Itinerarium curiosum

Full title: Itinerarium curiosum: or, an account of the antiquities, and remarkable curiosities in nature or art, observed in travels through Great Britain. Illustrated with copper plates. Centuria I. The second edition, with large additions. By William Stukeley, M. D. F. R. & A. S.

Folio. 2 volumes in one (Centuria I: ff. [2] (blank), pp. [vii], viii-x, 205, [7], ff. [101] (plates); Centuria II: pp. [4], 177, [13], ff. [2] (blank), ff. [74] (plates). Includes frontispiece, plates (some folded) portraits, genealogical tables, maps (some folded). Two copies, owing to confusions in the collation. The present copy has calf-backed marbled boards, marbled edges. Red spine panel with title "Stukeley Itinerarium curiosum." Both copies contain two extra plates not called for in the list of illustrations (two versions of Plate 51 in "Centuria I", and two versions of Plate 84 in "Centuria II").

Work by William Stukeley (1687-1765), who, while hardly a forger, had a propensity for invention, and for fabulizing his literary and topographical observations in line with his druidical theories. His grand self-illustrated books include the Itinerarium curiosum (1724, see Bib# 4103184/Fr# 699 in this collection) and the present second, posthumous edition of 1776, with an added ‘century’ of engraved plates and a fully-illustrated account of Richard of Cirencester (see also Bib# 4103121/Fr# 406 for Stukeley’s work on Richard of Cirencester of 1757). See ESTC, citation T145546.

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