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Inscribed to one of the leading rare book dealers of his generation, Bertram Rota, by a host of members of Chicago’s Caxton Club. A calligraphic inscription on the front free endpaper, "Presented to Anthony Rota on the occasion of the September 28, 1988 meeting of the Caxton Club with the appreciation of the members and guests whose signatures appe… Read more…

Number 94 of 100 copies, inscribed by the publisher as ‘Mrs Somerville No.94’ - Mary Somerville’s copy. Smith (1771-1845) founded the Edinburgh Review and lectured extensively at the Royal Institution as recorded here in these posthumously published texts. Mary Somerville (1780-1872) met Sydney Smith as a young woman in Edinburgh, describing in her… Read more…

Movingly inscribed first edition from the author to another of the (at first) 65 Irish Volunteers in Dublin’s Mountjoy Prison who demanded Prisoner of War status. Accompanied by mounting demonstrations across Ireland, the British government capitulated and many of these prisoners were released before greater harm was done. This printed edition of G… Read more…

First edition, bound in quarter black roan over worn marbled boards. Ownership signature of ‘Midgley Rushworth’ from 1840 on front flyleaf; similar inscription on final flyleaf. Foxing and browning but internally very good. Lacking the frontispiece. Martineau’s novella about industrial conflict is set in Manchester. BLx3 only. Read more…

A moralising chapbook dated Stockport, November, 1837. Homemade, vernacular, card wrappers in very good condition with old folds. Hand stitched to the printed leaves and inscribed on the wrapper: ‘Mess.rs Geo Wilson & Co’ in black ink. Vignette of a blacksmith at work on the title page. 12 pages all intact, in very good condition. Read more…

23-page pamphlet dedicated to the description and promotion of the R. 100 commercial airship, the first ever designed for world operation, designed and constructed in Howden, Yorkshire by the Airship Guarantee Company, Ltd, Maiden flight on the morning of 16 th December 1929. A little wear and darkening to the edges of the original, illustrated pri… Read more…

First Edition of the translation of a unique Arabic Manuscript on archery of circa. A.D. 1500 which is part of the Garret Collection of manuscripts in Princeton University Library. Includes an inlaid note card stamped and dated Princeton, August 11th 1942 to Dr Robert Elmer from the author, signed Nabih. In very good plus condition with very slight… Read more…

A collection of 32 interleaved playscripts and cookbooks, technical handbooks, pocket almanacs, botanicals and bibliography which contains hundreds, perhaps thousands, of hours of work freely given by the books’ owners as they added to the printed texts on subjects as diverse as gothic architecture, early music, surgery, roses, illicit marriages, a… Read more…

‘The Daredevil Aeronaut’, Vincent Lunardi’s account of his first balloon flights made in Scotland’s capital, Edinburgh in a collection of pamphlets which was owned by a leading Newcastle attorney and Clerk of the Peace, Thomas Davidson, who seems likely to have acquired this book in connection with Lunardi’s disastrous subsequent balloon ascent out… Read more…

A beautiful set of Davies’ 48 photogravure plates depicting the Norfolk Broads still in their original portfolios as first issued, with a distinguished Norfolk provenance. These beautiful and evocative photographs by ‘the man who found the Broads’, (Charles Carrodus) are the works of the first of the great Broads photographers and a landmark in Eng… Read more…

The first printing of one of the most important 19th century Acts of the British Parliament which ended the slave trade in 1807. The passing of this bill into law on 25 March 1807 marked a turning point in the campaign led by William Wilberforce against this cruellest of trades transporting human cargoes between Africa, the West Indies and the Amer… Read more…

Unusually lively Irish-flavoured pamphlet collection from the turn of the 18th century including the notorious sex scandal of Mervyn Touchet (second Earl of Castle Haven), two items attributed to Jonathan Swift and a scarce Dublin printing of An Inquiry into some of the Causes of the Ill Situation of the Affairs of Ireland. Full sheepskin binding,… Read more…

