Cambridge Bookbindings : An elaborately decorated Cambridge binding of ca.1625

Herbert, George 1593-1633

Cambridge Bookbindings

<p style='text-align: justify;'><p>A tradition for producing collections of verses from the universities in Oxford and Cambridge to mark significant occasions in national life – often births, marriages or deaths in the royal family – began in the late sixteenth century. They were written by academics and promising students, mostly in Latin or English, and in Cambridge, from 1587, they were gathered together and printed by the University printers; around fifty such compilations were published during the following couple of centuries. It was common practice to commission local tradesmen to bind up multiple copies in a range of styles, suitable for presentation to various people according to their social status, from the King downwards. Copies destined for more important recipients would be handsomely bound, like this set of verses from 1623, tooled in black and gilt enhanced with red paint. The distinctive flying pheasant tool can be seen here. Its original owner is not known but it the book was in an aristocratic library in the nineteenth century (the Earl of Westmorland; it may originally have belonged to an ancestor).</p><p>Pasteboards, covered with white skin with a central red painted oval, gilt- and black-tooled. Smooth spine, with recessed supports, gilt- and black-tooled, with repair and later labelling. Red sprinkled leaf edges; narrow gilt roll round board edges; plain paper flyleaves (but no pastedowns); remains of pink cloth ties.</p><p>Dr David Pearson</p></p>