Architectura Navalis Mercatoria.

Scarce first edition in Victorian red morocco with an important association. John Scott Russell's copy of the scarce first edition of this landmark work of naval architecture. This magnificent volume, in a handsome Victorian full morocco binding, contains detailed and attractive plans for many different kinds of naval vessels and provides an extraordinary summary of then state-of-the-art shipbuilding techniques.

Fredrik Henrik af Chapman (1721-1808) was the greatest naval architect of his era. A Swede of English parentage, his father a Royal Navy officer and his mother the daughter of a London shipwright, he rose in the Swedish Navy to vice admiral in 1791. He was also the manager of the shipyard at Karlskrona, the base of the Royal Swedish Navy, from 1782 to 1793. Under the direction of King Gustav III, Chapman drove the modernisation of the Swedish fleet and by extension the Western world. His methods surpassed and perfected contemporary shipbuilding and were rapidly adopted by the rest of Europe.

Not all of Chapman's plans were built, chiefly because of the imposing scale on which he worked. He produced, for example, plans for a privateering frigate, designed as a deep-water commerce raider, 160 feet long, and displacing 750 tons. She was to be armed with forty guns and no fewer than four hundred men: around five times the size of the average privateer of the day, and twice the size of actual French privateers built during the French Revolutionary War (Konstam & McBride, pp31-2).

This has always been a scarce and desirable work. In 1781, when Vial du Clairbois issued an annotated quarto edition of Chapman's work, he commented 'Il ne se trouve pas en France & coûte 180 livres en Hollande, en feuilles. Il est de nature à occuper dignement une place dans le cabinet des curieux sur cette matière, mais il n'est pas d'un prix à la portée de tout le monde' ('It is not found in France & costs 180 pounds in Holland, in sheets. It is likely to occupy a worthy place in the cabinet of those curious about this subject, but it is not of a price within everyone's reach'). One of the reasons for the work's scarcity was its its practical use in shipyards of the period.

John Scott Russell (1808-1882) was an important naval architect in his own right and was heavily influenced by Chapman and this work in particular: 'when John Scott Russell first turned towards the study of hydrodynamics and naval architecture, the only work of use he could find was that of Chapman' (Watson, p. 32). Russell's chief publication, The Modern System of Naval Architecture (1864-65) was 'an English equivalent of Chapman's Architectura Navalis' (Pugh & Baynes, p.164). Russell's studies of wave formation and hull resistance 'embraced a great many experiments, including tests both with models in a tank and with full-sized vessels on a canal. He attempted to translate what he called his "wave system", or wave line theory, to the design of ships, and was associated with I. K. Brunel in the design of the Great Eastern steamship in 1856 which was built on his principles... He also introduced the system of cellular double bottoms for iron ships, pioneered many improvements in marine boilers and engines, and was concerned in the design of the Warrior and Black Prince, the world's first ironclad battleships' (Kemp, p.735).

First edition; large folio (56 x 43 cm); 62 engraved plates, double-page engraved and etched title page by Årre incorporating a fine view of Stockholm harbour, double-page engraved dedication within a decorative border, 4 letterpress index leaves in English and French (replacing the original contents leaves), light unobtrusive spotting and toning, plate XXXI professionally inset; mid-19th century red morocco by J. J. Leighton, spine in six elaborately gilt tooled compartments, rich gilt rolls to board borders, edges, and turn-ins, French Curl pattern marbled endpapers, all edges gilt, a touch of rubbing to extremities, a few minor marks to lower board, a very good copy.

Peter Kemp (The Oxford Companion to Ships & the Sea, 1979); Angus Konstam & Angus McBride (Privateers & Pirates, 1730-1830, 2001); Francis Pugh & Ken Baynes (The Art of the Engineer, 1987); Nigel Watson (Maritime Science and Technology: Changing Our World, 2017).