Christian Lyrics: Chiefly Selected From Modern Authors. [Fore-edge Painting].

First edition of Christian Lyrics: Chiefly Selected From Modern Authors; finely bound and decorated with a fore-edge painting

London: Sampson, Low, Son, and Marston, 1868.

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First edition of this fine collection of Christian Lyrics. Octavo, bound in full pebbled morocco with gilt titles and tooling to the spine in six compartments within raised gilt bands, central gilt emblem and fleuron cornerpieces within triple gilt ruling to the front and rear panels, gilt turn-ins and inner dentelles, marbled endpapers, all edges gilt, decorated with a concealed fore-edge painting of two Victorian scenes, illustrated with upwards of one hundred engravings. Neat period gift inscriptions. In very good condition.

The term 'fore-edge painting' can refer to any painted decoration on the fore-edges of the leaves of a book, such as was not uncommon in the 15th and early 16th centuries, particularly in Italy. The term is most commonly used, however, for an English technique quite widely practiced in the second half of the 17th century in London and Edinburgh, and popularized in the 18th century by John Brindley and, in particular, Edwards of Halifax, whereby the fore-edge of the book, very slightly fanned out and then held fast, is decorated with painted views, or conversation pieces. The edges are then squared up and gilded in the ordinary way, so that the painting remains concealed while the book is closed: fan out the edges and it reappears. The technique was practiced by a few other English binders in the late 18th and 19th centuries, and a certain number of undoubted examples survive.