Εροτοπαιγνιον, or the Cyprian academy. By Robert Baron of Grayes Inne, Gent.

8vo. ff. [4] (blank), pp. [24], 61, [3 blank], 101, ff. [2] (plates). Red morocco by Rivière. Engraved border on title page. Printer's device on title page. Added engraved title page, signed "W. Marshall sculpsit". Includes headpieces, engraved initials, and untitled songs (without music). "Gripus and Hegio, or the passionate lovers. A Pastorall acted by the Lady Iulias Servants, for the entertainment of Flaminius" has separate title page. Includes, on pp. [87]-101: "Deorum dona, a masque. Presented before Flaminius and Clorinda, King and Queene of Cyprus at their Regall Palace in Nicosia," which has separate title page dated 1647. A portrait, inscribed ‘Aetat: Suae 19,’ properly belongs to Baron’s Pocula castalia (Bib# 4102845/Fr# 315 in this collection; see Grolier Club, New York, Catalogue of Original and Early Editions of Some of the Poetical and Prose Works of English Writers from Wither to Prior. 3 vols. New York, 1905, nos. 27 and 29). The George Thorn-Drury copy. Labels of Bibliotheca Fictiva and Arthur and Janet Freeman.

In this rare work by the teenaged poetaster Robert Baron, his wholesale plagiarisms from Milton, Shakespeare, Webster, Waller, Suckling, and Lovelace amount (like Henry Bold’s ‘Wit a sporting In a pleasant grove of new fancies,’ see Bib# 4102847/Fr# 319 in this collection) to effective forgery. See D. Wing (ed.), Short-title Catalogue of Books Printed in England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, and British America, and of English Books Printed in Other Countries, 1641–1700. 4 vols. New York, 1982-98 (2nd ed.), B890; Grolier Club, New York, Wither to Prior, 27.

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