Chronicles of England Description of Britain.

London: Wynkyn de Worde, 1515. SAINT ALBANS CHRONICLE; WYNKYN DE WORDE. Saint Albans Chronicles Printed by Wynkyn de Worde

[SAINT ALBANS CHRONICLE]. Chronicles of England. [And:] Description of Britain. [London: Wynkyn de Worde, 1515].

Seventh edition (the third printed by Wynkyn de Worde). Two parts in one folio volume (9 15/16 x 7 1/8 inches; 252 x 181 mm.). 172 (of 192) leaves. Lacking the first six leaves (gathering Aa) containing the full-page woodcut arms of England and the table and blank leaves bb8 and D4, twelve leaves (a1-a6, C4-C6, and D1-D3) supplied in pen facsimile (nineteenth century or earlier), and two leaves (S2 (truncated) and S5) supplied from another copy. Large woodcut of city in landscape (A1 recto), twenty-two (of twentyfour) woodcut illustrations, including one repeat and two partial repeats, eight (of ten) woodcut diagrams, woodcut printer’s device (McKerrow 1b) on bb7 verso (lacking the woodcut printer’s device (McKerrow 19) on D3 verso). Decorative woodcut and lombard initials. Black letter. Forty-four lines plus headline. Double columns.

Nineteenth-century embossed and blindstamped calf over beveled boards. Expertly rebacked, with original spine laid down. Spine decoratively tooled in blind and lettered in gilt in compartments, board edges decoratively tooled in blind, all edges gilt, marbled endpapers. Leaves d2-d6 remargined, several leaves strengthened in the margin, several leaves with marginal repairs, some resulting in a few letters being supplied in pen facsimile. Occasional staining and soiling. Armorial bookplate on front pastedown. A few early ink annotations. A good copy of this exceptionally scarce

First printed by the St. Albans printer in 1485, the eponymous chronicle is an expansion of the Chronicles edited and printed by William Caxton in 1480. Like Caxton’s edition, it is a continuation of the historical narrative known as the Brut, widely popular in both manuscript and print (see Lister M. Matheson, “Printer and Scribe: Caxton, the Polychronicon and the Brut,” Speculum 60 (1985), pp. 593-614). “This Chronicle differs from Caxton’s mainly in having interpolated histories of popes and other ecclesiastical matters. However, it is an independent compilation, and derives its name from the place of printing of the first edition. The Descrypcyon is an integral part of this edition as it is mentioned in the Tabula as belonging ‘in the later ende of this presente Cronycles’. The first edition was separately printed but is usually found bound with either the first or second edition of Caxton’s Chronicle. It was compiled by Caxton from the Liber Primus of Trevisa’s translation of HIgden’s Polycronicon”

(Pforzheimer 183, describing the 1502 third edition).

HBS 66462.

$42,500. (Inventory #: 66462)