2) Juvenal and Persius, trans. Barten Holyday. 1673
3) Callipædiæ: getting pretty children. 1710
4) Drunken Barnaby’s four journeys to the north of England. 1714
1) A Restitution of Decayed Intelligence.
736J. Verstegan, Richard. (1550-1640)
A Restitvtion Of Decayed Intelligence: Inantiquities. Concerning the most noble, and renowned English Nation. By the study, and travell of R.V. Dedicated unto the Kings most excellent Majestie.
London: by Iohn Bill, Printer to the Kings most Excellent Maiestie, 1628
Price. $2,300
Quarto, 14 x 17 cm. Second edition (the first printed in England). –**4, A-Z4, Aa-Xx4(Xx4, blank, lacking). There are Eleven engravings by Verstegan himself, (copies/re-cut for copies printed in England but very faithfully so) that appear in the text including the title vignette of the tower of Babel. The engravings illustrate various Saxon Gods who are the namesakes of our ‘days of the week’,( in the style of an emblem book) The arrival of the Saxons in Britain, and remains of ancient fish and fossils found inland. This edition also has woodcut initials, head and tailpieces.
This copy is bound in original sheep rebacked about 100 years ago.
Having one of my favorite titles of an early modern book, this book does not betray its promise. The contents list reveal the breath of subjects explored by Verstegan in order that unlike Joannes Goropius Becanus his opinion would not exceeded his proofs. The ten Chapters are expansive, consisting of observations historical, natural, linguistic, cultural and moral . Published first in Antwerp on the eve of ”The gun powder plot” and dedicated to James I , wonderful illustrated by Verstegan. The book defies categorisation touching upon many genres of books, Lexicon, Natural history (geology and paleontography) , Mythology (This includes the first English version of the story of the Pied Piper of Hamelin) and Historical national controversies, Catholic apologetics (and idolatrie of the old pagan Saxons.”).
Verstegan sets out by reminding us that
“We not only finde Englishmen (and those no Idiots neyther) that cannot directly tellfrom whench the Englishmen are descended, and chancing to speak of the Saxons, doerather seeme to understand them for a kind of forraine people . . . how ridiculous it mustseem unto the posterity of the Brittaines, for Englishmen to borrow honour from them,not needing to borrow it of any in the world.”
Graham Parry places this book in a historical context:
“The reputation of the Anglo-Saxons was further enhanced by an influential little book published in 1605, ‘A Restitution of Decayed Intelligence in Antiquities’ by Richard Verstegan. In the dedication to King James, Verstegan ignores the conventional flattering genealogy of the King from Brutus and Arthur, and plainly asserts that ‘your majestie is descended of the chiefest blood-royal of our ancient English-Saxon kings.’ (James would probably have flatly denied any such affiliations.)Verstegan offered a convncing theory of the Teutonic origin of the Britishpeople which he buttressed with sensible evidence from Tacitus and other Roman historians, supplemented with philological material astutely used. He also introduced evidence of cultural and religious similarities with the ancient Germanic tribes encountered by the Romans. He acknowledged that his theory of Teutonic settlement lacked the glorious appeal of the far-fetched derivations from Troy or Greece or Scythia, but none the less he maintained there was a peculiar virtue in the Nordic line that was every bit as admirable as any Mediterranean inheritance. The repossession of Britain by the Saxons after the Roman occupation was a reinforcement of the old Teutonic strength. Verstegan admired the hardiness and energy of what he called the English Saxons (whom we would term the Anglo-Saxons) in their military and political affairs, just as he admired the spiritual brightness shown by their eager reception of Christianity. Above all, the vigor of the race was characterized by the English language, which overcame the Latin of the Romans and resisted the French of the Normans. A terse, witty, and sinewy language, it expressed the plain forthrightness of the English spirit. Although it showed the scars of its battles with Latin and French, it needed no meretricious ornaments from modern languages, and Verstegan was hostile to any new borrowings from Europe, or neologistic inventions, for ‘our tongue is most copious if we please to make our most use thereof.’” (Parry)
Jane P. Davidson explains Verstegan’s discussion of “ the geology of Britain in his Restitution. He posited that Albion, as he calls England, was once part of the continent of Europe and connected to France as a peninsula. One of the reasons which he gave for this theory was the presence of what we would call fossils and what he recognized as the remains of animals which were not living in the areas in which they were found. I have retained Verstegan’s original spelling:
“A third reason is, that in digging about two fadome deepin the earth, though in some places more and in some lesse, innumerable shelles of sea life are found, and that commonly in all places of these plain and even grounds both in field and town and heerof to be thoroughly informed I have talked with such laboring men as usually digged welles and deep foundations of buildings and they all agree that they do commonly in all places find an innumerable quantitie of these shelles some whole and some broken and in many places the great bones of fishes whereof I have seen many and have had some even as they have bin digged out of the earth. For a more plain description of the manner and forme of these bones and shelles of fishes and to give the curious reader herin the more satisfaction I have thought good in the next ensuing page to set down some of them in picture.” (page103)
After this comment Verstegan placed his illustration ofvarious bones and shells, and a tongue stone, so that his readers might take his meaning, more plainly, as he put it. He went on to comment specifically about the tongue stone and to give further indication to his readers that he was something of an empirical scientist himself. His statement concerning tongue stones seems to indicate that Verstegan understood these to be fossils, if not fossil shark teeth:
“… potters woorking their clay, which is gotten in some espetial places, do fynd in it certain things which are as hard as stone and of the very forme and shape of the toungs of some sortes of fishes, each with the root unto it to make it the very markable and right proportion of such a kind of toung in all respects, some being more than two inches long and some lesse then one inche. And they that thus fynd them do not otherwise call them but the tongues of fishes, which beeing so, and turned into very hard stone, is a strange thing in nature, but the lesse strange because nature in her conversions of other sub-stances into stone is often seen to woork the lyk.”
ETYMOLOGIES and Lexicons:
Anthony a Wood, in Athenae Oxonienses (1691–92). emphasized Verstegen’s linguistic skills, calling him “a most admirable Critic in the Saxon and Gothic Languages.
Were-wulf.
This name remaineth stil known in the Teutonic
Were-wulf. This name remaineth stil known in the Teutonic, & is as much to say as man-wolf; the greeks expressing the very lyke, in Lycanthropos.
Ortelius not knowing what were signified, because in the Netherlandes it is now clean out of use, except just composed with wolf, doth mis-interprete it according to his fancie.
The Were-Wolves are certain sorcerers, who having annoynted their bodyes, with an oyntment which the make by the instinct of the devil; and putting on a certain inchanted girdel, do not only unto the view of others seemed as Wolves, but to their own thinking have both the shape and nature of wolves, so long as they were the said girdel. And they do dispose theselves as very wolves, in wurrying and killing, and most of humaine creatures.
Of such sundry have bin taken and executed in sundry partes of Germanie,and the Netherlands. One Peeter Stump for being a Were-wolf/ and having killed thirteen children, two women, and one man; was at Bedbur not far from Cullen in the yeare 1589, put unto a very terrible death. The flesh of divers partes of his body was pulled out with hot iron tongs, his armes thighes and legges broke on a wheel, & his body lastly burnt. He dyed with very great remorce, defyring that his body might not be spared from any torment, so his soule might be saved.
The Were-wolf (so called in Germanie) is in France, called Loupgarou.
Jane P. Davidson, A History of Paleontology Illustration. Bloomington: Indiana University Press 2008
Jane P. Davidson, “Historical Point of View: Fish Tales: Attributing the First Illustration of a Fossil Shark’s Tooth to Richard Verstegan (1605) and Nicolas Steno (1667)” in Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia vol. 150 (2000). https://www.jstor.org/stable/4065077?read-now=1&seq=14#page_scan_tab_contents
Graham Parry. The Trophies of Time: English Antiquarians of the Seventeenth Century. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995.
Rolf H. Bremmer, Jr. The anglo-saxon Pantheon according to Richard Verstegen 1605, Published in The recovery of Old-English. Kalamazoo Medieval Institute Publications 2000.
2) Juvenal and Persius, trans. Barten Holyday. 1673
748J. Juvenal and Persius, trans. Barten Holyday. (1593-1661)
Decimus Junius Juvenalis, And Aulus Persius Flaccus Translated and Illustrated, As well withSculpture as Notes. By Barten Holyday, D.D.and late Arch-Deaconof Oxon.
Oxford: Printed by W. Downing, for F. Oxlad Senior, J. Adams, and F. Oxlad Junior. Anno Dom. 1673. Price $3,200
Folio, 28.5×19 cm. First edition; first complete edition of all the Satires of Juvenal in English. [π]2, a-b2, B-Z4, Aa-Xx4 (lacking Xx4 blank ). Forty-eight text engravings and woodcuts appear in the text, as well as four large folding engravings. (4 engraved plates (incl. 1 map, 1 folding, & 1 of a manual counting system) The title page is printed in red and black.
This is a gorgeous copy, bound in full contemporary calf expertly rebacked , with renewed endpapers, later ownership note on title.
The Illustrations in this book include full-paged maps, portraits of the two authors, games, household objects, plants, animals, architectural styles, city views, and other things the commentator thought a seventeenth century English reader would need to see illustrated in order to better understand the Satires.This is a deftly executed edition with admirable plates. The completeness and breadth of illustrations isimpressive, greatly contributing to an English reader’s enjoyment of the Satires.
