A Smaller Classical Dictionary – Smith, Blakeney (1927)

S$192.00

A Smaller Classical Dictionary – Smith, Blakeney (1927)

S$192.00

A gorgeous fine-binding by Robert Riviere, a prominent bookbinder of the early 20th century.

Title: A Smaller Classical Dictionary, bound with A Dictionary of Dates

Author: William Smith, E. H. Blackeney (ed.)

Publisher: Everyman’s Library, 1927, with a title page that states Robert Riviere & Son. A Dictionary of Dates published 1911.

Condition: Full leather, fine binding. Very good. Raised bands to spine, bright gilt to all edges, inner dentelles, marbled endpapers. A few scratches to cover and darkening to spine, with very slight rubbing, but nothing significant enough to detract from the beauty of the book. Slight scratches to gilt. With illustrated plates. About 1000 thin paper pages in total. App 6.5″x4″.

An edited reprint of Smith’s Smaller Classical Dictionary, which was probably the most important reference work on the Greco-Roman world in the late 19th and early 20th century. Here is an A-Z list of all things Greek and Roman, from important cities and events to gods and poets. Included are lovely illustrations and maps. This Smaller Classical Dictionary is bound with A Dictionary of Dates, which contains a chronology of more modern events, and does not relate to the Greco-Roman world.

The title page on this edition states the publisher as being Robert Riviere & Son, although further research shows this is the Everyman’s Library edition which was reprinted a few times in the 1920s. Robert Riviere was a prominent and sought-after bookbinder of the period, and thus this book was probably bound by his bindery and not published by it. Robert Riviere’s bindery would later merge with that Bayntun, another important early 20th century bindery, to form what is today Bayntun-Riviere.