This wonderfully illustrated is probably the first illustrated fable with the be a female English author. It is a a glorious book in many ways.
717J Æsop edited by Planudes, Maximus,; approximately 1260-approximately 1310. French Translator Baudoin, Jean, 1590?-1650. English Translator Behn, Aphra, 1640-1689. Illustrator Barlow, Francis, 1622-1704. Engraver, Dudley, Thomas, active 1670-1687
Æsop’s Fables, with his life: in English, French, and Latin. Newly translated. Illustrated with one hundred and twelve sculptures. To this edition are likewise added, thirty-one new figures representing his life. By Francis Barlow.
London: printed by R. Newcomb, for Francis Barlow, and are to be sold by the booksellers of London and Westminster, 1703. $6,500
Folio 32 x 19 cm. Signatures: π1 (engraved) π1π1 (“), a², B-L² Bb-Ll² Bbb-Ppp² A reissue of the 1666 and 1687 edition sheets, with cancel title page, but also including some sheets from the 1666 edition; the exact composition, including the engraved title page used, varies from copy to copy. 31 leaves of plates illustrated (metal cuts), coat of arms, table . 110 half-page vignette engravings to the ‘Fables’. And 30 of 31 leaves, Lacking the censored/suppressed plate 17. Plus frontispiece which in this copy is bound in the location plate 17 should be. Plate was considered to be obscene in the seventeenth century …to the present? In many copies the frontispiece is placed here and in other copies there is a second copy of plate 23 placed here, but in most is is totally absent or mutilated. (SEE O’Donnell for a detailed description of copies) This is a large copy with ample margins. It is bound in full contemporary calf recently very professionally rebacked with spine label.
110 fables and morals in French and Latin prose. Latin life and version by Maximus Planudes; in this edition, the French version is by Jean Baudoin and the engraved English version is by Aphra Behn./ Life of Aesop in English, French, and Latin; fables with morals in French and Latin with French and English titles
Otto Benesch of the Albertina Museum, Vienna has called him ‘one of the greatest illustrators of all time’.’ (Edward Hodnett)
The English verse is by Aphra Behn (1640 – 1689)
She was commissioned especially for each of the ‘Fables’. Which consist of six lines for each fable, four lines of narrative and two lines of “Morrall ” they have been engraved beneath each picture, which appears on the recto. Marry Ann O’donnell in her Boigraphy of Aphra Behn, suggests that Bhen probably provided the verses for the 31 engravings of the Life of Æsop. (See O’donnell page 239 BB16.) Germaine Greer accepts this)
The unsigned plates are engraved by Barlow and the remainder by Thomas Dudley, a student of Wenceslaus Hollar. Barlow himself drew and engraved all of the illustrations for the ‘Fables’
‘The Ingenious Mrs. A. Behn has been so obliging as to perform the English Poetry, which in short comprehends the Sense of the Fable and Moral: Whereof to say much were needless, since it may sufficiently recommend it self to all Persons of Understanding.’ (Francis Barlow).
__’Francis Barlow was the first native English book illustrator – indeed, the leading interpretative illustrator in England before 1800 … Otto Benesch of the Albertina Museum, Vienna has called him ‘one of the greatest illustrators of all time’.’ (Edward Hodnett).__
According to the 1666 ed., Thomas Philipot is responsible for the English translations and Robert Codrington for the French and Latin. In this ed. the English verses (accompanying the illustrations to the fables and the life) are by Aphra Behn, the French life differs, and the French fables have been revised
Hofer, P., in Harvard Lib. Bull., 2 (1948),; 294 M.A. O’Donnell ,APHRA BEHN 1986, Pages 239-244 her # BB16 (for the 1687 edition) See Janet Todd , The Works of Aphra Bhen 1991 1;#72) ESTC System No\006357352; ESTC Citation NoT87018; Identified as Wing A695 on UMI microfilm.
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