WILLETT, Ralph.

A Description of the Library at Merly in the County of Dorset. Description de la Bibliothèque de Merly dans le Comté de Dorset.

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Title with large engraved allegorical vignette & 25 engraved plates (seven are double-page, many folding). Parallel texts in English & French. 2 p.l., 14 pp. Large folio, cont. marbled boards (rebacked & recornered, some foxing), orig. red morocco lettering piece on spine. London: Printed for the Author by John Nichols, 1785. First illustrated edition. This privately printed and remarkable work is a splendid record of probably the most magnificent private library building constructed in England in the 18th century. Ralph Willet (1719-95), after inheriting the family’s West Indian estates, devoted his life to scholarship, botany, and the collecting of books and pictures. He formed a very rich library, strong in incunabula, travel, botany, topography, and architecture. To properly house these books, Willet constructed a library room for his house at Merly. “Few collectors can have given more thought to the creation of a fitting casket for their treasures…The room was 84 feet long 23 feet wide, and 23 feet high, of which 5 feet, six inches were coving. The bookcases, 13 feet 4 inches high, were of carved mahogany, enriched with a complete Ionic order. The top of each bookcase was flanked with busts, and in the centre was an ornamental scroll inscribed with the subject contained in that case, crowned by the lamp of science with the motto ‘Non Extinguatur’… “But it was the plasterwork of cove and ceiling which made this unique among Georgian libraries. Thought up by Willet and executed by a ‘Mr. Collins’, the theme was nothing less than the origin and progress of civilization… “This masterpiece of Georgian architecture, in which Willet and Collins were assisted by Banks and ‘Athenian’ Stuart…existed for little more than 40 years, for the library wing was pulled down by Willett’s nephew, a few years after the books were sold in 1813.”–Alan G. Thomas, “Ralph Willet of Merly” in The Book Collector (1963), pp. 439-448 (see the article for a very detailed description of the library’s decorations). An unillustrated edition appeared, limited to 200 copies, in 1776. Very good copy. Contemporary bookplate with interlocking monogram “N.C.” (?) below the coronet of an English Marquess.

• USD 9,500.00 > otras divisas
• nº de pedido: HillBibl-2055

• librero: Jonathan A. Hill, Bookseller, Inc. (USA)