John Luffman (1751-1821) had a varied career being a publisher, engraver, goldsmith, author and geographer. He also became bankrupt in 1793 but appears to have recovered. His earliest recorded work is the engraving of the road strips for Taylor and Skinner’s ‘Survey and Maps of the Roads of North Britain’ in 1776. In 1780 he was the engraver of Captain Andrew Armstrong’s large-scale map of Rutland. These curious circular engravings of the counties of England and Wales are his most noted work and accompanied a geographical text. It was first published in 1803 by Luffman as a ‘New Pocket Atlas and Geography of England and Wales’. A further issue was published in the same year, the maps in which are all in their second state, but by 1806 ownership had passed to the firm of Lackington Allen & Co. This firm was founded in 1774 by James Lackington (1746-1815) from Somerset as a shoemaker. From there he moved temporarily to Bristol where he first began buying books at market stalls. It is stated he was to ashamed to enter bookshops! A legacy of £10 enabled him to rent a shop in London from where he started selling both shoes and books. Soon he focused on the books and in 1798 he retired. George Lackington (1768-1815) of undetermined relationship joined as partner. By 1803 their catalogue contained 800,000 books! The firm finally closed when George Lackington himself retired in 1826. Provenance: inscription inside upper cover with name effaced but dated ‘November 10th 1856’; private English collection; Clive A. Burden Ltd. Catalogue 9 (2012) item 64; private English collection. Refer Batten & Bennett (1996) 66; refer Carroll (1996) 59; Chubb (1927) 309; Tooley’s Dictionary (1999-2004); Worms & Baynton-Williams (2011).