Le Morte D'Arthur. Sir Thomas Malory's Book of King Arthur and His Noble Knights of the Round Table. In Two Volumes. London; Macmillan and Co., Limited; 1900.
Truly beautiful full tree calf bindings of Sir Thomas Malory's famous chronicle of the Arthurian legend.
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Provenance:
Contains the gilt crests and gilt inscription "Floreat Rossallia" ('May Rossall Flourish') on boards, and the bookplate of Rossall School.
Gilt crests on front boards depict a square shield (as referred to in heraldry) sectioned into three equal parts (the pale). The first and third section contain two roses. The second / middle section contains two open books with a bishop's mire between them. Underneath the coat of arms is a banner with the motto "Mens Agitat Molem" meaning 'mind moves matter'.
The bookplate is inscribed "Rossall School. Prize for (?) Paper. Awarded to T. W. Ma?es. O. P. Way. Headmaster. June 1902".
The school's origins and history are detailed on the school's website: "The school was founded in 1844 by Rev. St Vincent Beechey as a sister school to Marlborough College which had been founded the previous year. Its establishment was ‘to provide, at a moderate cost, for the sons of Clergymen and others, a classical, mathematical and general education of the highest class.’ Beechey set about finding the funds required to set up such a school and received support from many including The Earl of Derby, the Duke of Devonshire and the Bishop of Chester. Sir Peter Hesketh Fleetwood agreed to lease his ancestral home of Rossall Hall to the school on a 21 year lease with the option to purchase for £7000 in the first ten years. The Northern Church of England Boarding School, renamed Rossall College under the reign of its first Headmaster Dr John Woolley, opened on 22 August 1844 with 70 boys enrolled. By the following March 120 pupils were in residence...".
Size: 145 x 220 mm (approx., each)
Condition:
Spines unevenly sunned with very minor rubbing. Tooled labels present with some uneven sunning. Both boards attached with joints cracked, and hinges either cracked or starting. Boards with very minor rubbing to extremities. Front board of volume two sunned at the top. Rear boards with few scratches. Shelf and edge wear. Minor shelf lean. Minor dulling to page edges. Bookplate attached to front pastedown in volume one. Pencil inscription on preliminary in both volumes. Text blocks extremely clean with light toning to extremities.