“The [engravings] are nearly all by David Loggan, but unsigned. There is a liberal use of ornaments in which the Sheldonian Press was markedly deficient at this time. […] The Oxford publishers may have wished to show that they could hold their own in the face of the University Press.” (Madan)
Holyday was a dramatist, translator, and divine, archdeacon of Oxford. This posthumous edition was issued by his step son. It is a line for line translation, devoid of poetry, but rich with learned annotations and interesting illustrations.
“Juvenal, satirist of Roman vices under the empire. Of his life little is known, although most early accounts agree that he spent some time in military service and ended his life in exile for having criticized a popular stage performer who was a special favorite of the emperor Domitian. He is the author of sixteen satires, divided traditionally into five books. In these biting attacks onpublic manners and morals. Juvenal shows himself to have been a sharp observer of his fellow men.
‘Whatever men do,’ he announces in his first satire, ‘their devotion, their fear, their rage, their pleasure, their joys, their conversations —all these will make up the potpourri of my little work;’ and he fulfills his pledge with the bitter gusto of an inspired cynic. Unlike Horace, the other great satirist of Roman letters, Juvenal seldom places himself among the foolish, the corrupt, and the frustrated; and while Horace’s satires are conversational in tone and meter, Juvenal’s are tight, rhetorical, and finely polished. He excels in sketching memorable vignettes and small portraits etched in vitriol. His satires abound in wittyobservations and terse proverbs, among which is the motto mens sana in corpore sano, ‘a sound mind in a sound body.’” (Sandys HCS)
Wing J-1276; Madan III, 2979; ESTC R12290; Brueggmann, p. 680;
3). Callipædiæ: getting pretty children 1710.
843J QUILLET, Claude, (1602-1661 ) [William Oldisworth, translator; Elisha Kirkall, engraver]
Callipædiæ : The Art of getting pretty children, In four books translated from the original Latin of Claudius Quillettus. By several hands.
London: Printed for Bernard Lintott at the Cross Keys between the Two Temple Gates in Fleetstreet, 1710 Price $3,200
Octavo: 16 x 10 cm. Signatures A-M4.. Frontispiece, facing title and plates, facing pp. 1,16,31 and 47, not counted in the signatures or pagination. First English edition. Bound in Contemporary speckled sheep boards framed with single gilt fillet, spine in six compartments between raised bands, recent Morocco lettering piece gilt. Rubbing and scuffs to boards and spine, joints skillfully repaired, binding now sturdy and secure. Pages generally clean, with the plates in deep, rich impressions.
First Edition in English of this neo-Latin poem on procreation, pregnancy, and the raising of children, the translation of which (from the French) is attributed in subsequent editions to William Oldisworth.): complete with all five full-page engravings by Elisha Kirkall (the plates apparently were not ready when the book was issued and are often lacking, as with all three copies at the British Library) and four final index and advertisement leaves. This is quite a poem, very suggestive and informative! First published in Leiden, in 1655, and in Paris, in 1656. A Latin version was issued in London in 1708; two editions in English (the other printed for John Morphew) appeared in 1710 and in 1712. The French abbe Claude Quillet’s poem concerns not only raising children but also choosing the right wife, and offers thoughts on marriage, divided into four books: “The First treats of the Nature and Variety of Beauty, and of the Choice of a Wife. The Second, of Marriage and Enjoyment, with Laws and Rules relating to both, from Nature and Astrology. The Third, of Conception, and Imagination. The Fourth and Last, of the Beauty of the Mind, of Education and Virtue, and of the Variety of Climes, Customs, and Manners.”
“KIRKALL, ELISHA (1682?–1742), engraver, born at Sheffield in Yorkshire about 1682, was son of a locksmith, from whom he learnt to work and engrave on metal. Walpole, Redgrave, and others erroneously give him the christian name of Edward. About 1702 he came to London, where he was employed ‘to grave arms, ornaments, etch and cut stamps in hard mettal for printing in books for several years’ (see Vertue in Brit. Mus. Addit. MS. 23076). He also studied drawing in the new academy in Great Queen Street, Lincoln’s Inn Fields. He married early in life, as appears from his trade card, preserved in the print room of the British Museum (reproduction in Linton’s ‘Masters of Wood-engraving’), which bears the names of Mr. Elisha and Mrs. Elizabeth Kirkall, and the date 31 Aug. 1707. This card was cut in relief on metal, and not on wood, as sometimes stated. Kirkall has been classed (see Chatto and Jackson’sTreatise on Wood-engraving) as a wood-engraver, and credited with the revival of the art in the eighteenth century. He is also claimed as the first exponent in England of the white-line intaglio manner of wood-engraving, afterwards brought to such perfection by Thomas Bewick [q. v.] It is very doubtful, however, whether he engraved on wood at all. “ DNB
Foxon,; O 142 ; English Short Title Catalog; English Short Title Catalog,; T67282; Case,253 ; Wellcome IV p. 457.
