Provenance for the Musgrave Baronets. An excellent set in a contemporary sprinkled calf binding of the collected works of Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527) in English.

Including his major titles The Prince, Florentine Histories, Discourses on Livy, and The Art of War, together with his lesser known treatise on the government of Florence, Life of Castruccio Castricani of Lucca, Narrative on the Duke of Valentine, sketches on the affairs of France and Germany, novella Marriage of Belphegor, and letters.

This the second, corrected translation by Ellis Farneworth (d.1763), illustrated with a life of the author, critical notes, and engraved folding plates. Farneworth relied on a variety of sources for his translations, basing The Prince, for instance, on the French-language edition by Amelot de la Houssaye. This is followed chapter-by-chapter with an English translation of the King of Prussia's 'Anti-Machiavel' discourse Examen du Prince, and prefaced by Voltaire's essay on the text.

With provenance for the Musgrave Baronets of Tourin, County Waterford. Sir Richard Musgrave, 1st Baronet (d.1818) was Member of Parliament for Lismore from 1778 to 1801, and author of the anti-Catholic Memoirs of the Different Rebellions in Ireland published in 1801. His nephew, Sir Richard Musgrave, 3rd Baronet (1790-1859), succeeded to the title in 1826.

Second edition, corrected; 4 vols; 8vo (21.5 x 14 cm); engraved folding frontispiece, 3 folding engraved plates, text in English, armorial bookplates to front pastedown of vol. I and IV, bookplates excised from vols II and III; contemporary sprinkled calf, gilt spines of floral bouquets, contrasting red and green morocco lettering pieces, a little chipped to vol. III, corners slightly bumped, the odd abrasion and minor wear, a few white specks, inside crisp and clean, very good or better; xl, 447, [1]; [4], 520; [4], xvi, 490; [4], 361, [76]pp.

ESTC T91220.