Exhibit for Center's Garden Conference (5/7)

I've been busy today preparing a small exhibit of rare books for this weekend's Garden Conference at the Renaissance Center. The following images and descriptions are derived from the exhibit.

"You have wisely ordered your vegetable delights, beyond the reach of exception"

--Sir Thomas Browne, The Garden of Cyrus (1658) 

 

the Garden of Eden, from The Holy Bible [Bishop's Bible] (1602)

“And the Lord God placed a garden Eastwarde in Eden, and there he put the man whome he had made. For out of the grounde made the Lord God to growe everie tre pleasant to the sight, and good for meat: the tre of life also in the middes of the garden, and the tre of of knowledge of good and of evil” (Geneva Bible, 1560: Genesis 2:8-9).

Early printed Bibles frequently contain woodcut images of Eden, as seen above in the image from the 1602 Bishop's Bible. Our quarto copy of the KJV features a similar image. 

Engraved illustration in Paradise Lost (London: Tonson, 1705): Book Nine

The engraving shown here illustrates Book Nine of John Milton's Paradise Lost, and depicts  the serpent tempting and suborning Eve to eat the forbidden fruit.

Engraved illustration in Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, trans. John Harington (1591): Canto Six

To complete their intended quests and fulfill the prophecies of ghosts and gods, epic heroes have had to face a seemingly endless series of redoubtable foes, including disaffected gods (Poseidon and Juno), monstrous creatures (Scylla and Polyphemus), and uninvited house guests (Penelope’s suitors). Yet these heroes must also avoid distraction, especially in the form of luxurious, paradisal lands inhabited by beautiful goddesses (Odysseus with Circe on Aeaea and Calypso on Ogygia; Aeneas with Dido at Carthage).  Modern readers might upbraid Odysseus and Aeneas for loving and leaving these women, but in the early modern period these paradisal places became literary tropes, imaginary locations symbolizing the deadly allure of seemingly beautiful lands and people. In the epic tradition of the Italian Renaissance, these places were figured as enchanted gardens, most notably those belonging to Alcina in Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso (1516) and Armida in Tasso’s Gerusalemme Liberata (1580). The first garden is described in Harington's English translation as a place where the “air is alway temperate and cleare, / And wants both winters storms, and summers heate, / As though that Aprill lasted all the yeare.” After luring the knight Ruggiero into her sumptuous palace, Alcina reveals her true form as a witch, a deformed hag made beautiful through enchantment.

Ariosto’s poem had an enormous influence on Edmund Spenser’s Faerie Queene (1590), whose allegorical knight Guyon encounters the “Bower of Bliss” in Book Two. In the last canto Guyon enters the bower, “a place pickt out by choice of best alive, / That natures worke by art can imitate: / In which what ever in this worldly state / Is sweet, and pleasing unto living sense … Was poured forth with plentifull dispence, / And made there to abound with lavish affluence.” Despite its profound beauty, the Bower of Bliss is a site of temptation and evil in the allegorical project of the poem, and so must be destroyed. In an unsettling show of violent power that to this day troubles critics, Guyon brutally razes the bower to the ground, spoiling its “plentifull dispence” and “lavish affluence”:

                      But all those pleasant bowres and Pallace braue,
                      Guyon broke downe, with rigour pittilesse;
                      Ne ought their goodly workmanship might saue
                      Them from the tempest of his wrathfulnesse,
                      But that their blisse he turn'd to balefulnesse:
                      Their groues he feld, their gardins did deface,
                      Their arbers spoyle, their Cabinets suppresse,
                      Their banket houses burne, their buildings race,
                      And of the fairest late, now made the fowlest place.

