[Rarebooks] fa: JOHN MILTON - POETICAL WORKS - Fine Publisher's Bindings/Engravings 1850

[ArCh]

Auction ends Sunday, March 26. Images and more details can be found at the URL below or by searching for the seller name arch_in_la. 

https://tinyurl.com/5n75n6u7

Thanks again,
Ardwight Chamberlain
Ann Arbor, MI, USA


John Milton: The Poetical Works of John Milton. With a Memoir, and Critical Remarks on His Genius and Writings by James Montgomery; and One Hundred and Twenty Engravings from Drawings by William Harvey. New York: Harper & Brothers, [c. 1850]. Two volumes, 8vo (20.5 cm), bound in [original?] full black pebbled morocco or roan leather elaborately tooled in gilt, all page edges gilt, in modern black leather slipcase; 432; 349 pp.; engravings.

Early American edition of this handsomely produced and profusely illustrated collection, originally published in London in 1843 and described by Lowndes as "a beautiful edition." The striking bindings are almost certainly from the publisher Harper's own bindery, intended as a holiday offering for well-heeled customers: uniform contemporary black pebbled morocco or roan, the covers framed in gilt triple fillets surrounding arabesque designs and central vignettes of Adam and Eve, on vol. I, and a serpent-entwined cross on vol. II, both volumes house in a Fine double-barreled black leather slipcase.

Bindings with a touch of wear and bumping to the corners, front hinge of vol. II just starting and a little tender, but the board is secure, repaired at the inner hinge; contents mildly age-toned at the margins, occasional light finger-dimples to the leaves, else clean and sound. Front paste-downs with the original owner's small monogram bookplates.