he either held Bohemond in the highest esteem or expected him to read, or at least hear of, the chronicle. The socio-political restraints of a vassal would have necessitated this treatment to the author’s lord. Additionally, the author fought in the ranks of Bohemond’s knights at the Battle of Dorylaeum and the Lake of Antioch, and he was one of the band of hand-picked men Bohemond took with him to enter Antioch by night in order to obtain control of the city through stealth. In reference to Pope Urban II’s journey to Clermont he described the destination as “across the mountains,” showing that he considered Italy to be his home. This evidence indicates that the author was a member of a Norman family that had followed Tancred de Hauteville into southern Italy in the eleventh century. Bohemond’s father was Robert Guiscard, who was one of Tancred’s sons. It seems likely that Bohemond’s immediate followers were of Norman descent despite many of them having been born in Italy.

It is also likely that the anonymous author of the Gesta was a layman as opposed to clergy, who usually authored chronicles. That he was a knight is obvious from the account. Less obvious is how he became educated enough to write the account, even with it being written in a simple, unadorned style. It was possible, although uncommon, for knights to be educated (milites literati), usually in cases where younger sons who had been trained for service in the church were recalled to a military career upon the death of an older brother so long as they had not progressed beyond minor orders. This may be the case for the anonymous author of the Gesta. While it is primarily a tale of heroic deeds, it does have the feeling of being written by a devout man familiar with passages in the Vulgate. When Bohemond decided to stay at and rule Antioch, the anonymous author chose to abandon his lord, possibly giving up the prospects of enfeoffment in the Principality of Antioch, to continue on to Jerusalem and fulfill his pilgrim’s vow. If true, this would lend credibility to the hypothesis of a devout layman who had become literate through church training.

The Gesta is comprised of a fascinating account of the events of the First Crusade, delightfully presented in this edition – an edition of the highest quality printing – done by the The Golden Cockerel press. Clifford Webb’s masterfully engraved illustrations put the reader right in the middle of the action. One can imagine a Golden Cockerel there, in the middle of it all, as the Crusaders stormed the walls of Jerusalem in July of 1099. If only Ekkehard had been so lucky as to have found such an edition rather than the “little book” he came across in Jerusalem in 1101.

~Contributed by Jon Bingham, Rare Books Curator

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The Risk of Being Less Free

04 Tuesday Jul 2017

Posted by rarebooks in Donations

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Alexander Hamilton, Articles of Confederation, Benjamin Warner, Charleston, Chief Justice of the United States, Constitution of the United States, Constitutional Convention, engravings, James Madison, John Jay, New York, New-York Packet, Philadelphia, portraits, President of the United States, Publius, Richmond, Ronald Rubin, Secretary of the Treasury, South Carolina, The Daily Advertiser, The Federalist, The Independent Journal, The New-York Journal, Virginia, war

JK154-1788-title
“The violent destruction of life and property incident to war, the continual effort and alarm attendant on a state of continual danger, will compel nations the most attached to liberty to resort for repose and security to institutions which have a tendency to destroy their civil and political rights. To be more safe, they at length become willing to run the risk of being less free.”
― Alexander Hamilton

The Federalist: A Collection of Essays…
Alexander Hamilton (1757-1804), James Madison (1751-1836), and John Jay (1745-1829)
New-York: Printed and sold by J. and A. M’Lean, no.41, Hanover-square, M,DCC,LXXXVIII (1788)
First edition
JK154 1788

Although written for the purpose of supporting New York state’s ratification of the Constitution of the United States, these essays were eventually published together as The Federalist and were soon recognized for their brilliant commentary on the new republican charter. The use of The Federalist as a tool for interpreting the Constitution began before it was officially ratified and has continued to the present day. The Federalist is the fundamental document left by the framers of the Constitution as a guide to their philosophy and intentions.

Alexander Hamilton was the principal force behind the pro-ratification pamphlets, enlisting fellow New Yorker John Jay and Virginian James Madison as coauthors of the essays. The individual responsible for each essay is not clear. The first essay by “Publius” (the pen name for all three authors) appeared in the 27 October 1787 issue of The Independent Journal, and all or some of the subsequent numbers were also printed in the New-York Packet, The Daily Advertiser, and The New-York Journal. The first thirty-six Federalist essays were collected and published by the M’Lean brothers in March 1788 and the final forty-nine, along with the text of the Constitution, followed in a second volume in May. The last eight essays were printed in book form before they appeared in newspapers. In all, the essays represent one of the most important American contributions to political theory.

