WAGENAAR, Jan.
Vaderlandsche historie, vervattende de geschiedenissen der nu Vereenigde Nederlanden, inzonderheid die van Holland, van de vroegste tyden af. Uit de geloofwaardigste schryvers en egte gedenkstukken samengesteld. Met konstplaaten en kaarten opgehelderd.
Amsterdam, Isaak Tirion, 1752-1759. 21 volumes. 8vo. With an engraved frontispiece, 6 large folding maps, 41 folding engraved plates, mainly designed and engraved by S. Fokke and 82 engraved portraits, mainly drawn by A. Schouman after original paintings by other artists and engraved by J. Houbraken. Contemporary, uniform gold-tooled vellum by the so-called Parrot Bindery in Utrecht (except that vols. 19-21 differ slightly). Possibly a prize binding for the Latin school in Amersfoort. A complete list of contents is available upon request.
€ 4,000
Wagenaar's highly influential and expertly illustrated history of the Low Countries, complete in 21 beautifully bound volumes with the arms of the city of Amersfoort on each board. Wagenaar wrote the first complete overview of the entire history of the Low Countries, from "the earliest times" up to 1751, two years after the first printing of the first volume appeared. His aim was to provide the general Dutch public with an impartial and objective general history of their "fatherland" to promote active and morally correct citizenship. It remained a leading work on Dutch national history to the end of the 19th century.
The present set was bound by the so-called parrot bindery in Utrecht, perhaps initially ca. 1758, since volumes 1-18 (1752-1758) are uniform but volumes 19-21 (1758-1759) form a minor variant. It may have been commissioned by the Latin School in Amersfoort as a prize to award to a student. Volumes 1-4 appear in the rarer second edition (as noted on their title-pages), published by Tirion in 1752, only three years after the first edition of volume 1, because Wagenaar's work was in such high demand. Volume 5 is a second issue of the first edition, dated 1752 rather than the original 1751. Perhaps Tirion didnt wish to publish the book with volume 5 dated earlier than volume 4 and therefore either reprinted the preliminary bifolium or - knowing he would need to reprint volumes 1-4 - changed the date during the press run). Volumes 6-21 appear in the only issue of the first edition.
The volumes variously slightly foxed and browned, with occasional minor marginal defects and the back of some large folding maps reinforced with paper strips along the folding lines, but still in good condition. The bindings variously show minor discolouration and occasionally spots or minor stains, but are generally in very good condition, with the tooling clear and all structurally sound. An influential and authoritative work on the history of the Low Countries from "the beginning of time" until the author's own time (1751), beautifully, uniformly bound, probably as an Amersfoort prize binding. Muller, Historieplaten, S. 14 A; STCN (separate records for each volume); cf. (later ed.) De Buck 1130; I.D. van Dijk, Gedeelde winst - gedeelde smart (2022), pp. 20-23, 109-120; for the binding: Storm van Leeuwen, vol.2B, "Parrot Bindery Utrecht", pp. 784-806, 848 (stamps 13, 35 and coat of arms D).
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