GAMMER GURTON'S GARLAND: OR, THE NURSERY PARNASSUS

London: Printed for R. Triphook . . . By Harding and Wright, 1810. First Complete Collected Edition. 184 x 123 mm. (7 1/4 x 4 7/8"). 1 p.l., 46 pp.
Attractive 20th century green morocco with single gilt-ruled frame, smooth spine with gilt rules and lettering, binding edges studded with a chain of small and large gilt dots, all edges gilt. Blind stamp of the University Club on title; ink numbering near gutter on p. 1; a few pencil notations on title and in margins elsewhere. Opie, "Three Centuries of Nursery Rhymes" 30. See also: Opie, "The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes," pp. 34-35. ◆Upper board ever so slightly sunned at top, final leaf with thin dampstain in gutter, a couple other trivial imperfections elsewhere, but A FINE COPY with virtually no evidence of use.

This is a beautiful copy of a fundamental text in the history of nursery rhymes. First published in 1783 or 1784, the book originally consisted of 79 rhymes collected by antiquary Joseph Ritson (1752-1803), whom DNB calls "one of the earliest collectors of local verse." According to Opie, Ritson was inspired by a collection of nursery rhymes he had purchased in 1781 entitled "Mother Goose's Melody," and "soon afterwards was urging his nephew to collect verses." The present much-augmented posthumous edition consists of 134 nursery rhymes divided into four parts. Parts I & II reproduce the first edition by Ritson, which included the first printing of such well-known rhymes as "There was an old woman, she liv'd in a shoe," and "Ride a cock-horse to Banbury Cross"; parts III & IV include 55 additional nursery rhymes, among them the first known appearances of "Humpty Dumpty" and "Little Bo-Peep." One of the contributors to the latter parts of this work is believed to have been Francis Douce (1757-1834), a former Keeper of Manuscripts at the British Museum and an illustrious private collector. The first edition of "Gammer" is excessively rare, and according to RBH, our first collected edition has appeared just a handful of times at auction this century. The present item is a particularly fine a copy of a fragile work, being extremely well preserved and attractively presented..