ELIZABETHAN DEVOTION
[PRIMER.]
Preces privatae, in studiosorum gratia[m] collectae & Regia authoritate approbatae …
London, William Seres, 1568.
16mo, pp. [688]; title-page and calendar section printed in red and black; slightly dusty at the extremities but a very good copy in early nineteenth-century black morocco, gilt, by J. Mackenzie ‘Bookbinder to the King’, with his stamp to front free endpaper; ownership inscription of Charles Marriott dated 1838, bookplates of the Early English Theology Collection at the General Theological Seminary.
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Preces privatae, in studiosorum gratia[m] collectae & Regia authoritate approbatae …
Second edition of this rare ‘private’ prayer book, first printed in 1564, with a calendar, a Latin catechism for children, selected psalms, and a Latin–English list of English islands, counties, cathedral cities, bishoprics, rivers, and ports.
Preces privatae was one of three authorized works for private devotion to be published early in Elizabeth’s reign, all less Protestant than those issued under Edward VI, the others being the Primer and Orarium of 1560. Largely based on the Elizabethan Book of Common Prayer, 1559, and in turn on the Orarium, it is a book ‘of great interest to the historian of English devotional literature’, and includes Latin hymns from the Sarum Primer, and extracts from the Hortulus animae and even some Counter-Reformation works (Morison, English Prayer Books, 1949). Particularly interesting in a devotional context is the list of signs of the zodiac in the calendar, with a table of corresponding body parts (new to 1568), and a table of the humours – content perhaps expressive of the influence of John Dee at Elizabeth’s court. The text here is largely the same as that of 1564, with errata corrected and some new ones introduced; a later edition, 1573, introduced some new material derived from John Fisher.
All editions of the Preces privatae are extremely uncommon in commerce – we can trace only three complete copies, of any edition, at auction since 1950, and none of the present one, which is also the rarest in absolute terms. One of five copies only in ESTC, the others being at the British Library, Durham (slightly imperfect), St Paul’s Cathedral; and Folger.
Provenance: Charles Marriott (1811–1856), fellow of Oriel College, member of the Oxford Movement, and co-editor of the Library of the Fathers; subsequently item 877 in Quaritch catalogue 869 (1922), sold for £8 8s to the General Theological Seminary.
ESTC S1647; STC 20379.
