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WILLIAM PETYT'S COPY

SOMNER, William. The antiquities of Canterbury. Or a survey of that ancient citie, with the suburbs, and cathedrall. Containing principally matters of Antiquity in them all. Collected chiefly from old Manuscripts, Lieger-bookes, and other like Records, for the most part, never as yet printed....

London. Printed by I.L. for Richard Thrale..., 1640. First edition.
Quarto. [16], 516pp, [12]. With three folding engraved leaves of plates. including a map of Canterbury, and a large woodcut coat of arms to the verso of title. Recent half calf, gilt-tooled lettering-piece, marbled boards. Marginal holing to title, some softening and loss to marginal fore-edges of preliminaries and towards the end of the volume, unobtrusive wormtrack to gutter margin extending from title to Y2. William Petyt's copy, with his ink inscription to head of title, and the ink stamp of Inner Temple to the centre of title.
The first edition of antiquary and Anglo-Saxon scholar William Somner's (bap. 1598, d. 1669) geographic, civic, and episcopal history of Canterbury that has the distinction of including the first comprehensive survey of a medieval cathedral. Somer held a number of administrative posts associated with Canterbury Cathedral, where he was patronized by Archbishop Laud, to whom the book, Somner's first publication, is dedicated. Accordingly, the text is conscientiously Laudian, notably describing Becket's shrine as the 'glory' of Canterbury 'cut down' at the Reformation. Somner's historically knowledgable and contextual text reverently guides the reader through the interior of cathedral which he considers to 'exceed most of the Realm, if not all, in beauty, stateliness, and magnificence of beauty'. The book was reissued in 1662. A second edition by Nicholas Batteley appeared in 1703. It is said to be the first book published with an appendix containing original records.

William Petyt (1640/41-1707), lawyer and political propagandist. The son of William Petyt, a landowner and lawyer of Bolton Abbey and Barnard's Inn, he matriculated from Christ's College, Cambridge, in April 1660. He was admitted to the Middle Temple in June of the same year, and the Inner Temple on 25th November 1664. He was called to the bar in February 1671 and to the bench in 1689. Between 1701 and 1702 he served as treasurer of the Inner Temple. Petyt would develop a reputation as a valued, and indeed feared, whig writer noted for his impassioned polemics often associated with violent opposition to the late Stuart kingship and devotion to the ancient constitution. His influential The Antient Right of the Commons of England Asserted (1680), is considered one of the most influential radical ancient constitutionalist tracts published in the latter half to the seventeenth century. In his will Petyt provided for the construction of a library in the Inner Temple to house the entirety of his vast collection of books and manuscripts, but his brother Silvester removed approximately 2000 pieces to his Yorkshire home. In 1998 Sotheby's dispersed, in 17 lots, a selection of books from the library of the Inner Temple.
ESTC S121902, STC 22918.
£ 1,500.00 Antiquates Ref: 27419