"May," from John Evelyn, Kalendarium hortense (1683)

One of the Center's several early printed almanacs, John Evelyn’s Kalendarium hortense (1683) is subtitled “The Gard’ners Almanac, directing what he is to do Monthly throughout the year.” In the “Introduction to the Kalendar,” Evelyn notes that “as Paradise… was no longer Paradise than the Man was put into it to dress it, and to keep it; so, nor will our Gardens (as near as we can contrive them to the resemblance of that blessed abode) remain long in their perfection, unless they are also continually cultivated.” For every month of the year Evelyn offers his readers basic information (length of month, average times of sunrise and sunset), a list of tasks “to be done” in the garden (including planting, pruning, fertilizing, etc.), and a list of “flowers [or fruits] in prime, or yet lasting.”

Sir Thomas Browne, The Garden of Cyrus (1658)

a Quincuncial Pattern

Well known for his work as a physician and empirical scientist, Sir Thomas Browne (1605-1682) was one of early modern England’s most inventive prose writers, composing  unique works like Religio medici (1642) and Pseudodoxia epidemica (1646). His Garden of Cyrus, or, The Quincunciall, Lozenge, or Net-work Plantations of the Ancients, Artifically, Naturally, Mystically Considered (1658) is a prolonged commentary and meditation on “X”-shaped forms in the human, natural, and mystical worlds. The “quincunx,” which literally means “five-twelfths” and was used in Classical antiquity to describe the spots of the “five” on a die, is “a pattern used for planting trees in which they are arranged in one or more groups of five, so placed that four occupy the corners of a square or rectangle and the fifth occupies its center” (OED). You can see an example of a quincuncial pattern in the image above. 

Intended as a “Garden Discourse” rather than a “massy Herball” (like John Gerard’s Herball—also owned by the Center), the work begins with a discussion of Babylon’s hanging gardens and the quincuncial layout of King Cyrus’ garden at Sardis. As the author notes in the dedicatory epistle to Nicholas Bacon, The Garden of Cyrus "range[s] into extraneous things, and many parts of Art and Nature...follow[ing] herein the example of old and new Plantations, wherein noble spirits contented not themselves with Trees, but by the attendance of Aviaries, Fish Ponds, and all variety of Animals, they made their gardens the Epitome of the earth, and some resemblance of the secular shows of old." 

Browne proceeds to trace the “X” or “net-work” (i.e. shaped like a net) pattern in the world around him, noting architectural styles, manners of sitting cross-legged, reticulated windows, the “pyramidal” cuts on precious gems, staggered battle lines, and astral constellations. His account of terrestrial and submarine plant life finds the quincunx in pineapples, seed pods, leaf structures, and various flowers. He finds it in the animal world, marking the scales of rattlesnakes and fish, the bee’s honeycomb, and even human skin. He points out that the motion of fins, wings, and human limbs depend on a back-and-forth, X-shaped movement. He even likens the elliptical shape of sound and light waves to the “decussated” line of the quincunx. At the end of his treatise, Browne applies the quincuncial  form to  more abstract ideas, including “intellectual reception” (“intellectual … lines be not thus rightly disposed, but magnified, diminished, distorted, and ill placed … whereby they [people] have irregular apprehensions of things”) and mystical philosophy. The structure of a garden, as Browne so creatively implies, can indeed reflect the organizational principles of nature itself, and become an “Epitome  of the world.”

Family Bibles

The Center owns two copies of the “Geneva Bible,” one of the most famous English translations of the scriptures and an enormous influence on Renaissance literature and culture, including the plays of William Shakespeare. As is the case with copies of most old “family” bibles, they contain various examples and genres of manuscript annotation, all of which reflect various social roles of the book. The Bible held an important function for the early modern family (as it has for families in many historical periods), building community through sessions of reading aloud while at the same time guiding the moral and spiritual development of its owners. It also served as an important educational site, especially in the development of literacy; MS annotations consisting of “pen trials” and other forms of handwriting practice found in bibles suggest they were used in this way. The typically extensive and personalized annotation of bibles should also come as no surprise since many households of the time owned only one book, usually a Bible, Book of Common Prayer, or John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments.