4). Drunken Barnaby’s four journeys to the north of England.
488J Anonymous. By Richard Brathwait. 1588?-1673.
Drunken Barnaby’s four journeys to the north of England. In Latin and English verse. Wittily and Merrily (tho’ near One Hundred Years ago) compos’d; found among some old musty Books, that had a long time lain by in a Corner; and now at last made publick. To which is added, Bessy Bell
London: printed for S. Illidge, under Searle’s Gate Lincolns-Inn New-Square: and sold by S. Ballard in Little-Britain, J. Graves in St. James’s-Street, and J. Walthoe over-against the Royal Exchange 1716. price $2,800
Octavo: 14 x 9cm. Signatures: A4, B-L8. 2 unnumbered leaves of plates This is the first printing under this title, The only previous edition was published as’Barnabees journall’ in 1638. This book describes Brathwait’s pilgrimages through England in doggerel English and Latin verse. Brathwait’s highly improper doggerel recounting the perambulations of an alcoholic lecher attracted little attention in its own day but became wildly popular in the eighteenth century. “Bessy Bell” is a similarly genteel ballad of courtship between two rustics.
“Richard Brathwait’s most famous work is Barnabae Itinerarium or Barnabees Journall [1638], by ‘Corymbaeus,’ written in English and Latin rhyme. The title-page says it is written for the “travellers’ solace” and is to be chanted to the old tune of “Barnabe.” The story of “drunken Barnabee’s” four journeys to the north of England contains much amusing topographical information, and its gaiety is unflagging. Barnabee rarely visits a town or village without some notice of an excellent inn or a charming hostess, but he hardly deserves the epithet ‘drunken.’” (EB)
“Thence to Ashton, good as may be
Was the wine, brave Knight, bright Ladie,
All I saw was comely specious,
Seemly gratious, neatly precious;
My Muse with Bacchus so long traded,
When I walk’t, my legs denaid it.”
The text is printed in parallel Latin and English on facing pages. Southey described Barnabee’s Journal as ‘the best piece of rhymed Latin in modern literature.’ Later editions of this work, beginning with the second edition, printed in 1716, altered the usage and spelling of words in the original. This first edition therefore was the only one available to cavalier, roundhead and restoration readers. The First edition is exceedingly rare.
There is also a bit of Shakespeariana in Barnabee, as he mentions the phrase ‘As you like it,’ suggesting thereby that it was of common usage, and served as a titular parallel to ‘Much Ado About Nothing,’ of the bard’s pen. Braithwaite , speaks of ‘As You Like It’ as a proverbial motto, and this seems more likely to imply the true explanation of the title of Shakespeare’s play. The title of the comedy may, on this supposition, be exactly parallel with that of ‘ Much Ado about Nothing.’ The proverbial title of the play implies that freedom of thought and indifference to censure which characterizes the sayings and doings of most of the actors, in this comedy of human nature in a forest. It is well to remember that Barnaby’s Journal was not printed until 1648-50; in it ‘drunken Barnaby’ finds the shop where ‘Officina juncta mutata Uti fiet” nota certa Quae delineatur charta. –Halliwell-Phillips.
Here is the section in question.
A shop neighbouring neare Iacco,
Where Young vends his old Tobacco,
‘As you like it’ sometimes sealed
Which Impression since repealed,
‘As you make it,’ he will have it
And in Chart and Front engrave it.”
Barnabae Itinerarium, Barnabees Journall, which in 1811 had not yet been attributed to Richard Braithwaite. Although the author of Barnabees Journall was unknown, Barnaby was commonly referred to as Barnaby Harrington because he was mistakenly associated with a town of that name. Insofar as the date of Bosworth’s birth is concerned, Allison had a reason for wishing Bosworth born no later than the early part of the seven- teenth century. In his 1805 edition of Drunken Barnaby’s Four Journeys, Joseph Haslewood calls attention to an occurrence in Part III where Bamaby seems to have been witness to an event that took place in York in 1634, (but at the age of) 8 at which date Bosworth/Barnaby (for so Allison almost certainly would have it) would have to be old enough to be on his drinking and wenching journeys.
Robin hood is also mentioned
[English text:]
Thence to Nottingam, where rovers
High-way riders, Sherwood drovers,
Like old Robin-Hood, and Scarlet,
Or like Little John his varlet;
Here and there they shew them doughty,
Cells and Woods to get their booty. “
ESTC (RLIN),; T006263; Wither to Prior vol. I #78;
Shakespeare and Shakespeareana. CATALOGUE NO 493. Maggs Bros. #34 & 35, THREE CENTURIES OF ENGLISH LITERATURE AND HISTORY. PART III–The Eighteenth Century. CATALOGUE NO 653.
Leave a Reply