The Columbiad (Binding) Barlow, Joel Americana,Sets & Fine Bindings

First edition. Illustrated with etchings from paintings by Smirke engraved by Bromley. 1 vols. 4to. Extraordinary de luxe American bookbinding for Joel Barlow s 1807 The Columbiad, an epic poem of the history of America, glorifying the values of the young republic. As book historian John Bidwell has written: "The publication of The Columbiad in 1807 was the graphic arts event of the decade: it was the first American made deluxe book to be manufactured on a cost-is-no-object basis." Here, the book s rich production values are amplified by a stunning neoclassical American bookbinding. Remarkably ambitious, this unique binding is emblematic of American progress and advancement, a desire to match European skills. In the book s Dedication to artist and inventor Robert Fulton, Barlow addressed the advancement of American society and the arts. He praised his friend profusely, commending Fulton for his own "inventions and discoveries in the useful arts." Fulton had financed half the book s publication cost of a staggering $10,000, one of the costliest for its time. Only 816 copies were printed on fine paper, and an additional 96 were printed on coarse paper possibly to meet a lower retail price point. The Columbiad was published in sheets or in boards at a price of $20 or $21 in boards, a hefty sum for one book. According to Bidwell, for an additional $5, the book customers could have the book bound "in the first style of elegance." There is no record of which bookbinder was used by the publishers. Barlow had produced the finest book ever printed in America up to that time. So impressive was the final product, Charles Willson Peale exhibited a copy of The Columbiad at his Philadelphia Museum. Likely bound between 1807 and 1830, this unsigned American binding is designed in a neoclassical style; the recto-linear cover panels are "architectural." The binding s design program includes: tinted panels, rolled gilt lines, and floral gilt tooling in combination, suggestive of Corinthian pilasters; marbled or mottled calf suggest, wood-graining, marble wall panels and, even, a tortoise-shell-like design; gilt and blind decorated accents evoke wainscoting or entablatures. Extensive gilt tooling and rolling is complemented by the use of detailed tooling and rolling in blind; seemingly negative spaces thus become tactile and visually interesting while retaining the restrained neoclassical taste. For example, the tinted fluted "pillars" of the "pilasters" are created by simple vertical gilt rules separated by narrow fields of blind rolled dicing. These design features carry over to the elaborate doublures which include inlaid gilt-decorated, straight-grained green morocco panels and wide dentelles. Matching green silk fly leaves remarkably fresh in their coloring augment the green morocco. In addition, the mundane, though necessary, corner mitering of the leather forming the dentelles has been cleverly concealed by the bookbinder by means of gilt decoration and marbling. Although unsigned, at least one of the small hand tools (the curved top and bottom of the pillars) appears on a binding signed by T. H. Burnton at the American Antiqurian Society (Papantonio 40). Burnton, though best known as for his later Providence, Rhode Island bindings began his career in New York, listed there in city directories from 1800-1806, i.e. consistent with The Columbiad's publication. Stoddard and Whitesell, in A Bibliographical Description of Books and Pamphlets of American Verse Printed from 1610 Through 1820, report examining 23 copies of The Columbiad in American libraries, including some by bound by Desilver. About a decade after the publication of The Columbiad, Philadelphia bookbinder Robert Desilver bound at least 19, possibly up to 27, copies. He bound many, but not all, of them in full calf, with morocco spine labels, gilt paneled spines and turn-ins, sprinkled edges, marbled endpapers, and with gilding and gilt and blind roll-tooling. This copy e