 

The Bible : translated according to the Ebrew and Greeke, and conferred with the best translations in diuers languages [Geneva Bible]. Imprinted at London: By the Deputies of Christopher Barker, printer to the Queenes most excellent Maiestie, 1598. 

[2], 434, [4], 441-554 leaves; [164] p. ; 23 cm. (4to). STC (2nd ed.) 2171   

Renaissance Center copy has the New Testament of the 1599 Barker edition; in later mottled calf, in phase box; births and baptisms of the children of Richard Palmer are recorded on 3I2v and *1v (dated 1627-1638); signature of Edmund Pell (1719) on 3I2v; inscribed on front pastedown: "Geoffrey Palmer bought at Lampert [?] March 1857"; given to the Renaissance Center by William A. Ringler.

These notes, written in English secretary hand, record the births of various members of the Palmer family in the 1620s, including Richard (the father), and his daughters Anne, Jone, and Avelina. I believe that Richard Palmer wrote the entries and crossed out the first record, which is essentially the same as the third (the birth of Anne Palmer), except for its incorrect birth times. But there is the also the possibility Richard wanted his own entry to hold the primary position in the family records. 

The first two entries (for Richard and Anne) read as follows:

Richard Palmer the soone of Jefferie

Palmer was baptised the x daye of Iunne

in the yeare of our Lorde 1572

Anne Palmer the Dautter of Richard

Palmer was borne at Winge the ffifth

daye of September beinge Wedsonda[y]

betwixte one and Twelfe a Cloke at

nighte: 1627    

blank leaf with ms family records

The second leaf continues with seventeenth-century Palmer family records, including the birth (and death) of his son Charles, along with the death and burial of Avelina Palmer. The records also contain the names of two godfathers (Sir Anthony Coolly and Roger Palmer) and a later ownership inscription from an Edmund Pell, dated 1719.

The Bible : translated according to the Ebrew and Greeke, and conferred with the best translations in diuers languages [Geneva Bible]. Imprinted at London : By Christopher Barker, printer to the Queenes most excellent Maiestie, 1586. 

[2], 434, [4], 441-554 leaves; [164] p. ;  21 cm. STC (2nd ed.) 2145.   

See catalog record for detailed local notes. 


Our other copy of the Geneva Bible, published in 1586, probably contains one of the greatest chronological ranges of annotation of any books in the collection."Robert White of Babworth," whose ownership inscription appears several times throughout the book, appears to be one of the bible's earliest owners. On leaf containing the "preface to the Christian reader" (shown above), he has added an inscription in the period's secretary hand: "Who soeuer heare in doe looke Robert White."

This leaf contains a number of additional early inscriptions, including two more by Robert White ("Robert White Bookee" and "Robert White Booke"). Nicholas and Francis Kent, two men who owned the book in the later seventeenth century, have also added their names, as has a Thomas Hemsworth. In a faint ink at the bottom of the leaf one can just make out a record related to his son Robert (I cannot determine if this is a record of birth, baptism, or burial): "Robert hemsworth the sonne of Thomas hemsworth [????] the [??] of marche."

I wrote about these manuscript annotations in an earlier post. It consists of yet another ownership inscription by Nicholas Kent, who has added an amusing piece of doggerel verse relating to the book.

 

 

The three images above depict a series of leaves containing Hindson family records dating to the eighteenth century. The manuscript annotations are fairly standard for family records in bibles, being very similar to the seventeenth-century notes related to the Palmer family I transcribed above. The second image contains not only the Hindson family records but also inscriptions from the book's earlier ownership history, including "Robert" in Robert White's hand and a gift inscription related to the Kents: "John Kent Book given by his Uncle Richard Kent who was Buryed ye 14th day of Aprill, Anno Domine 1671." The third image contains more of the Hindson records, including one related to a family business: "Began to work with my father July 12 1766."

