The Book of Common Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments.

KING GEORGE IV,.

$6,800.00

Item Number: 79456

Oxford: Bensley, Cooke, and Collingwood, 1816.

Royal Coronation edition of The Book of Common Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments used at the Coronation of King George IV on July 19th, 1821. Quarto, bound in full dark blue velvet, gilt arms of George IV to both front and rear panels, all edges gilt, housed in a custom locking full morocco clamshell box. From the library of American banker Mortimer L. Schiff, whose renowned collection of fine bindings was sold by Sotheby’s in 1938, with his gilt leather bookplate on the front free endpaper. Laid in is a printed copy of Martin Luther’s Hymn used in the Coronation ceremony. In very good condition in an excellent clamshell box. An exceptional piece of history from one of the most extravagant events of the Regency era.

King George IV was known for his extravagant lifestyle and patronage of new forms of leisure and fashion which came to define the Regency Era throughout Great Britain. His coronation in 1821 was an enormous and magnificent event for which the new king commissioned a crushed velvet and ermine Coronation robe with a 27-foot train, a Coronation crown encrusted with over 12,000 diamonds, and Book of Common Prayer bound in traditional blue crushed velvet.