Mary Byfield's Best Work
The Book of Common Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments and Other Rites and Ceremonies of the Church … together with the Psalter or Psalms of David.
London: William Pickering, 1853.
Price: $1,250.00
About the item
Reprint of Queen Elizabeth's Prayer Book of 1569. Title printed in red and black within woodcut border representing the Tree of Jesse: Portrait of Queen Elizabeth on verso of title : text of every page surrounded with engraved on wood by Mary Byfield. 1 vols. 12mo. Mary Byfield's Best Work. Bound in full contemporary vellum with red inlaid leather cross on upper covers, marbled endpapers, a.e.g., bookplate. Some external soiling, upper joint cracked but holding, else fine and attractive. Keynes p.86.
Item #24989
Mary Byfield (1795-1871) worked for the Chiswick Press nearly her entire life, and her contributions played a large part in the looks of many of the smaller Pickering editions. For this volume she cut over 100 blocks, mostly after the designs by Holbein, Durer, Tory and others, but including her contemporary Charlotte Whittingham, although it is next to impossible to tell which are the old designs, and which the new. "The cuts harmonize perfectly with the type (which is Caslon) and this small tome is a triumph of printing as well as of illustration and typography." (McLean; Victorian Book Design). An important and handsome Pickering production.