This image contains some of the book's latest family records, related to the Dawbarn family in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Written in a number of different hands and inks, the annotations record births, marriages, and deaths of family members from the 1820s to the 1910s, including Robert Hugh McKay Dawbarn, described as a "noted surgeon." 

The final image bears a gift inscription dated 15 July 1849, when a "Miss Robinson of Newark, England" presented the bible to "Charles Dawbarn of Wisbeck, England." The remainder of the inscription describes the bible's special place within several families during its history:

"This Bible the comfort of 'a family' for many generations, now passes from the possession of its last survivor, with the earnest prayer, that its blessings may rest upon many succeeding generations."

16th and 17th Century English Book Ownership I

The Bible : translated according to the Ebrew and Greeke, and conferred with the best translations in diuers languages : with most profitable annotations upon all the hard places, and other things of great importance, as may appeare in the epistle to the reader : and also a most profitable concordance for the readie finding out of any thing in the same conteyned.
Imprinted at London : By Christopher Barker, printer to the Queenes most excellent Maiestie, 1586.
[2], 434, [4], 441-554 leaves; [164] p. ; 21 cm.
Signatures: 4⁰. [pi]² A-3H⁸ 3I² *⁴ 3K-3Y⁸ 3Z¹⁰; A-K⁸ L².

One of the Center's copies of the Geneva Bible contains ownership inscriptions from several centuries of different owners. The page shown above features one from a Nicholas Kent, written in 1689. Like many such inscriptions, the note asserts personal ownership of the item and even offers a reward (albeit a paltry one) if the book should be lost. The inscription is written in a mixed hand typical of the period.

Whoosoeuer herein doo Looke.
Nicholas Kent of West Ketford:
Oweth this Booke-1689

If I it Lose and you it finde
I pray be so good and kinde
as for to giue it me againe
and you shall haue neaither
more nor less but Just one
peny to put in purse

Considering the one penny reward, if Kent had ever lost this book (doesn't appear he did), I doubt anyone would have bothered returning it to him--unless of course the finder was amused by the owner's amateur poetry.

Larger Image

Josephus, Flavius, The famous and memorable vvorkes of Iosephus, a man of much honour and learning among the Ievves. Faithfully translated out of the Latin, and French, by Tho. Lodge, Doctor in Physicke

[London] Printed by Humfrey Lownes, for G. Bishop, S. Waterson, and Tho. Adams. 1609.

6 p.l., 811 (i.e. 815), [28] p. 33 cm.

Signatures: 2⁰; [par.]⁶ A-V⁶ 2A-2V⁶ 3A-3F⁶ 3G⁸ 3H-3V⁶ 4A-4H⁶ 4I-4L⁴.

STC 14810

One of the Center's several books formerly owned by early modern women, this copy of Josephus's historical works (Thomas Lodge's English translation of 1609) belonged to a Susan Burnette in the 17th, possibly the early 18th century. On the title page, a modern stamp adjacent to her signature reads: "This edition of this book is rare and has extraordinary features making it valuable." These "extraordinary features" no doubt allude to a little poem Susan wrote on an endpaper, seen in the image below.

Larger Image

Littelle booke when I am gone

tell thy misteris that here was one,

That in hart could bee content

to Liue at her commaundemente

S [paraph] B

I must admit I'm a bit confused with this poem's syntax. What does "one" refer to? The book or Susan? "Liue at her commaundemente" suggests a duteous obligation of some kind, perhaps indicating that Susan served a "misteris" of higher social standing, presumably the person to whom the book would pass in the event of Burnette's death. Maybe Susan wrote this note late in her life, hoping to perpetuate her memory through the acts of inscription and bequeathal. Or, if "one" refers to the book itself, than perhaps Susan simply anthropomorphizes the book as a dutiful servant when she says it "could bee content / to Liue at her commaundemente." Regardless of the reading, the inscription offers an interesting perspective on female book ownership of the period.