[HARINGTON] | The metamorphosis of Ajax; An apologie, London, 1596, 2 volumes, later half green morocco

The Property of the Downside Abbey General Trust

[HARINGTON, SIR JOHN]

A new discourse of a stale subject, called the metamorphosis of Aiax (An apologie…). London: Richard Field, 1596; [London: Edward Allde, 1596]

together 2 volumes, 8vo (143 x 92mm. and 150 x 93mm.), woodcut printer's device on first title-page, woodcut initials, head- and tailpieces, woodcut illustrations, second volume without final blank leaf, late eighteenth-century straight-grained green morocco-backed boards, the first volume bound for Samuel Ireland and the second bound to match, THE METAMORPHOSIS EXTENSIVELY ANNOTATED BY THE "POETICAL ANTIQUARY" THOMAS PARK, including notes on Harington's works and biography, ribald commentary on the book by his contemporaries, and transcriptions of notes made by Harington in his own copy, in ink and pencil, written both in the margins and on slips of paper tipped into the volume, cut close at head

THOMAS PARK'S COPY OF HARINGTON'S INFAMOUS PUBLICATIONS ON HIS FLUSHING TOILET, including the exceedingly rare (and deeply unconvincing) supplementary apology. Park (1758-1834) was a noted scholar of the Elizabethans and edited Sir John Harington's Nugae antiquae in 1804. He made copious notes in his copy of the Metamorphosis of Ajax, although few on the subsequent Apology beyond a comment that "This little tract is more rare than the 'Metamorphosis of Ajax; for which it pretends to be 'an Apologie'. Mr Malone has not been able to obtain it. Mr Reed has Sir John Harington's own Copy and like the present it has no title page". There is a later note on the flyleaf stating that these volumes appeared in Longman's Bibliotheca Anglo-poetica, or a descriptive catalogue of a rare and rich collection of early English poetry (1815), items 321 and 322, a catalogue which included many books from Park's library, and which included some of Park's manuscript notes as footnotes. The books were priced at £20 each in 1815 but they subsequently appeared in a 1817 Longman catalogue at the price £10-10s (extract pasted to the inside front cover of the first volume).

There were numerous editions of Ajax and its related works in 1596-1597, which have been studied by Peter Blayney; he concludes that despite different printers, they were most likely all published by Richard Field, and that this copy of the Metamorphosis is probably the FIRST EDITION, and this Apologie is probably the third edition.

LITERATURE:

STC 12779 & 12774.5 (listing just 2 copies of the latter, in the British Library and the Huntington); P. Blayney, "The printers of the 'Ajax' pamphlets of 1596-97", The Library, series 7, volume 17 (2016), 317-330

PROVENANCE:

first work: Samuel William Henry Ireland (died 1800), signature on title-page

second work: "Duplicate Bridgewr Liby", ink stamp at end

both works: Thomas Park (1758/9-1834), initials and signature on title-pages, note in first work "Bo[ught] of Sad[?] - 1797 from the Shakespeare Repository, Norfolk Street", and the date 1802 in second work; Henry Cunliffe (1826-1894), bookplates, sale, Replica Shoes 's, 14 May 1946, lot 247, £44, to Quaritch, with their pencil note re collation at end of both volumes

Samuel Ireland was a noted collector of early English books and he had almost all his books bound in half green morocco. His son William Henry Ireland was the noted Shakespeare forger, who displayed his forgeries in the family home at 8 Norfolk Street, Strand.

The Bridgewater library was founded by Sir Thomas Egerton in around 1600, and the tract volumes from this library have a distinctive open box with a number on each title-page (in this volume there is the number 6 in a three-sided box, so it at one point it was the sixth item in a tract volume). Duplicates from the library were sold in 1802 and 1804.

There is also a pencil note on the inside front cover of the first work, "Farmer's sale no. 986", probably relating to Dr Richard Farmer (1735-1797), whose extensive library was sold on 7 May 1798, though given the other provenance in this volume, this is most likely referring to another copy of this work.