HOW TO TAME AN AUROCHS (DON’T BOTHER)
CAESAR, Gaius Julius.
C. Julii Caesaris quae extant. Accuratissime cum libris editis & MSS optimis collata, recognita & correcta. Accesserunt annotationes Samuelis Clarke S.T.P. Tabulae aeneis ornata.
London, Jacob Tonson, 1712.
Folio, pp. [vi], 560; engraved initials, head-, and tailpieces, 87 engraved plates, of which 62 double-page (see below), some deckle edges; occasional very light offset, a thin strip of soiling to foot of plate 59, plate 77 shaved at edges with slight loss of a few letters, but a remarkably fine copy; bound in late eighteenth-century English (probably Oxford) diced russia with single gilt fillet frame, spine richly gilt in compartments with foliate and vase tools, black morocco lettering-piece, gilt dentelles and board edges, marbled endpapers, edges yellow, green silk place-marker; extremities slightly rubbed, tailcap slightly chipped.
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C. Julii Caesaris quae extant. Accuratissime cum libris editis & MSS optimis collata, recognita & correcta. Accesserunt annotationes Samuelis Clarke S.T.P. Tabulae aeneis ornata.
First edition of the celebrated Tonson’s Caesar edited by Samuel Clarke (1675–1729), ‘the most sumptuous classical work which this country has produced’ (Dibdin).
Dedicated to the ‘new Caesar’, John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, victor of the Battle of Blenheim, this edition is richly illustrated with large and impressive engravings, mostly accompanied by an elaborate dedication at the foot of each plate. The sources for the plates are varied, and include Thomas Hariot’s 1590 book on Virginia, Clüver’s Germaniae antiquae libri tres (Leiden, 1616), and Andrea Palladio’s illustrated edition of Caesar (Venice, 1575). The eighty-seven plates comprise a frontispiece portrait of Caesar, a portrait of the dedicatee (folded), a double-page engraved title-page, six double-page engraved maps (of Gaul, Britain, Germany, Italy, Egypt, and Spain), plans of military camps, views of armies and battles (most notably a battle using elephants on a large double-page plate), costume plates (including a depiction of a Wicker Man and an animal sacrifice), plates of military activity such as building walls or siege towers, and the large double-page plate famously depicting an aurochs. The volume concludes with nine double-page plates of the Triumphs of the Caesars by Huyberts after Andrea Mantegna, seemingly based on woodcut copies by Andrea Andreani rather than the originals, located then (and now) at Hampton Court.
The bookseller and publisher Jacob Tonson (1655/6–1736) was perhaps the most successful printing entrepreneur of his time. He specialised in literature and Classical texts, both in the original and in translation, and helped shape some of our modern ideas about great works of literature. Tonson paid particular care to the presentation of this work, with regard to layout, typography, and illustration; the paper, typeface, and artists were all Dutch, though the printing was carried out for Tonson in London by John Watts. Emigré Dutch artists produced high quality engravings, which have ensured the enduring interest in this edition, beyond the careful scholarship of Samuel Clarke (see Suarez, ‘Hard cases: confronting bibliographical difficulty in eighteenth-century texts’, PBSA 111 (2017), pp. 1–30).
‘Among Tonson’s major publications during the Kit-Cat years is his great folio edition, in Latin, of the works of Julius Caesar; some nine years in the making, it finally appeared in 1712. No English publisher had ever produced so lavish a book before, with its careful scholarship (the texts were edited by Samuel Clarke), its numerous maps, and its eighty-seven engravings done in superb detail by Dutch artists. The book was dedicated to the duke of Marlborough, and had as its frontispiece Kneller’s portrait of Marlborough. Again, this was published by subscription, and in this case Tonson arranged to have each subscriber’s coat of arms printed on each double-plate page’ (ODNB).
ESTC T136730; Brunet I, col. 1456 (‘édition magnifique’); Cohen–De Ricci, cols 222–3.