The first edition of the collection was of five hundred copies, fifty of which were purchased by Hamilton and sent to Virginia. The sale of the others was poor. The publisher complained in October 1788, long after New York had ratified the Constitution, that they still had several hundred copies unsold.


The Federalist, On the New Constitution, Written in 1778, by Mr. Hamilton, Mr. Jay, and Mr. Madison
Philadelphia: Published by Benjamin Warner, No. 147, Market street, and sold at his stores, Richmond, Virginia, and Charleston, South Carolina, 1818
Fifth Edition
KF4515 F4 1818

Despite the poor sales of the first edition, The Federalist was published again and nearly continuously to the present day. The fifth edition of The Federalist contains an appendix of the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution of the United States with Amendments, not found in the fourth edition. The Philadelphia imprint contains revisions by Madison, along with his claims of authorship of some of the essays previously attributed to Hamilton. This is the second single-volume edition printed, complete with full-page engraved portraits of Hamilton, Madison and Jay. It was published the same year as a Washington, D.C. imprint.

Federalist1818-JamesMadison

James Madison became the fourth President of the United States.

Federalist1818-AlexanderHamilton

Alexander Hamilton, who had represented New York at the Constitutional Convention, became the nation’s first Secretary of the Treasury, holding the post until he resigned in 1795.

Federalist1818-JohnJay

John Jay became the first Chief Justice of the United States in 1789, stepping down in 1795 to become governor of New York, a post he held for two terms, until retiring in 1801.

Rare Books copy of fifth edition is gift of Dr. Ronald Rubin.

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Book of the Week — Athanasii Kircheri Societatis Iesu Magnes; sive, de arte magnetica

05 Monday Jun 2017

Posted by rarebooks in Book of the Week

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animals, arrows, Athanasius Kircher, electromagnetism, Emperor, engravings, F. Valentini, Ferdinando IV, God, Greek, Hapsburg, hydraulics, Jesuit, lodestone, longitude, love, magnet, magnetism, Mars, Martin Martini, medicine, music, plants, rare books, Roman Catholic, symbol, tides, toys, universe, woodcuts, zodiac

QC751-K58-1654-title
““The highest mountain, the oldest books, the strangest people, there you will find the stone.” — Attributed to Athanasius Kircher

Athanasii Kircheri Societatis Iesu Magnes; sive, de arte magnetica
Athanasius Kircher (1602-1680)
Romae: sumptibus Blasii Deuersin, & Zanobii Masotti Bibliopolarum typis Vitalis Mascarditypis V. Mascardi, MDCLIV (1654)
Third and final edition
QC751 K58 1654

Athanasius Kircher learned Greek and Hebrew at the Jesuit school in Fulda. He continued his scientific studies at Paderborn, Cologne, and Koblenz, taking orders in 1628 as a Jesuit priest. He traveled to Paris, fleeing fighting in Germany, and settled in Rome in 1634. His rigorous scientific curiosity was girded by a mystical conception of natural laws and forces. His methodology ranged from scholastic to hands-on experimentation. He once had himself lowered into the crater of Vesuvius to observe its features soon after an eruption. He was a prolific writer, publishing forty-four books. More than 2,000 of his manuscripts and letters survive. He assembled one of the first natural history collections, housed in a museum after his name in Rome, and later dispersed throughout various institutions.

The third edition of Magnes sive de arte magnetica is the first to appear in folio format. It is virtually a new work, rewritten and expanded from the first edition (1641). This edition is Athanasius Kircher’s largest, most complete, and definitive treatise on magnetism and electromagnetism (a term coined by Kircher in this work), which he conceived as a universal force of nature. Kircher compiled measurements of magnetic declination from several places around the world as reported by Jesuit scholars. One of these, Martin Martini, suggested to Kircher the possibility of determining longitudes by the declination of a magnetic needle, a possibility which Kircher then introduced to the scientific community.

In this work Kircher included discussions about the magnetism of the earth and heavenly bodies, the tides, the attraction and repulsion in animals and plants, and the magnetic attraction of music and love. He addressed the practical applications of magnetism in medicine, hydraulics, the construction of scientific instruments, and toys. Above it all, God remained the central magnet of the universe.

