Lot 36
Stuart, John Sobieski Stolberg and Charles Edward
The Costume of the Clans
Auction: 02 October 2025 from 10:00 BST
Description
with Observations upon the Literature, Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce of the Highlands and Western Isles during the Middle Ages; and on the Influence of the Sixteenth, Seventeenth, and Eighteenth Centuries upon their Present Condition. Edinburgh: John Menzies, 1845. First edition, large folio (56 x 38.2cm), contemporary red half morocco, gilt edges, 36 plates, most of them hand-coloured etchings of ‘Highland’ costume (frequently heightened in gum arabic), the remainder including tinted lithographs of antiquities, spine sunned, a few areas of skinning to leather, variable spotting to contents, etched title-page with short closed tear to foot of gutter, letterpress title-page and dedication leaf creased
Footnote
A notorious work of forgery and fantasy by the impostor Stuart brothers, Englishmen whose real surname was Allen, but who presented themselves (in good faith or otherwise) as grandsons of Prince Charles Edward Stuart, and set about producing works revealing the wealth, and strictly Catholic and Celtic character, of Scottish culture in the middle ages.