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Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser, The
London: Scott, Webster, and Geary, 1842. Item #06420
A Handsome Pall Mall Prize Binding: Spenser in Full Green Morocco
with Institutional Supralibros and Country-House Provenance
SPENSER, Edmund. The Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser. In five volumes. A new edition; with introductory and glossarial notes: to which is prefixed, the account of the author's life and criticism of his works by John Aikin, M.D.
London: Scott, Webster, and Geary, 1842.
Five small octavo volumes (7 5/8 x 4 5/8 inches; 194 x 118 mm.).
Handsomely bound ca. 1842 in full green straight-grain morocco by White of 24 Pall Mall, London, with their printed binder’s stamp on the front pastedown. Covers elaborately tooled in gilt with a wide fillet border and centrally stamped with the gilt supralibros of Downing’s Academy, incorporating an oval device enclosing an open book and the motto Domine illuminatio mea. Spines with five raised bands richly gilt in compartments with repeating floral and foliate tools, red morocco lettering labels, and volume numbers lettered in gilt. Board edges and turn-ins finely tooled, marbled endpapers, all edges gilt.
A very attractive and well-preserved set, the bindings bright and fresh with only minimal wear, the gilt crisp and luminous.
Provenance:
Bound as a mid-nineteenth-century institutional or prize binding for Downing’s Academy, as evidenced by the gilt supralibros on each cover. Later in the library of William Carr (1862–1925), of Ditchingham Hall, Norfolk, historian and collector, with his engraved armorial bookplate (Ad sidera tollite vultus) on the front pastedowns. With a later penciled bookseller’s or shelf mark.
This elegant five-volume Spenser represents the high standard of West End binding in the 1840s, produced by the Pall Mall binder White, whose work - while less frequently encountered than that of Zaehnsdorf or Bedford - embodies the same careful craftsmanship and decorative restraint characteristic of the period’s best trade bindings. The use of straight-grain morocco, combined with dense gilt ornament and repeating floral tools, reflects the mid-Victorian taste for richly textured yet orderly decoration, while the bold red labels provide a striking chromatic contrast against the deep green leather.
Particularly appealing is the presence of the institutional supralibros, indicating that the set was likely issued as a presentation or prize binding—a form of book production that often resulted in bindings of a higher-than-usual quality. Such volumes were intended to convey both scholarly merit and aesthetic distinction, and frequently entered private libraries of substance, as here.
The later ownership of William Carr of Ditchingham Hall adds a further layer of interest, situating the set within the tradition of nineteenth-century English country-house collecting, where finely bound editions of canonical authors such as Spenser formed an essential component of the cultivated gentleman’s library.
Price: $1,850.00