With Two Double Page Engraved Maps
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This handsome volume presents Edward Dayes's celebrated Picturesque Tour through Yorkshire and Derbyshire, a work that stands firmly within the late-Georgian tradition of topographical travel and landscape appreciation. Dayes, a noted watercolourist and draughtsman, combines an artist's eye with a traveller's curiosity, guiding the reader through some of northern England's most striking scenery—abbey ruins, wooded valleys, waterfalls, market towns, and romantic upland vistas—captured at a moment when the picturesque ideal strongly shaped British tastes in art and travel.
The 1825 second edition is enhanced with illustrative notes by Edward Wedlake Brayley, an antiquary and topographical writer whose commentary adds historical depth and contextual richness to Dayes's observations. The volume is illustrated throughout with a frontispiece portrait of Dayes, an engraved vignette to the title, and a complete suite of twelve finely engraved plates, all present as called for, depicting locations such as Roche Abbey and Hack Fall. These plates, engraved after Dayes's original drawings, exemplify the delicate line work and tonal balance characteristic of early nineteenth-century British landscape engraving.
Beyond its visual appeal, the work is an important document of early domestic tourism, reflecting contemporary interests in nature, antiquity, and regional identity during the post-Picturesque era. Scarce in complete condition with all plates intact, this edition offers both aesthetic pleasure and scholarly value, and would particularly appeal to collectors of British topographical books, admirers of Georgian landscape art, and those with an interest in Yorkshire and Derbyshire history."
Heavy wear and fading to covers and lacks lower section of outer spine as shown. Contemporary distance notes on endpapers. Pages clean and well presented with age toning. Includes both double paged engraved maps. Appears to lack 2 leafs between advertisement and preface as shown otherwise complete. Despite the aged bindings this copy presents well, includes both maps and is in good condition overall. Please study photos to further understand condition.
