Godman, Ernest.

[Essex House, One of 38 in Vellum]. Mediaeval Architecture in Essex.

Banstead, Surrey: By the author [Essex House Press], 1905. First Edition. First edition. #121 of 250 hand-numbered copies, of which this is one of 38 copies bound in full stiff vellum with green silk ties and gilt-lettered spine. See Norman Architecture in Essex, Bibliographical Note.

Filled to the brim with 50 illustrations of buildings and architectural details, including one etched plate, eight photographic plates, and dozens of illustrations in the text (many of which are full-page).

This study of medieval architecture in the county of Essex is a result of Essex House Press founder C. R. Ashbee’s and Godman’s intense interest in preserving historic architecture and Ashbee’s involvement in William Morris’s Society for the Preservation of Ancient Buildings.

Godman was Ashbee’s first architectural pupil and first secretary of Ashbee’s Committee for the Survey of the Memorials of Greater London (which included parts of Essex and Middlesex). “[Godman] and Ashbee made an odd pair, the one was all fire and go, the other plodding along. . .” Crawford, C.R. Ashbee. Architect, Designer & Romantic Socialist (1985, pgs. 58-60, 216-17). This work was one in a series of six proposed architectural studies planned by Ashbee and Godman that was cut short by Godman’s early death.

8vo. Tomkinson 58. Ransom 55. Crawford 58. Ashbee, pg. 79. Very good with bowing to boards which are a bit stained, with some offsetting to endpapers and morocco bookplate of W. A. Foyle, Beeleigh Abbey. Item #290

Price: $400.00