ESSEX HOUSE PRESS: CELLINI, Benvenuto.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

The Treatises on Goldsmithing and Sculpture. First Essex House edition, number 167 of 600 copies. The first book sold by C. R. Ashbee's Essex House Press, translated from the original Italian by Ashbee, and printed as a deliberate attempt to preserve the ideals of the Kelmscott Press.The colophon of the book notes the intention "to keep living the traditions of good printing refounded by William Morris, the master craftsman, and likewise of T. Binning & J. Tippett, compositors, and S. Mowlem, pressmen, who came to Essex House from the Kelmscott Press to that end". When the Kelmscott Press closed, Ashbee's Guild of Handicraft purchased the presses (without type) and engaged the services of the principal compositors and pressmen.The Essex House Press had previously published a few copies of the articles of association of the Guild of Handicraft Ltd for shareholders of the Company. This translation of Cellini was, therefore, the first book sold by the press and was dedicated "to the Metal Workers of the Guild of Handicraft". Ashbee hoped that they might implement some of Cellini's ideas in their work. Benvenuto Cellini (1500-1571) was a skilled sculptor and goldsmith in the Renaissance.

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