Lot 126
£3,276
Rare Books, Manuscripts, Maps & Photographs
Auction: 28 September 2022 from 10:00 BST
Waltham Saint Lawrence: Golden Cockerel Press, 1926. 4to, original cream cloth, top edge gilt, others uncut, 5 copper-engraved plates by Eric Gill, dust jacket (with short closed tear to head) [Chanticleer 37; Evan Gill 277]
Note: First edition, one of 175 numbered copies, this copy inscribed by Gill for Father John O'Connor, the inspiration for G. K. Chesterton's Father Brown ('The Rev J. O'Connor from Gill, June 1926') on the front free endpaper, and including a suite of four engraved proofs of alternative designs, each initialled by Eric Gill in pencil and numbered 6/25. A laid-in advertisement slip states that 'three alternative designs have been engraved for this book'. Similarly Evan Gill's bibliography states that there were three alternative designs only, namely for 'God sending' (Skelton, P364), 'Earth inviting' (P365), and 'Earth wrestling' (P366). These are all included in the present set, together with an alternative design for 'Earth receiving' (P367). This was 'the first book of the press illustrated by Eric Gill with line engravings in copper' (Chanticleer).
Provenance: Property of an English collector.