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[Scottish antiquarianism] Bannatyne Club
Etchings Chiefly of Views in Scotland. By John Clerk, Esq. of Elgin, MDCCLXXIII-MDCCLXXIX
£2,016
Rare Books, Manuscripts, Maps & Photographs
Auction: 8 February 2023 at 10:00 GMT
Description
Edinburgh: [for the Bannatyne Club], 1825. Folio (43 x 27.5cm), original straight-grain half morocco, red paper sides, 28 etched plates on india paper, mounted, tissue-guards, binding rubbed, variable spotting, a few marginal tide-marks [David Laing, The Bannatyne Club. Lists of Members and the Rules, with a Catalogue of the Books printed for the Bannatyne Club since its Institution in 1823, 1867, pp. 48-9]
Footnote
Note:
First edition, the eighth work issued by the Bannatyne Club, one of 40 copies only. John Clerk of Eldin (1728-1812), 'a true child of the Enlightenment' (ODNB) is best remembered today for his Essay on Naval Tactics (1790). 'Clerk was an exceptional amateur artist. His wealthy background afforded him the luxury of entertaining numerous careers, including medicine and business, and he also showed a considerable interest in geology. In the 1740s he began sketching alongside his brother-in-law, Robert Adam, and the artist Paul Sandby. Clerk travelled extensively throughout Scotland, recording a wide range of landscapes and ancient buildings. His sketches of Edinburgh and the surrounding areas are highly personal representations of his native countryside' (National Galleries of Scotland, online). An enlarged edition was published by the Bannatyne Club in 1855. The Bannatyne Club was an antiquarian printing society founded in Edinburgh in 1823 by Sir Walter Scott on the model of London's Roxburghe Club.
Provenance: 1) Robert Graham (1785-1859), of Redgorton and Balgowan, advocate; 2) Thence by descent; 3) Lyon & Turnbull, 1st February 2005, lot 211.