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1662 2-vol. folio Works of Charles I - Royal Binding !! |
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Curent Price | 2081 USD |
Buy It Now Price | 12000 USD |
Item # | 330287727108 |
Status | Completed |
Binding | Fine Binding |
Category | Law & Government |
Printing Year | 1662 |
Special Attributes | 1st Edition |
End time | 11/25/2008 4:55:01 PM (EST)
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Ships From | Athens, Georgia |
Category | Antiques > Books & Manuscripts > English |
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Beautiful 2-volume folio set of the works of Charles I,
sumptuously bound by the Royal Heads Binder,
with the Royal Arms of Charles II. 1662.
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Charles I (1600-1649) / royal arms of Charles II (1630-1685).
(engraved title:) Aeternitati Sacrum / BASILIKA (Graece) / The Works of Charles. I. with his Life and Martyrdome.
(printed title, v. 1) BASILIKA (Graece) / The Workes of King Charles the Martyr: with a collection of declarations, treaties, and other Papers concerning the Differences betwixt His said Majesty and his Two Houses of Parliament.
(printed title, v. 2) A Collection of Declarations, Treaties, and other Principal Passages concerning the Differences betwixt King Charles I. and his Two Houses of Parliament. Clearly Manifesting: The Justice of His Cause. His sinceritie in Religion. His Constant Endeavours for Peace.
London, Printed by James Flesher for R. Royston, Book-seller to His most Sacred Majesty. MDCLXII. (1662)
2 volumes, folio (2o). 361 x 230 mm. [12],120,[2],458,[2]; [8],733,[7] pp.
Full-page engraved frontispiece, engraved title-page, three double-page plates, and decorated initials. All pages neatly and extensively double-ruled in red throughout. Three pages printed in red and black.
Without question, the most beautiful set of books I've had the privilege to own. Sumptuously bound in full contemporary red turkey with elaborate decorations and royal arms on both covers of each volume. Black morocco title label. All edges gilt. Light damage to raised bands, corners, spine ends; some very small early repairs, some darkening. Binding in very good, impressive shape overall.
The wonderful bindings are by the elusive "Royal Heads Binder". It has a gilt border of double fillet, enclosing a panel of single and double fillets, and flower in a circle roll, the center of each side of the panel decorated on the outside edge with strawberry and flower volutes, acorn, scroll, flower and dot tools, and at the corners with an elaborate scroll tool, in the center a fine large gilt block of the Royal Arms with supporters and motto. The spines have six raised bands, with black goatskin gilt-lettered labels, and otherwise elaborately tooled with repeating gilt strawberry and flower volutes. The board edges have a gilt flower in a circle roll. All edges gilt.
The Royal Heads Binder is named after the small tools showing the heads of Charles II and Catherine of Braganza which were used on a small group of bindings from the Royal Chapel. As Nixon points out in English Restoration Bookbindings, "Bindings, with the same tools but without the heads, are found on a dozen more books -- some of them with a fine block of the royal arms -- which include a copy of the works of Charles I in the Royal Library at Windsor." (p. 30).
As Nixon notes, only about a dozen volumes from this binder are known: two copies of the Full Anthems for the Chapel Royal (one of which is at the Boston Athenaeum, see here), a copy of the works of Charles I at Windsor Palace, five copies of the 1662 Book of Common Prayer (two of which have the royal arms), dedication copies of Bochart and Diogenes Laertius, both in the British Library, and of Fuller, in the Pierpont Morgan Library, plus two more manuscripts.
None of the dated books is from after 1664, and Nixon deemed it probable that the tools used by the binder were lost in the Great Fire of London in 1666 (cf. also Nixon & Foot 1992, p. 73).
The present set was not known to Nixon, perhaps in part because it has in the past been mis-attributed to Samuel Mearne, a better known and more prolific royal binder for Charles II. It is is very similar to the Windsor Palace copy of the same work (pictured in Nixon 1974), and almost identical to the dedication copy of Bochart's Hierozocon in the British library, of which an image can be found online here. This is quite possibly the only remaining product of the Royal Heads Binder not in a royal or institutional library!
What makes the royal provenance of the set even more interesting is that it contains the works of Charles II's father, and predecessor as king, including the Eikon Basilike. Charles I, of course, famously fought with the British Parliament over the extent of his power (he was an advocate of the divine right of kings), and lost out to Parliament (and Oliver Cromwell), leading to his execution in 1649. Charles II only came to the throne once Cromwell's interregnum ended in 1660.
The work includes the first edition of Richard Perinchief's Life of King Charles, plus dozens of prayers, speeches, letters, "Messages for Peace", etc. of the King. In particular, the 'Tryall' that led to his execution is featured in considerable detail.
It would be difficult to imagine a better association copy for this title!!
In addition to the engraved matter at the front (armorial frontispiece by W. Hollar, and engraved title), the work has three splendid double-page plates (two of which were produced in Antwerp for this edition, and one of which had been used previously): one at the start of the Eikon Basilike, by A. Hertochs after Philip Fruytiers; one near the start of volume 2, by Jac. Neeffs again after Philip Fruytiers, and one showing "The Goodly Cedar of Apostolick and Catholick Episcopacy" (referring to the Treaty at Uxbridge).
As Madan notes in his bibliography of the Eikon Basilike: "In the preface to the second edition of Perinchief's Life, published in 1676, Royston mentions that the greater part of this edition of the Works perished in the Great Fire." (p. 78) (By the way, it also appears that the real compiler of the life of Charles I may have been William Fulman rather than Richard Perinchief.)
Condition:
The pages are lightly browned throughout, and there is scattered mild foxing, mostly in the first few leaves. In addition, there are a few small rustholes, never affecting more than 1 letter. On p. 197 of vol. 1 there is a manuscript annotation next to "A Praier in time of Captivity" arguing that the Prayer of Pamela to a Heathen Deity in Pembroke's Arcadia (p. 248 in the 1674 ed.) is identical.
Both volumes are protected in their own padded cloth cases. The cases are somewhat threadbare, and splitting at the corners, but still serve their purpose very well.
Provenance: King Charles II (binding); Tho: Boudler? (ex-dono on title page); Will: McGuire (ex lib.);
old inscription partially crossed out (XXX her booke); John Wesley Warrington (bookplate).
References:
(1) Madan, Francis F. 1950. A New Bibliography of the Eikon Basilike of King Charles the First. London: Bernard Quaritch.
(2) Nixon, Howard M. 1968. "English Bookbindings LXIV: A binding by the Royal Heads Binder, c. 1665." The Book Collector 17(1):44.
(3) Nixon, Howard M. 1974. English Restoration Bookbindings: Samuel Mearne and his Contemporaries. London: British Museum Publications Limited.
(4) Nixon, Howard M., and Mirjam M. Foot. 1992. The History of Decorated Bookbinding in England. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
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