Antique Virgil Opera 1744 Brindley Leather Binding
Antique Virgil Opera 1744 Brindley Leather Binding
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A small-format Georgian Virgil, printed in London by J. Brindley in 1744, in a contemporary full calf binding with a decorated gilt spine that remains the most compelling thing about it. The five compartments between raised bands are tooled with floral rosettes, daisy stamps, and interlaced borders, and the red morocco label lettered VIRGILIUS is intact and legible. Someone cared about how this copy was dressed. The front endpaper carries an unidentified armorial bookplate, the arms showing crosses and a crescent within a baroque cartouche, and the flyleaf bears a period ink inscription that possibly reads C. F. Dawson. The text block is clean, white, and tight throughout, which for a book of this age is genuinely notable. Virgil's complete works in Latin, the Eclogues, Georgics, and Aeneid, in a copy with a quiet history still written into its pages.
The binding is sound and complete but shows honest wear consistent with nearly three centuries of existence. The boards have significant surface scuffing, rubbing, and scattered spotting to the calf; the leather at the spine base shows crumbling and some loss, with red-orange powdering visible. The hinges have surface cracking. The spine tooling is substantially intact and reads well across all five compartments despite the overall wear, and the red morocco label remains present and fully legible. The head of the spine shows some fraying. The text block is the best part of this copy: pages are clean, white, and free of foxing or annotations throughout, the paper fresh and bright for a 1744 printing. A green textile bookmark ribbon, period or near-period, is present though frayed. The marbled endpapers are intact with some toning. The armorial bookplate is pasted to the front pastedown in good condition. Overall: Good. The exterior shows its age; the interior does not.
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Every antique and vintage item we carry has lived a life before arriving in your home. These are not factory-made products. They are objects with history, character, and the marks of time.
Age-appropriate wear, patina, minor imperfections, and signs of previous use or repair are inherent to antique and vintage items and are not considered defects. These characteristics are part of what makes each piece unique and are often what give it its beauty and value.
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