MALORY, SIR THOMAS. (H. OSKAR SOMMER, EDITOR; ANDREW LANG, CONTRIBUTOR.)

Le Morte Darthur by Syr Thomas Malory. The original edition of William Caxton now reprinted and edited with an introduction and glossary by H. Oskar Sommer. With an essay on Malory's prose style by Andrew Lang.

London. David Nutt. 1889-1891. First Edition Thus. Illustrated by a Facsimile plate of a page of the Caxton Edition and further by two folding charts detailing the various printed and manuscript incarnations of the story. Stylized rubrications throughout. 4 volumes, complete as issued. Small 4to. 7.5" x 10.5". Regally bound in 3/4 gilt ruled grain Morocco and Linen covered boards. Gilt ruled spine compartments with gilt tooled roses and world globes. Marebled endsheets.Top edges gilded.

IT is remarkable that it should have been reserved to a Prussian scholar to produce the monumental reprint "Le Morte Darthur," ' which was published 1889 - 1891. As a specimen of typography, this work has few equals, and Dr. Sommer, as the result of four years' almost continuous labor, effected, thanks to the German Government, who granted three subsidies, a result which must delight all bibliophiles, and at the same time reflect the greatest credit upon himself. The first volume, covering eight hundred and sixty-two pages, is a reprint from Earl Spencer's copy, printed page for page and line for line. Only two copies of Caxton's editio princeps of 1485 are extant. That belonging to Lord Spencer was acquired at Lloyd's sale in 1816 for £325, but lacks eleven leaves, which were replaced by facsimile leaves executed from the only other copy in existence, which, after belonging to the Harleian collection, was sold to the Earl of Jersey, and was one of the gems of the library at Osterley Park. This copy is perfect, and on the death of the owner came into the market, when a spirited contest for its ownership naturally ensued. The British Museum bid £1,800 for it, but there stopped. The prize fell to Mrs. Abby E. Pope, of Brooklyn, N. Y., who paid £1,950 and became the envied owner of the volume.

The Caxton edition is printed in black letter, and the type throughout is that described by Mr. Blades as 4*. The volume has no title-page, the lines are spaced out to an even length of 4% inches, and thirty-eight lines make a full page.1 It is without folios, headlines or catchwords, and the initial letters are printed from wood. Those to "Books" are ornamental letters five lines high, the initials to "Chapters" being only three lines high. Dr. Sommer has used handsome Roman type in lieu of black letters, but at the beginning of volume I, has provided the reader with a fac-simile of page 75 from Earl Spencer's copy. The next edition after Caxton's was printed by Wynkyn de Worde in 1498, in folio, and Lord Spencer owned the only known copy. Of a second edition by the same celebrated printer, dated 1529, the only existing copy, known as Archdeacon Wrangham's, has been acquired by the British Museum. The Earl Spencer collection is now the property of the Manchester Public Library, in England. Only nine other reprints prior to Soimner's were published, of which the best known are Southey's edition of 1817 and Mr. Thomas Wright's two editions of 1856 and 1866, included in the "Library of Old Authors."

' A few pages have less than thirty-eight lines and some have thirty-nine.

Volumes II and III of Sommer's edition contain the critical and literary portion of his work, and also Mr. Lang's essay. One of the most valuable contributions in these volumes consists of a "List of Names and Places" in the "Morte Darthur," being the "first complete and "critical index" to this work ever published. In it are from eight hundred and fifty to one thousand names which occur in the text. It is printed in seventy-four double columns, and an idea of its laborious character may be gathered from noticing that Arthur fills eight, Galahad three, Launcelot seven, and Tristram six columns respectively.

Tear to both charts ( partiallytape repaired from verso). The mildest of occasional wear to extremities. Minor flecking to top edge of Vol. 1, else a Fine, extremely attractive set.

Item #8729