QC751-K58-1654-Obelisk
Glass spheres contain wax figures incorporating magnets, which can be affected by the large magnet in the base of the obelisk. On the globes are letters and signs of the Zodiac to which the figures point. By manipulating the handle in front of the table skirt, the operator could rotate the central magnet and cause the figures to answer questions or spell out words. The Greek inscription on the ribbon at the top of the obelisk is the Hermetic axiom, “Nature rejoices in Nature.” — p. 275

Illustrated with thirty-two full-page engraved plates and more than one hundred and fifty ornamental woodcuts throughout the text. Title-page printed in red and black. Rare Books copy has odd little hand-inked drawings by a past owner throughout.

QC751-K58-1654-Portrait
The portrait of Ferdinando IV, reigning Hapsburg Emperor, to whom Magnes sive de arte magnetica is dedicated, contains magnetic needles in the shape of arrows, a lodestone, the eye of God, the orb and cross corresponding to the ancient symbol for Mars, and other, even more esoteric, symbols. This engraving embodies the doctrine of Roman Catholic monarchy as a divine institution, and the emperor and his empire as the microcosmic reflections of God and his universe. Ferdinando IV died the year this edition was published, at the age of 21. — Engraving by F. Valentini

QC751-K58-1654-Sunflower
Sundial in the form of a sunflower — p. 508

QC751-K58-1654-pg593
In southern Italy, most commonly in Apulia, dancing the Tarantella cured the tarantulla bite. — p. 593

Recommended reading:

Glassie, John. A Man of Misconceptions: The Life of an Eccentric in an Age of Change. New York: Riverhead Books, 2013
CT1098 K46 G53 2013, General Collection, L2

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Book of the Week — An Essay Towards a Real Character…

18 Tuesday Apr 2017

Posted by rarebooks in Book of the Week

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animals, Bishop of Chester, cryptography, engravings, Gellibrand, grammar, Great Fire of London, John Ray, John Wilkins, Joseph Moxon, language, Latin, letterforms, London, music, Oliver Cromwell, paneled calf, phonetics, plants, printing, Robert Boyle, Robert Hooke, Royal Society, space travel, symbols, theology, Trinity College, typography, University of Utah, vowels, William Harvey, William Lloyd

P101-W4-1668-pg311
“…Letters, the Invention of which was a thing of so great Art and exquisiteness, that…doth from hence inferr the divinity and spirituality of the humane soul, and that it must needs be of a farr more excellent and abstracted Essence that mere Matter or Body…” — John Wilkins

An Essay Towards a Real Character, and a Philosophical Language
John Wilkins (1616-1672)
London: Printed for S. Gellibrand, 1668
First edition

John Wilkins, Bishop of Chester, was the chief founder of the Royal Society and its first secretary. He was Master of Trinity College. Wilkins was acquainted with many of the great minds of his day: William Harvey, Christopher Wren, Robert Boyle and Robert Hooke. He married the younger sister of Oliver Cromwell. In 1662, he lost all of his library and scientific instruments to the Great Fire of London. He was interested in just about everything — from theology to cryptography, music to space travel. He worked on creating an artificial universal language to replace Latin as a means of clearer communication between scholars and philosophers.

In this book Wilkins discussed the origin of language and letterforms, as well as a theory of grammar and phonetics. He classified words by their meanings and assigned each class a set of typographical characters, in an attempt to create a rationally ordered language and system of symbols.

P101-W4-1668-pg186

He divided the universe into forty classes, or categories, and subdivided these, and then subdivided these. To each class he assigned a monosyllable of two letters; to each subdivision he added a consonant; to each further subdivision, or species, he added a vowel. Each letter, or symbol, had meaning.

P101-W4-1668-Faces

John Ray drew up systematic tables of plants and animals for the book. An index was created by Dr. William Lloyd. Joseph Moxon (1627-1691) cut the typographical characters Wilkins proposed for his language. Moxon was the author of Mechanick Exercises, the first comprehensive manual of printing and letter-founding in any language.

The first issue of the first edition appeared without any of the engraved plates. This copy, apparently a second issue, contains all of the plates, although two folded leaves of tables and diagrams that are in other copies are missing. Bound with Wilkins’ An alphabetical dictionary, wherin all English Words According to their various significations, are either referred to their Places in the Philosophical Tables, Or explained by such words as are in those tables. The second work functions as an index to the first.

University of Utah copy bound in contemporary paneled calf with covers ruled in blind.

