Book #70930
Item #70930 The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic. Sir William Blackstone.
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...
The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...

The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic...

The First Critical Edition of Magna Carta Blackstone, Sir William [1723-1780], Editor. The Great Charter and Charter of the Forest, With Other Authentic Instruments: To Which is Prefixed an Introductory Discourse, Containing the History of the Charters. Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1759. [iv], lxxvi, [iv], 86 pp. As in many copies, half-title and table of contents (Tabula) are bound between pp lxxvi and 1. Copperplate engraved dedication leaf, initials and tail-pieces. Quarto (13-1/2" x 10-1/4"). Contemporary diced calf, gilt fillets to boards, rebacked retaining existing gilt spine with lettering piece, gilt tooling to board edges, gilt inside dentelles, marbled edges and endpapers. Negligible light rubbing and a few nicks and scuffs to boards, moderate rubbing to extremities, bookplate residue to front pastedown, early bookplate ("RW" monogram) to verso of front free endpaper. Light toning, light soiling and foxing to a few leaves, occasional light offsetting from engravings. A very desirable wide-margined copy. $7,500. * First edition of the first modern critical edition of Magna Carta. Blackstone's first important work, it contains the Articles of the Barons, the issues of the Great Charter in 1215, 1216 and 1217, with several charters of confirmation, the Charter of the Forest, and the Statute of Marlebridge. The introduction is in English and the texts of the Magna Carta and Carta de Foresta in Latin. Blackstone's essay, which is based on a great deal of original research, argued that the charter was the foundation of English liberties. This idea, first proposed by Coke, was a central tenet of Whig ideology. More important, Blackstone's research into the original texts demonstrated that all earlier editions of the charter were based on the significantly different reissue of 1225, in the reign of Henry III, rather than the original one endorsed at Runnymede. His philological approach was highly influential; it established the textual focus that has governed subsequent study of the charter. This edition is esteemed for its handsome appearance, which was recognized as early as 1829 in Richard Thompson's An Historical Essay on the Magna Charta of King John, which described it as a "beautiful and rare edition" and noted that its "elegance of typography is very great." The engraved dedication to the Ea.

Price: $7,500.00

Book number 70930

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