Ivanhoe; A Romance. 3 vols. - [FIRST PRINTING OF IVANHOE]

1820. Edinburgh, Archibald Constable & Co., 1820. Bound in three contemporary beautiful straightgrained morocco, spines gilt, gilt borders, hinges slightly weak. A beautiful set exhibiting slight yellowing to pages due to age and with evidence of minor foxing. First edition, with points of the first state as listed by Worthington(with the usual one exception): The points in volume one: pagination ends on p. 298; forme-mark on p. [iii] is 9; "Peter" reading on p. iv, line 6; p. v, line 12 the second and fourth words are "which," not the third as noted in Worthington, but with the 6 forme-mark; "observed" is first word on p. vi, line 14; without commas on p. ix, line 1 or p. xii, line 5 after "fought" or "people" respectively; "toilsome" reading on p. xv, line 3; no forme-marks on pp. xvi, xix, or xxiv, forme-marks of "9" and "12" on pp. xxviii and xxx respectively; a comma after "paste" on p. xxix. First edition, first printing of one of the most beloved and widely read novels of the 19th century. With Ivanhoe Walter Scott gave birth to the historical novel and it is credited with the revival of courtly romance novels and medievialism; Cardinal John Henry Newman claimed that Scott "had first turned men's minds in the direction of the middle ages".The legendary Robin Hood, in the novel initially known under the name of Locksley, is also a character in the story, as are his "merry men", including Friar Tuckand and Little John. The character that Scott gave to Robin Hood in Ivanhoe helped shape the modern notion of this figure as a cheery, decent, patriotic and noble outlaw.Ivanhoe was as much a success with the critics as it was with the reading public. Ivanhoe sold at an astonishing rate. Within less than two weeks, the entire first printing of 10,000 copies was sold out and the demand for more copies kept going up. Translated into numerous languages, it marked the beginning of Scott's European literary adventure and the emergence of the historical novel as an international phenomenon.Ivanhoe was the first novel in which Scott adopted a purely English subject, portraying the enmity of Saxons and Normans during the reign of Richard I (1189-99), a time when the English nobility was overwhelmingly Norman. "Various explanations have been offered for Scott's decision to turn to medieval England. J. G. Lockhart in his Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Bart. (1837-38) suggests that it may have been sparked by the 'after-dinner conversation' of his friend William Clerk which first drew Scott's attention to racial tensions in post-Norman Conquest England. Clerk noted how our names for livestock generally have Anglo-Saxon origins (e.g. sheep, pig, cow) which are exchanged for Anglo-French terms once they are prepared for the table (e.g. mutton, pork, beef)." (Edinburg University Library, Centre for Research Collections)."But if relatively few modern readers have actually opened the pages of Ivanhoe, the eighth work in the original sequence, scarcely any will be unfamiliar with a title that still carries, faintly but irremovably, the aura of the immense fame achieved on its first publication in in 1819 and subsequently maintained through its role as model for innumerable works of historical fiction published in all part of the world during the succeeding century." (Millgate, Making it New: Scott, Constable, Ballantyne, and the Publication of Ivanhoe).One Hundred Books Famous in English Literature no. 71.Worthington 8