P101-W4-1668-NoahsArk

“From what hath been said it may appear, that the measure and capacity of the Ark, which some Atheistical irreligious men make use of, as an argument against the Scripture, ought rather to be esteemed a most rational confirmation of the truth and divine authority of it. Especially if it be well considered, that in those first and ruder ages of the World… men were less versed in Arts and Philosophy, and therefore probably more obnoxious to vulgar prejudices than now they are… — John Wilkins

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We recommend — Saints at Devil’s Gate: Landscapes along the Mormon Trail

21 Wednesday Dec 2016

Posted by rarebooks in Recommended Exhibition, Recommended Reading

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Angelina Hawkins, Ann Agatha Walker Pratt, art, artist, book, Brigham Young, Byron C. Andreasen, catalog, Church History Museum, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, drawings, editor, emigrant, England, English, engravings, exhibition, France, Frederick Hawkins Piercy, Hampshire, James Linforth, Jersey, John Burton, journals, landscapes, Laura Allred Hurtado, Liverpool, London, Mary Pugh Scott, Millenial Star, Mormon, Mormon Trail, New Orleans, newspaper, Orson Pratt, paintings, Paris, portraiture, Portsea, proselytizing, Royal Academy of Arts, Saints at Devil's Gate, Salt Lake City, Salt Lake Valley, ship, Suffolk Street Gallery of the Society of British Artists, The Church Historian's Office Press, Utah, Wallace Stegner, woodcuts

siantscover

“For aren’t we all on a journey that tries our faith, tests our courage, makes us vulnerable, and at times defeats us and blisters our soul?”
— Laura Allred Hurtado

Saints at Devil’s Gate: Landscapes along the Mormon Trail
Laura Allred Hurtado and Byron C. Andreasen
Salt Lake City, UT: The Church Historian’s Office Press, 2016

Catalog to accompany an exhibition of the same name at the Church History Museum in Salt Lake City. The exhibition is free and open to the public and runs through August 2017. An online exhibit is also available at history.lds.org.

ps3537-t316-g36-1964-cover

“…if courage and endurance make a story, if human kindness and helpfulness and brotherly love in the midst of raw horror are worth recording, this…is one of the great tales of the West and of America.”
— Wallace Stegner, quoted in the Curator’s Essay.

e166-p65-titlee166-p65-kanesville

Route from Liverpool to Great Salt Lake Valley Illustrated with Steel Engravings and Wood Cuts from Sketches…
Frederick Hawkins Piercy (1839-1891)
Liverpool: F. D. Richards; London: Latter-Day Saints’ Book Depot, 1854
First edition
E166 P65

“Frederick Piercy was the eighth of nine children born in Portsea, Hampshire, England. He joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on March 23, 1848, and a year later, he married Angelina Hawkins, also a convert. When Piercy was twenty and his wife was expecting their first child, he left for a short mission to Paris, France. In addition to proselytizing, he produced artwork and can be considered a predecessor to the Paris art missionaries who came years later.

“Piercy was an artist know for portraiture and landscapes, and he exhibited at the Royal Academy of Arts and at the Suffolk Street Gallery of the Society of British Artists in London prior to leaving for the Salt Lake Valley. In 1853, then twenty-three years old, Piercy left England aboard the emigrant ship Jersey, which was headed for New Orleans. He and James Linforth, an editor for the Mormon newspaper Millennial Star, published a collection of engravings and woodcuts made from Piercy’s drawings, paintings, and journals in the book Route from Liverpool to Great Salt Lake Valley. Instead of remaining in Utah like many others, Piercy returned to England shortly after his trip. By April 1857, after refusing to return to the Salt Lake Valley at the behest of both Brigham Young and Orson Pratt, Piercy and his wife left the Mormon faith.”
— Laura Allred Hurtado

e166-p65-slce166-p65-gsl

moon
— New Beginnings, John Burton, 2016 oil on canvas, from Saints at Devil’s Gate

“I never shall forget the last day we traveled, and arrived in the Valley… When my eyes rested on the beautiful entrancing sight — the Valley; Oh! how my heart swelled within me, I could have laughed and cried, such a comingling [sic] of emotions I cannot describe…No doubt our valley looks astonishingly beautiful to the strangers who come here now, but it cannot evoke the same emotions as it did to us, poor weary tired, worn out, ragged travelers.” — Ann Agatha Walker Pratt

“Behind us now are the heart aches and many thousands of silent tears that fell on the long unknown trail.” — Mary Pugh Scott
–from Saints at Devil’s Gate

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Book of the week — Biblia sacra

