MILTON, John; The Crown Edition of The Poets of Great Britain

[The Crown Edition of] The Poets of Great Britain

New York and London: Chiwick Press:- Charles Whittingham and Co,, [1900]. Item #05259

'Paradise Lost'
A Fine Extra-Illustrated Edition of the Poems of John Milton
Finely Bound Almost Certainly by The Harcourt Bindery of Boston

MILTON, John. [The Crown Edition of] The Poets of Great Britain. Extra Illustrated Copy of the Aldine Edition of the British Poets. New York and London: Chiwick Press:- Charles Whittingham and Co,, [1900].

Two small octavo volumes (6 1/2 x 4 inches; 165 x 102 mm.). [i]-lxiv, [1]-337, [1, imprimateur]; [i]-xvi, [1]-387, [1, blank] pp. Title-pages printed in black and red. With a life of John Milton.

Extra-illustrated by the insertion of twelve engraved plates, including four hand-colored, all with tissue-guards.

Handsomely bound almost certainly by The Harcourt Bindery ca. 1900, in full red morocco, covers with double gilt border with fancy corner-pieces, enclosing a spray of flowers elaborately stamped in gilt and with green morocco leaf inlays and buff morocco inlaid flowers. Spines with four raised bands decoratively tooled and lettered in gilt in compartments and with three olive green morocco flower inlays. Highly decorative gilt turn-ins surrounding an oval panel of green morocco decorated in gilt with a large central gilt flower with inlaid red morocco flower head, green moire silk end-leaves, all edges gilt. Minimal rubbing to joints, otherwise fine. Although unsigned the binding is almost certainly by The Harcourt Bindery.

John Milton (9 December 1608 - 8 November 1674) was an English poet and intellectual who served as a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under its Council of State and later under Oliver Cromwell. He wrote at a time of religious flux and political upheaval, and is best known for his epic poem Paradise Lost (1667). Written in blank verse, Paradise Lost is widely considered to be one of the greatest works of literature ever written.

We believe this to be 1/10 copies specially bound and extra-illustrated.

The Harcourt Bindery of Boston has made fine cloth and leather art bindings by hand since 1900. It remains the largest for-profit hand bookbindery in the U.S. When it was founded in 1900, Boston was home to over 47 book binderies and 1,452 craftsmen, according to the company’s website. Few large binderies exist today. Before the 1930s, there were about fifteen people working in the Harcourt Bindery; the number fell to five during the Depression, and the company changed hands three times between 1927 and 1931. When binder Sam Ellenport took over Harcourt in 1971, there were only four employees. In 2008, Ellenport sold the Harcourt Bindery to Acme Bookbinding of Boston.

Price: $2,500.00