True first edition, first issue of E M Forster's family saga with the motto 'Only Connect', considered by many to be his masterpiece. This edition has absolute primacy with four pages only of advertisements following the printed text - in the second issue from later in 1910 the advertisements extend to eight pages and include a notice of this novel… Read more…

A selection of 37 window-mounted, hand coloured views around Regent’s Park in a super-luxurious bespoke Sotheran’s binding. Chunky square format (25x25cm) bound in crushed red morocco with gilt lettering, raised spine bands - a little fading to the spine. Marbled endpapers with red morocco turn-ins and slight off-setting to the marbling. Card leave… Read more…

Rare collection of psalms and hymns printed for the Chapel of the Magdalen Hospital in Southwark in London ‘for the Reception of Penitent Prostitutes’. One of the reformed prostitutes is depicted in the frontispiece - the young women who sung these hymns were shielded from view in the octagonal chapel from behind a curtain. The Magdalen Chapel beca… Read more…

Annotated Cambridge edition of Julius Caesar owned by the life long Shakespearian George ‘Dadie’ Rylands who began directing Shakespeare at school, oversaw professional recordings of the plays at Cambridge and schooled in Shakespeare some of the leading actors of the twentieth century. In association with the Marlowe Society and a group of professi… Read more…

The first two parts of the Journal of the earliest British club specifically constituted to explore caves. This is one of twelve copies made using carbon paper and containing original silver gelatin photographs as illustrations, painstakingly tipped into each of the copies. There were the only two issues of this journal published but we cannot loca… Read more…

William Parson’s 1826 Leeds Directory, owned and inscribed by a Leeds butcher and a female family member also from a butchering family - both of whom are referenced in the printed text. PHYSICAL DESCRIPTIONl: Small octavo bound in half black roan; fold out map of Leeds is present but detached. Signatures of ‘John Cockshott Farsley 1826’ and ‘Mary A… Read more…

From the library of a distinguished British scholar of Ezra Pound, this collection of essays has been inscribed by its editor the poet Peter Russell: ‘For mother with love from Peter [Russell] October 30th, 1950 - the date of publication, being the sixty fifth birthday of Ezra Pound’ with Russell’s ownership stamp and ‘Please return to’ above - no… Read more…

Early edition in pleasingly unsophisticated contemporary sheep binding, unadorned except with blind rules Small octavo in very good early 18th century full sheep, just starting at the tail of the hinge between front board and spine; no pastedowns; engraved title page on verso of A1, as if functioning as a frontispiece; fraying to foreedge of this l… Read more…

First edition of Smart’s signature novel - with its memorable title and equally striking dustjacket. Publisher’s red cloth binding, near fine; contents near fine - a little toning to paper stock. Bookseller’s label from Welwyn Garden City to front pastedown.The jacket has divided along the spine with substantial loss to the paper over the spine and… Read more…

The first volume of the first edition of Shakespeare’s works to appear after the four Folio Editions of the seventeenth century and the very first illustrated edition which has been described by a recent scholar as an 'inaugurating moment'. The publisher Jacob Tonson and the book’s editor Nicholas Rowe achieve their preeminence among Shakespeare pr… Read more…

A very pleasing association copy of Volume III of Gilbert’s monumental biography presented by the author to Churchill’s friend and Parliamentary Private Secretary from the 1920s, Robert Boothby: ’Inscribed with many thanks for a most superb lunch Martin Gilbert. London January 1975’. Additionally Boothby has signed his name as ‘Boothby’ on the dedi… Read more…

Rare possibly unique survival of this miniature ready reckoner with a record of female ownership, probably to a London family of Covent Garden market traders. Miniature format bound in publisher’s cloth with gilt lettering, faded and marked but sound. All edges gilt. Pencilled ownership signature of ‘Isabelle Levy 1874’ to the yellow-coated flyleaf… Read more…

An inscribed copy of this rare book about the manners and customs on the Solway Firth. Small format bound in embossed blue-green cloth, neatly repaired, with yellow-coated endpapers and an albumen portrait of the author tipped in opposite the title page, inscribed below. Collates complete: pp208; a little paper decay at the foot of the title page a… Read more…