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Mr. Philip D. Burden
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An example of the rare Robert Wilkinson edition of Emanuel Bowen and Thomas Kitchin’s beautiful ‘Large English Atlas’. The maps were first separately published from 1749 to 1760 and early issues of the work can be found with varying contents. The final tally of sheets for the atlas was forty-five. The project began at the hands of the publisher John Hinton before he ran into financial difficulties and ownership passed to the Bowles family and Robert Sayer. They are superb clear and concise engravings. In the history of English county atlases, it is hard to think of one with finer quality. Wardington praised the book saying that ‘the size of the plate presented the publishers, the engravers and the printers with as formidable a task as any posed by the finest productions of Louis XIV or XV, the best of the Dutch engravings fifty years earlier, or the Ordnance Survey sheets fifty years later’. Hodson provides a thorough account of the complex history of this atlas, which was finally completed and issued with a title-page c.1762. Around 1763 two additional general maps of Scotland and Ireland were incorporated making a total of 47. John Bowles died in 1779 and by the end of the year the business passed to Robert Wilkinson (1752?-1825). In December 1779 Robert Strahan printed 150 titles printed in black only for the ‘Large English Atlas’ for 15s. Ownership of the plates was shared with Carington Bowles and Robert Sayer. Hodson believed the shareholding was now Bowles three, Sayer two, and Wilkinson four. Provenance: manuscript inscription on the title of ‘Anthony ?field’; further early inscription on final rear endpaper; private English collection. Bonar-Law (1997) 97.iii; Chubb (1927) 199; Hodson (1984-97) 227; Moir (1973) p. 191; Baynton-Williams (2011).
BOWEN, Emanuel & KITCHIN, Thomas
The Large English Atlas: or, a New Set of Maps
Sold by Robert Wilkinson, at No. 58, in Cornhill, Successor to Mr. John Bowles, deceased, London, c.1779
Folio (600 x 415 mm.), contemporary half calf, marbled paper boards, spine with raised bands, gilt ruled compartments and gilt burgundy calf title label, worn. With typographic title, general map of England and Wales by Kitchin, general map of Scotland, Bayly of Ireland, and 44 engraved double-page map sheets, all with early outline colour, creasing to title-page and three general maps, otherwise in good condition.
Stock number: 10738
£ 7,500