Markham's Maister-Peece, Containing all Knowledge Belonging to the Smith, Farrier, or Horse-Leech, Touching the Curing of all Diseases in Horses [.] Now the seventh time newly imprinted, corrected and augmented [.].

Markham, Gervase.

Published by London, William Wilson, 1651.

About this Item

4to. (14), 591, (23) pp, final blank. With additional engr. title page (frontispiece), 4 full-page text woodcuts (2 folding) and several smaller woodcuts in the text, as well as 1 folding woodcut plate, latterly backed with cloth. Sumptuous mid-19th-century three quarter morocco binding with gilt spine. Extremely rare and early edition of this great English hippiatric manual, first published in 1615, by one of the earliest Western owners of and dealers in Arabian horses. A distinctly modern touch is provided by the small woodcut pointing hands scattered about the margins, denoting new cures and "medicines that are most certaine and approved; and heretofore never published". Gervase (Gervais, Jarvis) Markham, as well as his father Robert, a Nottinghamshire MP and Sheriff, was the owner of valuable horses, and "is said to have imported the first Arab. In a list of Sir Henry Sidney's horses in 1589 'Pied Markham' is entered as having been sold to the French ambassador [and it, or a horse of the same name, may have been given to Markham by Sir Francis Walsingham], and Gervase sold an Arabian horse to James I for £500" (DNB). - Variously browned; occasional corner faults (no loss to text). From the library of Sir Robert Throckmorton, Bt. (1800-62), member of an eminent Anglo-Catholic noble family who sat in the House of Commons from 1831 to 1835 (his bookplate on front pastedown; a later bookplate is opposite on the flyleaf). - Wing M659. Poynter 20.7. Wellcome IV, 56 (incomplete). Cf. Mennessier de la Lance II, 156. Huth p. 17 (other editions). Seller Inventory # 32364

Bibliographic Details

Title: Markham's Maister-Peece, Containing all ...

Publisher: London, William Wilson, 1651.

Binding: Hardcover