LOCKE, NEWTON, CROMWELL, ANNE BOLEYN, MARY STUART…: SPLENDIDLY BOUND AND ILLUSTRATED SET OF LODGE’S PORTRAITS

LODGE, Edmund. Portraits of Illustrious Personages of Great Britain. Engraved from Authentic Pictures in the Galleries of the Nobility and the Public Collections of the Country. With Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Their Lives and Actions. London: Harding, Mavor and Lepard (Shakespeare Press), 1823-34. Twelve volumes. Imperial octavo, 19th-century three-quarter brown morocco gilt, marbled boards, endpapers and edges. $2500.

Imperial octavo edition of Lodge’s greatest work, illustrated with 240 fine steel-engraved portraits after original paintings by Holbein, Vandyke and others.

"One of the most magnificent books that we have ever seen, and, whether we consider the genius of the painter or the talents of the engravers, reflects high honor on the age and nation which produced it" (London Monthly Review). First published in 40 folio parts in 1821, Lodge's Portraits was praised by Sir Walter Scott as "a collection which at once satisfies the imagination and the understanding, showing us… how the most distinguished of our ancestors looked, moved and dressed, and… how they thought, acted, lived, and died" (Preface). Subjects include Locke, Newton, Cromwell, Wellington, Robert Boyle, Lord Nelson, Sir Thomas More, Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, Mary Stuart, Walter Raleigh, and Francis Bacon. The steel engravings are after the original portraits by Holbein, Vandyke, and others. Holbein's main task as Court Painter to Henry VIII was "to paint portraits of the royal household. It is because of Holbein's unfailing eye that we still have such a vivid picture of the men and women of that period" (Artchive). Allibone, 1120. Lowndes, 1381. Bookplates.

Some foxing to plates, wear to binding extremities. A very good set.