1848 Aesop's Fables

Description

Fine Binding, First Edition, Illustrated, Leather Binding, Signed Binding, With Slipcase

The first John Tenniel edition of Aesop.

Strikingly bound in a quarter morocco binding with colourful paper to the boards, with renewed endpapers, an unsigned binding by Eric Sweet. In a custom cloth chemise and custom cloth slipcase, both in a fine condition.

Pages have been washed, presenting an extraordinarily and uncommonly bright copy of this work.

An anthology of the fables of Aesop.

Illustrated in-text throughout, alongside an engraved title page. Collated, complete.

Aesop's Fables is a selection of fables, generally attributed to the Ancient Greek storyteller Aesop, who lived around 620 BCE-564 BCE. The fables are moral tales that guide in religious and secular aspects of life, following adventures of many different creatures.

This was Tenniel's most significant work of his early career,before the 1866 publication of Carroll's 'Alice'.

Twelve pages of adverts to the rear, dated March 1848.

Bound by Eric Sweet, a keen collector of private press and fables. He studied at the Brighton College of Art, before moving to London to work as a lettering artist and typographer for advertising agencies, later becoming the head of Birmingham School of Printing. Sweet's bindings are unique and striking, reflecting the topics of the volumes in distinctive style.