Grolier Club Library Additions
In this section, we highlight seven works from the Stanley D. Scott gift that will be added to the Grolier Club Library’s permanent collection. These items were carefully selected by the Library Committee for their ability to fill in gaps, add to the teaching collection, or enhance prominent collecting areas. A particular highlight is a copy of the Nuremberg Chronicle with a royal provenance, elegant penwork initials, and some original hand-coloring.
Liber Chronicarum [The Nuremberg Chronicle].
Hartmann Schedel. Nuremberg: Anton Koberger, 12 July 1493. First edition (Latin).
The Nuremberg Chronicle is one of the most iconic books of the incunable period. It recounts a universal history of the Christian world up to 1493, richly illustrated with over 1800 woodcuts from 645 blocks. (Many of the cuts are repeated throughout the book.)
This copy has fine initials supplied in red and blue, elaborate marginal penwork flourishing, and contemporary hand-coloring on three woodcuts, including the map of the world and the map of Northern Europe. It bears a presentation inscription to an unnamed royal figure, perhaps Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine (1712-1780).
The Nuremberg Chronicle. A Pictorial World History from the Creation to 1493.
Ellen Shaffer. Los Angeles: Plantin Press for Dawson’s Book Shop, 1950. Edition of 300.
Leaf book containing an original leaf from the 1497 Latin Augsburg reprint of the Nuremberg Chronicle. Shaffer’s introduction includes a census of copies in North America of fifteenth-century editions.
This copy was formerly owned by Jacob L. Chernofsky (1928-2004), managing editor of AB Antiquarian Bookman’s Weekly from 1972 to 1999. It is accompanied by the original prospectus.
Historical Relics of George Washington, Inherited and Collected by Mr. William Lanier Washington.
Anderson Galleries Inc. New York: Anderson Galleries, 1917. [Sale: 19 April 1917]
The first of three sales of Washington memorabilia from the collection of his descendant, William Lanier Washington (1865-1933). The sale included historical documents, busts, portraits, and personal items such as General Washington’s shoe buckles and candlesticks. Significant purchases were made by William Randolph Hearst and Henry Huntington, among others.
The Grolier Club Library formerly possessed only the two later sale catalogues of 1920 and 1922. Thanks to Stanley Scott’s gift, we now have a complete set.
The Voyage of Bounty’s Launch. As Related in William Bligh’s Dispatch to the Admiralty and the Journal of John Fryer.
William Bligh & John Fryer. London: Golden Cockerel Press, 1934. Wood engravings by Robert Gibbings. Edition of 300. Original two-toned cloth.
The first of the Golden Cockerel ‘Sea Log’ series, edited by Owen Rutter in the 1930s. The distinctive two-toned cloth binding was intended to evoke a ship’s sail.
Treasure Island.
Robert Louis Stevenson. London: Cassell & Company, 1886.
Estelle Doheny’s copy of this classic adventure novel in bright red publishers’ cloth (1st ed. 1883). This book will be added to the Grolier Club Library’s teaching collection of publishers’ cloth bindings.
The Alhambra.
Washington Irving. 2 vols. New York: G.P. Putnam’s, 1892. Bound by Alice C. Morse.
Alice C. Morse (1863-1961) was one of America’s leading book cover designers of the late nineteenth century. She created this striking binding featuring a Moorish design for Putnam’s gift book edition of The Alhambra. The original blue chemise protective wrappers accompanying this copy are an unusual survival.
An example of this cover was shown at the Woman's Building at the World's Columbian Exposition at Chicago, in 1893.
Joachim and the Angel, ca. 1504 (From the 1511 Latin text edition).
Albrecht Dürer. Woodcut, 298 x 210 mm. Bartsch 78. Meder 190.
One of 19 superb woodcuts designed by Albrecht Dürer for his Life of the Virgin series. He designed the bulk of the cuts between 1502 and 1505 and, in 1511, published the set in book form with a Latin text and frontispiece. This print has Latin text on the reverse indicating it is from the 1511 edition.
In this scene, an angel appears to Joachim in the desert announcing that his wife, Anne, will soon become pregnant with the Virgin Mary.