Geography of Witchcraft First Edition - Montague Summers - Bauman Rare Books

Geography of Witchcraft

Montague SUMMERS

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Geography of Witchcraft

“STRANGE SIGHTS AND SHADOWY FIGURES LURKING”: THE GEOGRAPHY OF WITCHCRAFT

SUMMERS, Montague. The Geography of Witchcraft. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1927. Octavo, original black cloth, original dust jacket.

First American edition of Summers’ informative history, illustrated with eight plates, in original dust jacket.

Described by The Times of London as “in every way a ‘character,” the controversial scholar Montague Summers was born the son of an English banker. A passionate interest in medievalism and the occult led, in 1928, to his publication of the first English translation of Malleus Maleficarum (The Hammer of Witches), a 15th-century Latin work on the burning of witches. Summers followed with his History of Witchcraft and Demonology in 1926, succeeded by this volume, considered by him to be its complement. A well-researched survey of the field, with sections on Greece and Rome, Britain, America and Europe, the volume cites trial evidence, memoirs, folk histories, political and legal sources, and is illustrated with eight plates. Part of the series The History of Civilization, edited by C.K. Ogden, published same year as first English edition. This first American edition consisted of only 1040 copies, bound from same sheets as English edition. Four pages of advertisements at rear. Smith A12a. Owner signature.

Book about-fine, dust jacket extremely good with slight soiling, light wear to extremities, and a bit of toning to spine. Scarce.

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Aquatint Copperplate process by which the plate is “bitten” by exposure to acid. By changing the areas of the plate that are exposed and the length of time the plate is submerged in the acid bath, the engraver can obtain fine and varying shades of gray that closely resemble watercolor washes. Although the name contains the word “tint”, this is a black-and-white printing process; aquatint plates can often be hand colored, however.
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