1881 Rare Book - Middle Ages Poems of Francois Villon bound by Sangorski and Sutcliffe

 

Author : Villon, Francois; Payne, John (trans.).
Title : The Poems of Master Francis Villon of Paris.
Publisher : London: Reeves and Turner, 1881. First thus.
Language : Text in English
Size : 8 " X 5 "
Pages : xcvi-150 pages.
Binding : Attractive, very beautiful and very good full leather binding bounded by Sangorski and Sutcliffe (hinges fine, overall slightly scuffed and sunned) under a protective removable mylar cover in a very good protective slipcase.
Content : Very good content (bright, tight and clean)

The book : A very nice copy of the poems of François Villon born in Paris in 1431 and disappeared from view in 1463. He is the best known French poet of the late Middle Ages. A ne'er-do-well who was involved in criminal behavior and had multiple encounters with law enforcement authorities, Villon wrote about some of these experiences in his poems. This copy in a beautiful binding by Sangorski and Sutcliffe.

The binder: Sangorski & Sutcliffe is a firm of bookbinders established in London in 1901. It is considered to be one of the most important bookbinding companies of the 20th century, famous for its luxurious jeweled bindings that used real gold and precious stones in their book covers.
Sangorski & Sutcliffe was established by Francis Sangorski (1875-1912) and George Sutcliffe (1878-1943). They had met in 1896 at a bookbinding evening classes taught by Douglas Cockerell at the London County Council's Central School of Arts and Crafts. In 1898, Sangorski and Sutcliffe each won one of the ten annual craft scholarship awards, giving them £20 a year for three years to continue their training as apprentice bookbinders. They were employed at Cockerell's own bindery, and began to teach bookbinding at Camberwell College of Art. They were laid off in 1901 after a coal strike caused an economic slump, and they decided to set up on their own in a rented attic in Bloomsbury, starting on 1 October 1901. They soon moved to Vernon Place, and then, in 1905, to Southampton Row.
Sangorski's elder brother, Alberto Sangorski, worked for the firm. He became an accomplished calligrapher and illuminator, working for Rivière from 1910.