Bound by Alfred Matthews in three-quarter levant morocco with blind tooling, gilt edges. Leaf 10 1/2 × 8 in.
Peter van Os, of Breda, was actively engaged in printing at Zwolle from 1479 till the end of the century, except for the three years 1481-1484.
The English translation of the "Vitas Patrum," which was the closing labor of Caxton's life, was printed in 1495 by Wynken de Worde with this colophon: "Thus endyth the moost vertuouse hystorye of the deuoute and right renowned lyues of holy faders lyuynge in deserte, worthy of remembraunce to all wel dysposed persons which hath ben translated oute of Frenche into Englisshe by William Caxton of Westmynstre late deed and fynysshed at the laste daye of hys lyff."
24. HIGDEN, RANULPH. Polychronicon, translated into English by Trevisa and continued by Caxton. [Westminster]. William Caxton, [1482].
Fol. 1, blank. Fol. 2a: Prohemye. [G]Rete thankynges lawde & honoure we merytoryously ben bounde to yelde and offre vnto wryters of hystoryes, whiche gretely haue prouffyted oure mortal lyf, that shewe vnto the reders and herers by the ensamples of thynges passyd, what thynge is to be desyred. [Fol. 4-20, alphabetical table; 21, blank; 22-24, dialogue between the Clerke and the Lorde on translation, Trevisa's epistle to Lord Berkeley; 25, blank.] Fol. 26a: Prolicionycion. Prefacio prima ad historiam. [A]Fter solempne and wyse wryters of Arte and of scyence.... Fol. 389b: God be thanked of al his dedes. This translacion is ended on a thursdaye the eyghtenth daye of Apryll the yere of our lord a thousand thre hondred and .lvij. The xxxj yere of Kyng Edward the thyrd after the Conquest of Englond, the yere of my lordes age Syr thomas lord of berkley that made me make this translacion fyue and thyrtty. [390a, Caxton's epilogue to Trevisa; 390b, blank.] Fol. 391a: Jncipit Liber vltimus. Fol. 449a: Ended the second day of Juyll the xxij yere of the regne of kynge Edward the fourth & of the Incarnacion of oure lord a thousand foure score and tweyne. Fynysshed per Caxton. Fol. 449b, 450, blank.
Folio. Sign. a-b8, C4, 1-288, [28*2], 29-488, 494, 508, 52-558, 450 leaves, of which five (a, 1; 1, 1; 1, 5; 28*,2; 55, 8) are blank. The folios of sign. 1,2-55,7 are numbered 1-ccccxxviii (blanks 1, 5 and 28*,2 counted as iv and ccxxvi), with many errors which are mostly corrected on the following leaves, but in the case of fol. ccxli on the verso of the same leaf. There is, however, no clx, and ccccxiii is duplicated, errors which balance each other and do not disturb the final numeration. The omission of a signature 51 is accidental, the text continuing without a break. The purpose of the unsigned single sheet following sign. 28, consisting of one printed and one blank leaf, was evidently to carry the last remaining leaf of the fourth book and thereby make possible a division of the volume at this point into two nearly equal parts. Advantage has apparently been taken of this division to bind the Grenville copy (Brit. Mus. IB. 55060) in two volumes. Wynkyn de Worde, who reprinted the Polychronicon in 1495, followed in this particular Caxton's example and in order to begin the fifth book with a new signature left at the end of the fourth book nearly a whole leaf blank, though he separated the other books by a blank space of no more than three or four lines. Caxton's use of arabic figures for signatures was confined to the years 1481-1483; after that date he used letters only. The first few chapter-headings of each book have Latin ordinals (Capitulum primum, secundum, etc.) which are soon dropped for arabic figures. Gothic letter, Caxton's fourth font, forty lines to the page, with headline. Two- to seven-line spaces left for chapter and book initials, which are supplied in red. Chapter-headings underlined in red. Blades ii, 172. Ames-Dibdin i, 138. Seymour de Ricci p. 60.
