Statuta Angliae: Nova statuta.

Accession number: 
PML 716
Published: 
[London] : [Johannes Lettou and William de Machlinia], [between March 1483 and May 1485].
Description: 
[370] leaves ; 30 cm (fol.)
Credit Line: 
Purchased with the Bennett collection, 1902.
Notes: 

Title and imprint from ISTC. Date from BMC, previously dated as [1484].
Printed in Lettou and Machlinia's types 1:140G and 2:102G.
Signatures: A¹⁰ B-E⁸; a-z [et] [con] aa-nn⁸ oo¹² pp-qq⁶: 370 leaves, leaves A1, E8, a1, x7, k6, kk3, and qq6 blank. Leaf A2 signed A1, etc., and leaf a2 signed a1, etc.
Paper format: Chancery folio.
PML copy leaf dimensions: 28.5 x 20.3 cm.
PML copy missing 2 leaves: E8 and qq6 (blanks).

Binding: 
19th-century English gilt-tooled full brown goatskin over paper boards (30 x 21 cm), sewn on 5 supports, unsigned by likely by William Pratt. Plain paper pastedowns and endleaves; decorative endbands; gilt edges.
Inscriptions/Markings: 

Hand decoration: Contemporary English rubrication, primary initials in blue with red foliate decoration, with rest of initials in red. Rubrication likely from Lettou shop, see BMC XI 248-49 and Fig. 18. Annotations: Contemporary marginal notations sporadically throughout in French (not Ensor's hand). Unidentified inscription (name or title?), inked out (leaf A1r) and later listing of statutes by reigning order, i.e. "E 3. H 4. H 5. H 6. E 4." (leaf A1v).

Provenance: 
Rychard Ensor, 15th/early 16th-century signature (leaf A1r); anonymous sale, "Library of a Collector," Sotheby's, 19 March 1896, lot 799 for £275 to Pickering & Chatto for: Richard Bennett (1849-1930), armorial bookplate and purchase notes: No. 119, 23/3/96, with a note that Mr. Bateman's copy "not nearly so fine as this present" sold for £85 at Sotheby's, 31 May 1893 (front pastedown); Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913), purchased with the Bennett collection, 1902.
Classification: 
Department: