A Book of Architecture, Containing Designs of Buildings and Ornaments... the Second Edition.
London: for W. Innys and R. Manby [et al.], 1739. Second edition. Contemporary calf. Folio (47 by 29 cm). [4], xxv, [1, blank] pp; 150 numbered copperplate engraved plates (5 folding). Contemporary calf. Title moderately foxed, intermittent light to moderate foxing (mostly marginal); folding plate no. 1 with 20 cm tear extending into image (repaired), plate no. 26 with marginal reinforcement, notably darkened across leaf join. A good or better copy.
Second edition, first published by subscription in 1728. In the United States as well as England, "[t]he influence of A Book of Architecture was enormous... The extraordinarily diverse and numerous borrowings from Gibbs through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries" included those of Thomas Jefferson for Monticello. "The sheer number and variety of buildings and ornamental forms provided by Gibbs clearly appealed to amateur architects and craftsmen" (Millard).
James Gibbs (1682-1754) was born in Fittysmire in the far north of Scotland. His parents having died when he was young, at the age of seventeen he moved in with relatives in Holland, where he may have studied with a local architect. By 1703 he moved to Rome where, rather than study for the priesthood, he began to study achitecture under Carlo Fontana. Back in Britain, Gibbs was able after 1708 to establish a career as an architect through the patronage of John Erskine, 6th earl of Mar. While "Gibbs' designs for villas and country houses are all strongly influenced by the works of Palladio, Vincenzo Scamozzi, and Giacoma da Vignola," (Millard), his placement of private apartments and dining spaces, along with the introduction of corridors and service stairs, demonstrate some of the architect's particular and innovative concerns.
The plates were engraved by H. Hulsbergh, B. Baron, J. Harris, E. Kirkall, J. Mynde and George Vertue. They were subsequently "sold by Gibbs to the publishers Innys and Manby, J. and P. Knapton, and C. Hitch, for four hundred pounds according to Vertue (who was told also by Gibbs that he had made fifteen hundred pounds, in addition, out of his books), and a second edition was issued by them in 1738, on subscription, for three guineas, one less than before. The book was completed in 1739. No subscription list was included in this edition" (Millard). Good+. Item #55638
ESTC T22979; T. Friedman, James Gibbs (New Haven/London, 1984), for a detailed survey of Gibbs' influence. Cf. Fowler 138 (ed. 1728). Cf. Millard, British Books 22 (first ed. 1728; with note on present ed. at p. 107).
Price: $2,500.00