Lot 139
Chaucer, Geoffrey
Rare Books, Manuscripts, Maps & Photographs
Auction: 5 September 2007 at 12:00 BST
Description
The workes of Geffrey Chaucer, newlie printed, with divers addicions, whiche were never in print before.. compiled by Jhon Lidgate, monke of Berie. [London: Jhon Kyngston for Jhon Wight], 1561, fifth edition, first issue, folio, black letter, title within woodcut border, woodcut sectional titles to The Canterbury Tales and The Romaunt of the Rose, with the 22 woodcuts in the Prologues used by Caxton in his second edition of the Prologues and not present in the second issue of this fifth edition, seventeenth century calf, upper margin cut down with headlines and page numerals occasionally trimmed, lower fore-margin of title and Prologue somewhat grubby and slightly frayed/friable, 2cm repair to title fore-margin, two short tears in lower margin of Prologue (one extending into text, without loss), some damp-staining to margins, some light soiling, small rust-hole in I2, occasional adhesions affecting a few letters, 2B1 torn and repaired, paper flaw to 3N1 affecting a few letters, paper flaw to blank margin of 3O3 and 3V7, some later blank leaves bound in at beginning (now loose), binding worn, cords weak but holding, one ownership inscription lightly erased from title
Footnote
Note: A complete copy of the desirable first issue of the fifth edition reproducing Caxton's woodcuts used in his second edition of The Canterbury Tales published in 1483. Pforzheimer 176; STC 5075; Langland to Wither 42
Provenance: John Goldwell, two early inscriptions on title, one trimmed; Samuel Oldham Lees, Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, 1858; A. Oldham Lees, Cai. Coll. Cambridge, 1890, inscription on later blank bound in