Musical Instruments: Historic, Rare and Unique

Half morocco over cream vellum boards, with gilt ruling at joints. Decorative gilt embossed centerpiece with title on upper board. Spine in six compartments of raised bands with titles on two and three. All edges gilt. , Alfred James Hipkins (1826-1903) was an English musicologist whose ground-breaking work on cataloguing musical instruments remains celebrated to this day. Not only a writer and researcher, Hipkins also was a popular lecturer and performer. His greatest legacy, however, remains his book Musical Instruments, Historic, Rare and Unique (and perhaps also his later work A Description and History of the Piano-forte and of the older keyboard stringed instruments). Hipkins was a contributor to Encyclopaedia Brittanica, Grove?s Dictionary of Music and Musicians, as well as a Honorary Curator of the General Museum of the Royal College of Music. , Size : Large Folio (405x305mm), Illustrated with 50 lithographed colour plates of musical instruments by William Gibb. , P. Half Title, Publisher?s Note, Full Title, Blank, Dedication, Blank, Contents (1-2), Introduction (ix-xix), Blank, Text and Plates, Index (103-107), (1). A fine and handsome example in decorative original morocco and vellum, plates are vivid, clean, and crisp. …