Ovid's Metamorphoses, OVIDIUS NASO (Publius).

EIGHTEENTH CENTURY WOMAN'S BOOKPLATE, ON A BOOK DEDICATED TO WOMEN

in Fifteen Books. Translated by Mr. Dryden, Mr. Addison, Dr. Garth, Mr. Mainwaring, Mr. Congreve, Mr. Rowe, Mr. Pope, Mr. Gay, Mr. Eusden, Mr. Croxall and other Eminent Hands. Publish'd by Sir Samuel Garth, M.D. Adorn'd with Sculptures. The Second Edition.

Engraved portrait of the Princess of Wales, 15 engraved plates, and fine woodcut head and tail piece vignettes.

Two volumes. 12mo. [146 x 89 x 45 mm]. [7]ff, lii, [iv], 239 pp; 387pp. Bound c.1770 in tree calf, the covers with a gilt fillet border. Smooth spines divided into six panels by a gilt fillet, lettered in the second on a red goatskin label, the others with a flower tool, the edges of the boards hatched in gilt, marbled endleaves and edges. (Upper headcaps chipped, rubbed).
London: printed for J. Tonson; and sold by J. Brotherton and W. Meadows, at the Black Bull in Cornhill, 1720.

The plates are included in the pagination. They have been quite closely cut with loss to the dedications at the foot. A few minor spots and stains but a very good copy. It has the 18th century armorial bookplate of a female owner, one M.S. Biley. Another impression of this plate is in the Maria Gerard Messenger Collection of Women's Bookplates in the Grolier Club. At the foot of the plate is the label of a Mrs Clarke, in an almost identical font.

First published in folio 1717, this second edition is missing from some major libraries. Dedicated to Caroline Princess of Wales, with an engraved portrait after Kneller, the 15 plates serve as dedications to the individual books, each being inscribed to a prominent lady.

Stock no. ebc7822