JONES, Inigo (1573--1652)
[Roman sketchbook. Facsimile. 1831]
Roma: altro diletto che imparar non trouo
[London]: lithographed by G.B. Madeley. 3 Wellington St. Strand, [1831].
[78] leaves : litho. facsim. ; 21.1 cm. (8º)

Lithographic facsimile of Inigo Jones's so-called Roman Sketchbook, the original of which is in the collections of Chatsworth House (catalogued as Album 6). Jones began the sketchbook, which is the only surviving book consisting entirely of Jones's notes and drawings, while visiting Rome in January 1614, and continued to work on it until February of the following year; he returned to it some twenty years later in the 1630s, filling in many of the blank pages. The small volume was eventually acquired by Lord Burlington as part of his extensive collection of Inigo Jones's drawings and after Burlington's death in 1753 most of this material came into the possession of William Cavendish, 4th Duke of Devonshire through his wife Charlotte, Burlington's only surviving child. In 1831, William George Spencer Cavendish, 6th Duke of Devonshire, instructed John Payne Collier, the Duke's librarian whose colourful later career included literary forgery and theft, to oversee production of a lithographic facsimile of the Roman Sketchbook. Tracings from the original were drawn in reverse on a lithographic stone, 100 copies of which were printed by George Edward Madeley. Madeley's imprint appears at the foot of the first page in a small number of copies (including one of the three copies at Chatsworth and the Soane copy) but was removed from the lithographic stone after these proofs were printed, no doubt so as not to detract from the effect. The Duke's original idea of including a facsimile presentation inscription in his hand was abandoned, and most surviving copies have an inscription on his behalf in Collier's hand. See Edward Chaney, Inigo Jones's 'Roman Sketchbook' (London: The Roxburghe Club, 2006) for a facsimile reissue of the original with a companion volume of introduction, notes and textual transcript. See also Michael Twyman, Early lithographed books (London 1990), no. 1126 (pp. 299, 204--208).

Copy Notes Front free-endpaper inscribed in ink Sir John Soane R A / is requested by the Duke of Devonshire / to accept this attempted facsimile of Inigo Jones's Sketch book./ May 6. 1832. Tipped in at the front is a letter from the Duke of Devonshire to Soane, also dated 6 May 1832, presenting the inclosed tract and offering to show him some drawings. Two further letters are loosely inserted. The first is an undated letter from the Duke of Devonshire to 'Dover', i.e. George James Welbore Agar-Ellis, 1st Baron Dover (1797–-1833), discussing to whom the last of the 100 copies of the facsimile, intended for Soane, should be sent and mentioning Mr Tyndale, i.e. G.B. Tyndale, a hereditary Trustee of the British Museum and the occupant of No. 13 Lincoln's Inn Fields before Soane. The second letter from 'Dover' at Dover House to Tyndale at 22 Lincoln's Inn Fields, dated 31 March 1832, originally enclosed the previous letter, from which Tyndale would perceive that the Duke had reserved a copy for / Sir John Soane; but has no others left. A letter from Mrs Tyndale to Soane, dated 12 April 1832, explains that 'The Duke of Devonshire about 5 or 6 weeks ago presented the British Museum with a facsimile of Inigo Jones's "Sketch book," and Mr T: requested to have a copy, nominally to shew to, but in reality to present to you, in case one had not been sent. He now hopes it is already in your possession. The enclosed letters from the Duke and Lord Dover will explain the whole, and would have been sent before but they were not forwarded from L. I. Fds.'. (Priv. Corr. XIII.B.38.18; reproduced in Bolton, Portrait, pp. 487--488).

Binding C19th limp vellum imitating C17th original, linen ties.

Reference Number 6548