11 Monday Jul 2016

Posted by rarebooks in Book of the Week

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Apostles, Bible, brass clasps, classical scholar, decorative headbands, engravings, Exodus, France, Franciscus Stephanus, François Estienne, François Perrin, French, Geneva, Geneva Bible, Greek, Henri Estienne, horseback, initials, John Calvin, Kings, Latin, linguist, Lyon, maps, Margaret Cave, New Testament, Normandy, Paris, Petrum Santandreanum, Pierre Saint-André, pigskin, printer, Protestant, Robert Estienne, roll-tooled, Tabernacle, tail pieces, University of Utah, woodcuts

Biblia-Sacra-title

BIBLIA SACRA VETERIS ET NOUI TESTAMENTI…
Geneuae: Apud Petrum Santandreanum, MDLXXXIII. 1583
BS75 1583

A reissue, with a different title page, of an edition of François Estienne, Geneva, 1567. The title page of the New Testament bears the imprint: Ex Officina Francisci Stephanii, 1567. This edition was printed by Pierre Saint-André (1555-1624).

François Estienne was the third son of Robert Estienne (1503-1559), a French printer, linguist and classical scholar. In his father’s footsteps, François left France for Geneva as a follower of the Protestant movement. He was active as a printer between 1562 and 1582 in partnership with François Perrin, an associate of John Calvin. François Estienne issued a number of editions of the Bible in Latin and French, as well as works by Calvin. Some scholars believe that François emigrated to Normandy in 1582, where he married Margaret Cave. They had several children, none of whom survived to adulthood.

Robert Estienne’s fourth edition (1551) of the Bible is notable for being the first Latin Bible to be printed with verse numeration. Estienne designed the divisions to help the reader compare the two Latin translations and the Greek translation found in this edition. The fourth edition became the basis for the Geneva Bible. Estienne’s son Henri wrote that his father numbered the divisions while traveling “inter equitandum” from Paris to Lyon. Questionable verse divisions were later ascribed to the jolting of a ride on horseback. Although it is unlikely that Estienne was working while riding, the divisions appear to be hasty and distracted, a situation we can well imagine if Estienne was working on this project while traveling.

Text in double columns, with references, variants and section letters in the margins. Illustrated with two engraved folding maps, one in the New Old Testament and one in the New Testament; two full-page engraved maps; woodcuts of the Tabernacle and other images in Exodus and Kings, with occasional figures elsewhere; decorative headbands, tail-pieces and initial letters. The title-page for the New Testament has the woodcut device of Franciscus Stephanus. University of Utah copy bound in contemporary pigskin over wooden boards, covers with roll-tooled decoration, featuring portraits of the Apostles; brass clasps and catches; old paper spine labels.

Bibla-Sacra-EgyptMap

Bibla-Sacra-Mediterraneanseamap

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Memorial Day 2016

30 Monday May 2016

Posted by rarebooks in Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

American, British, cemetery, conflict, drawings, engravings, General Assembly, Harrisburg, House of Representatives, James Smillie, Kaleidograph Press, Luise Putcamp jr, Memorial Day, Military Cemetery, Nehemiah Cleaveland, Pennsylvania, Soldiers' National Cemetery, Sonnets for the Survivors, troops

“Stones stand at stiff attention as sun nears”


MILITARY CEMETERY

Here stationed without trumpet, without tears
Are the unwilling dead. Days walk the rounds
Of sentry duty past the ordered mounds.
Stones stand at stiff attention as sun nears,
Inspects them and departs. On earthen ears
The volley from the silent rifle sounds
And the slow winds police the sterile grounds
Where seconds march of equal rank with years.
Look long and with your heart until you see
In place of stone the man he planned to be,
Uproot the useless grass and find in place
The sons he might have fathered, or erase
The bare, official words and read instead:
He laughed at dying, so he is not dead.

– Luise Putcamp jr., Sonnets for the Survivors, Kaleidograph Press, 1952
“Military Cemetery” published here with permission of the author


F129-B7-G756-BattleHill

“In that vicinity, — upon ground traversed in part by every visitor to the Cemetery, and lying immediately below and around it, — occurred the first serious conflict between the British and American troops, on the memorable 26th of August, 1776.”

Green-wood Illustrated
Nehemiah Cleaveland (1796-1877)
New York: R. Martin, 1847
First edition
F129 B7 G756 1847

Illustrated with engravings from drawings taken on the spot by James Smillie.


E475.55-P41-foldout

“These men came here from the east and from the west, stood side by side, and fought and fell in one common cause and for one common country…and their dust is now in common…”

Revised Report of the Select Committee Relative to the Soldiers’ National Cemetery
Pennyslvania. General Assembly. House of Representatives.
Harrisburg: Singerly & Myers, state printers, 1865
E475 .55 P41

 

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