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Auction archive: Lot number 126

TURNER, William (ca.1508-1568). The Names of Herbes in Greke, Latin, Englishe Duche & Frenche with the commune names that Herbaries and Apotecaries use. London: John Daye and William Seres, [dedication dated 15 March 1548].

Auction 28.06.1995
28 Jun 1995
Estimate
£1,000 - £1,500
ca. US$1,595 - US$2,392
Price realised:
£4,830
ca. US$7,704
Auction archive: Lot number 126

TURNER, William (ca.1508-1568). The Names of Herbes in Greke, Latin, Englishe Duche & Frenche with the commune names that Herbaries and Apotecaries use. London: John Daye and William Seres, [dedication dated 15 March 1548].

Auction 28.06.1995
28 Jun 1995
Estimate
£1,000 - £1,500
ca. US$1,595 - US$2,392
Price realised:
£4,830
ca. US$7,704
Beschreibung:

TURNER, William (ca.1508-1568). The Names of Herbes in Greke, Latin, Englishe Duche & Frenche with the commune names that Herbaries and Apotecaries use. London: John Daye and William Seres, [dedication dated 15 March 1548]. Small 8° (135 x 84mm). Collation: A-H 8 . Title with woodcut border, woodcut initials. (Lacking ?blank H8, small hole in title neatly repaired, some soiling, especially to title.) Late-18th-century calf-backed sheep gilt (extremities rubbed, lightly soiled). Provenance : Robert Spearman of Oldacres, Durham (armorial bookplate); William Forsyth, F.A.S., F.S.A.; sold 11 November 1835; Barony of Morpeth; gift to Morpeth Mechanics Institution in memory of George William Frederick 7th Earl of Carlisle (1802-1864); E. H. Barker (signature on bookplate). FIRST EDITION of Turner's first major work in English. Turner has been named the 'Father of British Botany', as his writings mark a new era in English botanical studies. He was inspired by his travels on the Continent to break away from the traditional Englsih herbal, based on largely on superstition, and to follow the pioneering European botanists in describing the medicinal properties of plants from his own observations and experience. His first work, Libellus de re herbaria novus , was published in 1538, and listed more than 140 plants, with their synonyms in Greek and English. His Names of Herbes was written in English for the benefit of apothecaries "whom Turner found to be woefully ignorant of Latin and Greek, and in need of more accurate knowledge of the plants from which they were compounding their medicines" (Hunt I, p.74). Turner described the book as "no morebut a table or regestre of suche bokes as I intende by the grace of God to set furth her after", and it is indeed a forerunner of his celebrated A New herball , which was published between 1551 and 1568. However, the Names of herbes and its Latin predecessor are also important works in their own right, particularly as they include the localities of some of the species mentioned for the first time: the Names is "the earliest recognizable record of at least 105 of our plants, over and above those already identified from [the] Libellus " (C.E. Raven, cited in Henrey I, p.23). The Names was reprinted in 1881 by the English Dialect Society (Hunt I, appendix 51). STC 24359 (cites only one copy in America); Henrey I, pp. 18-24; cf. Hunt I, 65 (note); E.S. Rohde, The Old English Herbals , 1922, pp.81-2.

Auction archive: Lot number 126
Auction:
Datum:
28 Jun 1995
Auction house:
Christie's
London, King Street
Beschreibung:

TURNER, William (ca.1508-1568). The Names of Herbes in Greke, Latin, Englishe Duche & Frenche with the commune names that Herbaries and Apotecaries use. London: John Daye and William Seres, [dedication dated 15 March 1548]. Small 8° (135 x 84mm). Collation: A-H 8 . Title with woodcut border, woodcut initials. (Lacking ?blank H8, small hole in title neatly repaired, some soiling, especially to title.) Late-18th-century calf-backed sheep gilt (extremities rubbed, lightly soiled). Provenance : Robert Spearman of Oldacres, Durham (armorial bookplate); William Forsyth, F.A.S., F.S.A.; sold 11 November 1835; Barony of Morpeth; gift to Morpeth Mechanics Institution in memory of George William Frederick 7th Earl of Carlisle (1802-1864); E. H. Barker (signature on bookplate). FIRST EDITION of Turner's first major work in English. Turner has been named the 'Father of British Botany', as his writings mark a new era in English botanical studies. He was inspired by his travels on the Continent to break away from the traditional Englsih herbal, based on largely on superstition, and to follow the pioneering European botanists in describing the medicinal properties of plants from his own observations and experience. His first work, Libellus de re herbaria novus , was published in 1538, and listed more than 140 plants, with their synonyms in Greek and English. His Names of Herbes was written in English for the benefit of apothecaries "whom Turner found to be woefully ignorant of Latin and Greek, and in need of more accurate knowledge of the plants from which they were compounding their medicines" (Hunt I, p.74). Turner described the book as "no morebut a table or regestre of suche bokes as I intende by the grace of God to set furth her after", and it is indeed a forerunner of his celebrated A New herball , which was published between 1551 and 1568. However, the Names of herbes and its Latin predecessor are also important works in their own right, particularly as they include the localities of some of the species mentioned for the first time: the Names is "the earliest recognizable record of at least 105 of our plants, over and above those already identified from [the] Libellus " (C.E. Raven, cited in Henrey I, p.23). The Names was reprinted in 1881 by the English Dialect Society (Hunt I, appendix 51). STC 24359 (cites only one copy in America); Henrey I, pp. 18-24; cf. Hunt I, 65 (note); E.S. Rohde, The Old English Herbals , 1922, pp.81-2.

Auction archive: Lot number 126
Auction:
Datum:
28 Jun 1995
Auction house:
Christie's
London, King Street
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