An Archaeological Dictionary; or, Classical Antiquities of the Jews, Greeks, and Romans, Alphabetically Arranged: containing an account of their manners, customs, diversions, ... heresies in the primitive Church, &c. &c.

London: Printed for D. Ogilvy, and J. Speare et al 1793, 1793. The Second Edition With Considerable Additions. 8vo. 210x125mm. Unpaginated, collates [A4]-Z4, Aa4-Ll4, *A4-*Z4, Aa4-Dd4. Full tree calf with double fillet gilt border inside which is a further gilt border in a Greek key design. Spine with five raised bands, compartments decorated in gilt, maroon morocco label, lettered in gilt. Marbled endpapers, front pastedown has armorial bookplate of Matthew Wilson and the front free endpaper has the bookplate of his grand-daughter Frances Mary Richardson Currer. A little wear to extremities and joints and some fading to spine but otherwise in very good condition. Some browning but generally excellent internally. Overall a very nice copy, with an excellent provenance, of the expanded second edition dedicated to Samuel Johnson who had written to thank Wilson for the copy of the first edition. Johnson's letter is reprinted here. The Reverend Thomas Wilson (1747-1813) was the headmaster of Clitheroe grammar school, described as "a smart little man, octavo size" (a bit like this attractive book). He sought to inspire a love of intellectual enquiry in his pupils rather than drilling facts into them. At the heart of his teaching was the classical curriculum and if this lively, pithy, well-written dictionary is anything to go by he must have been a fine schoolmaster. As a young woman, Frances Currer inherited two fortunes and a large country house in North Yorkshire (Eshton Hall) containing Mathew Wilson's fine and important library. She then did what all rich people should do: she collected more books. Frances's library at Eshton was regarded as one of the best in England and Currer herself, according to the great bibliographer Thomas Dibdin, the most important female collector in Europe. It is uncertain whether Frances ever suffered from the bibliomania described by Dibdin in his famous 1809 book on the subject, but we do know that she declined an offer of marriage from Richard Heber who really was a bibliomaniac. He was probably more interested in her library than in Frances herself but as she, too, seems to have preferred the company of books, she wisely remained single. She was a generous patron and benefactor to Heber himself but most notably to the Bronte family. Currer's collection numbered about twenty thousand volumes at her death in 1861.