One work up for auction is a first edition of Humphry Repton’s Sketches and Hints on Landscape Gardening from 1795 featuring 16 fine aquatint plates—10 of which are hand-colored, six uncolored. This copy of the work (estimated £10,000–15,000) is enhanced by the inclusion of the original drawing, signed “H. Repton” in the lower right within the original wash border, of plate VIII.
“This is an exceptional copy of the rarest of Repton’s landscape books,” said Rupert Powell, deputy chairman and head of books at Forum Auctions. “Only 250 copies were printed, and Repton refused to issue a second edition, although some of the chapters were re-used in ‘Observations’ and ‘Fragments.’”
A first edition of Pauline Knip and Coenraad Jacob Temminck’s Les Pigeons Volume 1 (estimated £5,000–7,000) will join this rare title at auction. This volume includes 87 etched plates partly printed in color and finished by hand by César Macret after Knip. Les Pigeons is considered to be the best and most famous monograph on pigeons and doves.
Another highlight of September’s sale is a complete first edition of William Gilbert’s De Magnete in original condition (estimated £10,000–15,000). Published in 1600, this is known as the first truly modern scientific book published in England. Theorizing that the Earth was a giant magnet, Gilbert worked out the variation and declination of the compass, distinguished magnetic mass from weight, and was the first person to use the term “electricity.” De Magnete would go on to influence Kepler, Galileo, and Newton, becoming one of the foundational works of modern physics.
