Rare. Bowyer’s ledgers record 250 copies were printed. No copies recorded on Rare Book Hub or ABPC.
A celebratory life of the great Elizabethan statesman, William Cecil with an additional portrait and Burghley’s clipped signature.
Arthur Collins (1681/2-1760) is most famous for his Peerage, a much re-printed list of the English nobility first published in 1709. In addition to his work on the Peerage and his work as a printer and bookseller, Collins was also an “assiduous researcher and a prolific compiler and editor” (ODNB) who produced a number of historical biographies.
The present biography of William Cecil is dedicated to Brownlow Cecil, 9th Earl of Exeter (1725-1793) and includes an account of the Cecil family, a glowing appraisal of Cecil’s courtly life and a copy of his will.
The additional engraved portrait is attributed to William Rogers (active 1584-1604). See the example in the Royal Library at Windsor and in the British Museum (where the print is dated c.1589-1610). The print has a number of small holes through it and has been carefully repaired at the lower corner.
Provenance: 1. Augustus Frederick (1773-1843), Prince of Great Britain, Duke of Brunswick-Luneburg, 6th. son of King George III, created Duke of Sussex in 1801, with his bookplate. 2. Edward Howell-Lord Thurlow, 2nd Baron Thurlow, signature and various dates (?reading dates) in January 1822 on the front endpapers.
