Myrrour of the worlde.

Accession number:

PML 703

Uniform title:

Image du monde. English (Middle English)

Published:

[Westminster] : William Caxton, [about 1489-1490]

Description:

[88] leaves : illustrations (woodcuts) ; 28 cm (fol.)

Credit Line:

Purchased with the Bennett collection, 1902.

Notes:

Gossuin or Gautier de Metz was named as author in some of the manuscript sources.
Dates based on device and paper evidence.
Collation: a-l⁸: 88 leaves.
11 woodcuts and 27 (with repeats) woodcut diagrams. Woodcut initials, printed lombards and paragraph marks.
Paper format: Chancery folio
Printed in Caxton's type 6:120B.
Title from incipit of tabula (leaf a1r): Here begynneth [th]e table of the rubrices of this presente volume named the myrrour of the world or thymage of the same.
Translated by William Caxton between 2 January and 8 March 1480/81.
Translator from Caxton's Prologue (leaves a3v): ...And now at this tyme rudely translated out of frensshe in to Englissh by me symple persone Wyll[ia]m Caxton. at the request. desire coste [and] dispense of the honourable and worshipful man Hugh Bryce alderman and Cytezen of londen/ entendyng to present the same unto the vertuous noble [and] puyssau[n]t Lord Wyll[ia]m lord hastynges lor Chamberlayn unto the most Crysten kynge/ kynge Edward the fourthe kynge of England [and] of Fraunce [et]c. ... And emprysed by me right unable [and] of ytil connyng to translate [and] brynge it in our maternal tonge [th]e second day of the moneth of Janyuer the yere of our sayde lord .M.cccc.lxxx/ in thabbay of Westmestre by londen...
Caxton's device on leaf l8v.
In most copies sheet k2.7 is a cancellans (see BMC).
PML Checklist enters this under: Vincentius Bellovacensis. Imago Mundi. In English.
PML copy leaf dimensions: 27 x 18.4 cm
PML copy with leaves a4.5 and k1.8 repaired in gutter or cancellans.

Binding:

18th/19th-century gilt- and blind-stamped English blue, straight-grained morocco over paper boards (28 x 19.5 cm), sewn on 5 supports possibly by Roger Payne, with the Blandford crest in the center of each board. Plain paper doublures and fly leaves; decorative endbands; gilt edges.

Inscriptions/Markings:

Hand decoration: No rubrication required. Annotations: Diagrams not labeled in manuscript (as Edition I). No notations in text.

Provenance:

Richard Farmer (1735-1797), signature (fourth fly leaf verso) with his notes on the sale of other copies (fifth fly leaf recto); his sale, March 1798, lot 6223, (to Thomas Payne?); Michael Wodhull (1740-1816); his sale, Sotheby's London, 24 March 1803, lot 1030; George Spencer Churchill (1766-1840), Fifth Duke of Marlborough and Marquess of Blandford, crest on binding; his sale (White Knights Library), Evans, 23 June 1819, lot 2978, to Triphook for Hibbert for £55.13.0; George Hibbert (1757-1837); his sale, Evans, 16 March 1829, lot 5663, to Pickering; Rev. John Fuller Russell (1814-1884), armorial booklabel (front pastedown); his sale, Sotheby's, 26 June 1885, lot 806, to Quaritch for £265; Bernard Quaritch, catalogue VI (1887), no. 37906; Richard Bennett (1849-1930), armorial bookplate (front pastedown) and bibliographical notes: No. 134, 22/4/96 and price code rlm/-/- less 10% +com (front fly leaf verso); Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913), purchased with the Bennett collection, 1902.

Classification:

Incunable Collection

Catalog Link:

See more information »

Genres:

Incunabula

Printers' devices (Printing)

Morocco bindings (Binding)

Inscriptions (Provenance)

Department:

Printed Books