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[Combe, William]; Rowlandson, Thomas (illus).
The English Dance of Death, from the Design of Thomas Rowlandson, with Metrical Ilustrations, by the Author of "Doctor Syntax" [the Killua Castle copy].
Publisher: Printed by J. Diggens, St. Ann’s Lane; published at R. Ackermann’s Repository of Arts, 101, Strand, London;
Date of Publication: 1815
Stock Code: 15028
First Rowlandson edition. Royal octavo, two-volumes, pp., viii, 295, [5] index; [2], 296, [8] index. Complete hand-coloured aquatint frontispiece and title-page plus, 72 further hand-coloured aquatints divided between both volumes, designed and etched by Rowlandson. Uniformly bound in contemporary diced Russia, titled and ornamented in gilt to spines, double fillets in gilt to boards, gilt rolls to edges; all edges marbled; marbled end-papers; red silk place-markers to both volumes. Armorial bookplate of Benjamin Chapman of Killua Castle to front paste-down of both volumes. Some rubbing to extremities, joints slightly worn, top edges a little dusty. Contents clean and fresh. A very good set, handsomely bound. The celebrated first Rowlandson edition of one of Combe’s comical poems written for the illustrator, for which he is still best known. Unlike previous ‘Dance of Death’ works, Rowlandson drew both from the macabre and the familiar, drawing on images and characters from Regency life. The book is firmly in the firmament of the Rowlandson canon ‘The illustrations nearly excel all his other work’ (Hardie 172). ‘Indispensable to any Rowlandson collection, one of the essential pivots of any colour plate library, being one of the main works of Rowlandson’ (Tooley 334). Sir Benjamin James Chapman, 4th Baronet (1810 - 1888) was MP and High-Sheriff for Westmeath in Ireland and the great uncle of T. E. Lawrence. An attractive copy of one of Rowlandson’s most famous works.

£850.00