[Fore-edge painting]. - Gifford, [William]. The Baviad and Maeviad [...].

€ 600,00

Attractive miniature book of poems decorated with a delicate fore-edge painting and prettily bound in full black calf. Anonymously prepared, the fore-edge painting depicts a rural scene showing a woman peasant milking a cow, with a calf waiting nearby.

A combined edition of the two 18th century satires by Gifford. The "Baviad", directed against the Della Cruscans, a group of sentimental and - to Gifford's conservative mentality - dangerously radical poets, imitates the first satire of the Roman poet Persius (34-62 A.D.). The "Maeviad" was directed against some minor dramatists.

In the blindstamped black publisher's binding bearing the inscription "Jones's Diamond Edition", featuring rich abstract ornaments. Extremities slightly rubbed.