![[AMERICAN REVOLUTION] JUNIUS. Stat Nominis Umbra.](/sites/default/files/styles/auction_slider/public/images/lots/797/1593797.jpg?itok=9rzLak9F)
Lot Details
Lot 5
[AMERICAN REVOLUTION] JUNIUS. Stat Nominis Umbra.
London: printed for Henry Sampson Woodfall... 1772. First issue of the first authorized edition, without the Table of Contents and Index sections added later, per Lowndes. Two volumes, publisher's marbled boards, housed in a leather-backed slipcase with chemises. 6 1/2 x 4 inches (16.75 x 10 cm); [2-engraved title], xxxii, 208 pp.; [2-engraved title], 356 pp. Some wear to wrappers, note regarding ownership on the free endpaper of the first volume (suggesting Charles Lloyd, secretary to George Grenville as a candidate for authorship). A totally uncut copy, very rare in wrappers as here. Stenciled name of Buckston on front free endpaper, bookplate of Harold Greenhill on pastedown.
This is the first issue of the first authorized edition of the letters (and most likely edited by "Junius" himself, according to several authorities), which were originally published in the London Public Advertiser from Jan. 21, 1769 to Jan. 21, 1772 under the pseudonym of "Junius." "...'Junius' poured brilliantly slanderous invective upon Tory-minded English ministers, especially the Duke of Grafton, for a series of 'inconsistent measures' which allegedly ruined England and drove the colonies 'into excesses little short of rebellion.' Vehement, lucid, frequently reprinted in English and colonial newspapers, the letters were polemical masterpieces with such extraordinary knowledge and appreciation of contemporary colonial opinion that they lent moral support to the early revolutionary cause. 'Junius' opposed the Tea Duty, but upheld the legality of the Stamp Act, and prophesied (Dec. 19, 1769) that the colonies aimed at independence" - Dictionary of American History. The publisher and then the printers were (largely unsuccessfully) prosecuted for seditious libel. Sabin calls this the best and the original collected edition (there were previous unauthorized editions). Sabin 36906. ESTC T1830. DAH III, p.190. Lowndes V, p.1241. Reese Revolutionary Hundred 14.
C Private Collection of Barbara and Ira Lipman
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