Seventy-two leaves, including the five blanks, are wanting in this copy, viz.: sign. a-C; 1, 1, 4, 5, 8; 2, 1, 4, 5; 3, 2; 4, 1; 27, 3; [28*,2]; 44, 7; 50-55. The lacking parts comprise the first twenty leaves (Prohemye and alphabetical index), the last forty leaves (Caxton's eighth book), and twelve intermediate leaves. Of these the Proheyme is supplied in facsimile and sign. 4, 1 in manuscript. What is possibly an original impression of Caxton's large device is placed at the end of the volume. This was used by Caxton only during his last years, 1487-91, and by Wynkyn de Worde, into whose hands the original block passed, in his folios for thirty years longer. From one of the latter this may have been taken, possibly from the Polychronicon of 1495, where the other side of the leaf it occupied was blank, as is the case here also.
Trevisa's translation of Higden was completed, according to the best MSS., in 1387, not in 1357 as stated on fol. 389b. (In 1357 the 18th of April fell on Tuesday, not Thursday, and Thomas Lord Berkeley was then in the fifth, not the thirty-fifth year of his age.) Caxton was himself the translator of twenty-two of the one hundred books which he printed and it was therefore not strange that Trevisa's English should have been in his hands, as the proem states, "a lytel embelysshed fro tholde makyng." In what these embellishments consisted is partially explained in the epilogue: "Therfore I William Caxton a symple persone haue endeuoyred me to wryte fyrst ouer all the sayd book of proloconycon, and somewhat haue chaunged the rude and old Englyssh, that is to wete certayn wordes, which in these dayes [1482] be neyther usyd ne understanden". He went however further than this and so changed the inflections and orthography that the language is no longer of the fourteenth but rather of the fifteenth century. But in no other way could it have been made to harmonize with his proposed continuation, concerning which he proceeds to say: "and also am auysed to make another booke after this sayd werke whiche shal be sett here after the same, And shal haue his chapytres and his table a parte. For I dar not presume to sette my book ne ioyne hit to his, for dyuerse causes". Accordingly he begins his "Liber ultimus" with a new signature, preceded by a blank page. His "table" nevertheless is combined with that of the preceding seven books in one alphabet. Wynkyn de Worde's edition has a more elaborate index of ninety pages in which each of the eight books is indexed in a separate alphabet.
Apart from the interest attaching to this "Liber ultimus" as the only original work of any length from Caxton's pen, the Polychronicon is next to the Golden Legend his largest book, and in the Prohemye they are grouped together as the "twoo bookes notable" which treat of history. It happens also, probably because of larger editions printed, that of these two books many more copies have survived than of any of his other books, about one-fourth of which are now represented only by single copies. Of the Polychronicon, Seymour de Ricci's "Census of Caxtons" (1909) enumerates forty known copies (very few of them entirely complete), evenly divided between public and private libraries. To this list he adds, under the heading "Present owners untraced," forty-eight copies (nos. 41-88) which appeared at sales between 1698 and 1901, some of them possibly identical with copies already described as "known." In this second division is found the present copy (no. 79), purchased by the donor of this collection at the Smets sale, New York, May, 1868, in calf binding, with the name of the owner "A. A. Smets, Savannah, May 28, 1836" on the fly-leaf. It was at once sent to Francis Bedford for binding, with instructions to have the "inlaying, repairing etc. done over in the very best manner, by the best restorer in France or England." Bound in brown morocco, richly blind-tooled, with Tudor rose, fleur-de-lis and acorn emblems. Leaf 10 1/4 × 7 1/2 in. The Smets fly-leaf and the original instructions sent to Mr. Bedford with the volume and returned by him with an added note over his own signature, laid in.
Other copies of the Polychronicon which have passed through Mr. Bedford's hands have been bound in the same style, among them the Menzies copy, sold New York, November, 1876, which de Ricci wrongly conjectured might be identical with the Smets.