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First and only edition; a very handsome copy, bound in York, of one of the most resplendent English colour plate topographical books. Richardson's beautifully composed picturesque scenes, superbly lithographed by George Hawkins, were printed by the firm of Day & Haghe - responsible for the celebrated David Roberts folios - which "raised lithography to perhaps the highestpointit ever attained" (Abbey). Boyne remarks that "Richardson's really fine plates will always make this a desirable book" and notes that it was issued originally in nine parts, available at nine guineas plain, or eighteen guineas coloured; this copy has a mixture of both, which is often the case. All the major abbeys of Yorkshire are portrayed, among them Whitby, Kirkstall, Rievaulx, Byland, and Fountains, as well as a number of priories and smaller religious houses. Richardson's finely rendered, placid scenes, populated attractively by local people and admiring visitors, illustrate the exceptional richness of Yorkshire's survivals from Henry VIII's dissolution of the monasteries. In fact, Yorkshire did not "go quietly" during that period of state-sanctioned vandalism: "The dissolution violently destroyed centuries-old communities and wiped out ancient landmarks … [But] in the midst of the dissolution a sudden storm of opposition took the government by surprise; for a time it looked likely to threaten not only Cromwell's policy but even perhaps Henry's throne. This was the northern rising, also known as the Pilgrimage of Grace, which convulsed Lincolnshire, Yorkshire, and finally all the north in the last three months of 1536" (Elton, p. 145). Monastic Ruins pairs two men with deep roots in the county. York-born William Richardson (1814-1899), the son of a cabinet maker, specialized in architectural and landscape subjects and exhibited at the Royal Academy between 1842 and 1869. Edward Churton (1800-1874), theologian and Spanish scholar, held the living of Crayke in the North Riding of Yorkshire for forty years and from 1841 was prebendary of York Minster. "Churton saw himself as the custodian of a continuous Catholic tradition within the Church of England inherited from the Caroline divines" (ODNB) - making him a sympathetic choice as author. Abbey 381; William Boyne, The Yorkshire Library: A Bibliographical Account, 1869, XXXIII. G. R. Elton, England Under the Tudors, 1991. 2 vols, folio (605 x 415 mm). With 2 lithograph title pages (that for vol. I hand-coloured), hand-coloured lithograph dedication leaf, 82 lithograph plates by George Hawkins after William Richardson (32 full-page, 27 half-page on text leaves, 25 of these 59 are hand-coloured and mounted, and 23 plain lithograph plans), printed by Day & Haghe, coloured decorative initials, and map showing locations; text and plates mounted on white linen stubs. Contemporary red morocco by H. Potter of York (gilt-stamped on the front turn-ins), bevelled boards, spines with four low, broad gilt-decorated raised bands, gilt-lettered and numbered direct in second and fourth compartments, others panelled with gilt paired fillets enclosing scrolling foliate cornerpieces, dots and circlets, and a central lozenge composed of multiple tools, gilt-lettered covers framed by alternating concentric panels of gilt triple fillets and scrolling foliate rolls, gilt turn-ins, Bouquet pattern marbled endpapers, gilt edges. Bindings a little rubbed at extremities, a few shallow indentations to covers, pale stains to front cover of vol. II, some foxing, light tidemark at top corner of a handful of leaves at end of vol. I, offsetting from turn-ins to endleaves, a few mount sheets browned. A very good copy.
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