FITZGERALD, Edward. With Illustrations by Edmund Dulac. [Francis Sangorski and George Sutcliffe].
The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.
London: Hodder and Stoughton, c. 1910.
$125,000.00
In Stock
Item Number: RRB-150950
SUPERBLY BOUND IN A JEWELLED BINDING; SET WITH 37 JEWELS BY SANGORSKI & SUTCLIFFE; ONE OF ONLY 10 EXAMPLES
Exceptionally rare bound in jewelled binding, set with 37 jewels by Sangorski & Sutcliffe. Quarto, reproduced from a manuscript illuminated by F. Sangorski G. & Sutcliffe, with miniatures after E. Geddes, original red straight-grained morocco, upper cover with central sunken oval green morocco panel and a Peacock with light green, blue, white, and brown morocco onlays, the Peacock with an outstretched tail with feathers intricately gilt with blue heart onlays, set with a circle of 31 gold and torquoise garnets, the eye and comb in white morocco, all surrounded by a gilt floral background with large Tudor roses in corners, all within a blue morocco gilt tooled border, lower cover in a matching Tudor rose design, edges gauffered and gilt, spine in 5 compartments with 4 raised bands, green morocco lettering-pieces in two, the rest with a grape or Tudor rose design, blue morocco doublures, blue watered silk endleaves, two filigree brass clasps fitted with 6 jewels. Original cloth folding case, bookplate. An exceptional piece of history.
Eleventh-century Persian poet and mathematician Omar Khayyam composed more than one thousand quatrains, or rubaiyat, on love and mortality, expressing an enigmatic theology that has been interpreted and disputed over the course of centuries. Scholar Edward Fitzgerald (1809-1883), first translator and author of five separate English versions of the Rubaiyat, did not produce strict translations as much as loose “transmogrifications” of the poetry, often taking great liberties with the original Persian text. Nevertheless, he remains the most famous of Omar Khayyam’s translators, and is credited with bringing the Rubaiyat to broad public notice in the English-speaking world. Sangorski & Sutcliffe, the famed London binders founded in 1901, produced the legendary Great Omar, an extravagant jeweled binding of Edward FitzGerald’s Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam completed in 1911 after nearly two years of meticulous labor. Encrusted with over a thousand precious stones, heavy gold inlays, and Sangorski’s signature peacock designs, it was regarded as the most sumptuous binding ever created. Purchased by American collector Gabriel Weis, the volume was consigned to the Titanic in April 1912 and tragically lost at sea, leaving behind only a handful of photographs and Alberto Sangorski’s illuminated manuscript as witness to its brilliance.
The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.
$125,000.00
In Stock