Description

(Stephen, lawyer and poet, friend of John, Baron Somers, of East Betchworth, Surrey, 1655-1707).- Marriage settlement between Stephen Hervey and Ann Staunton, widow, daughter of John Hervey of Thurly Hall, Bedfordshire [?now Thorley, Hertfordshire], bargain and sale by the Dean and Canons of St. George's Chapel, Windsor of the rectory and parsonage of East Betchworth in Surrey, D.s. "Ste: Hervey", manuscript on vellum, 2 sheets, engraved initial T with royal coat of arms, 4 red wax seals, folds, a few small holes along folds, slightly creased and yellowed, 500 x 665mm. & smaller, 10th August 1693; and c. 80 other pieces, most indentures on vellum, some shipping receipts etc., v.s., v.d. [mostly eighteenth - nineteenth centuries] (c. 80).

***"Harvey made three contributions as a verse translator to the publishing ventures of Jacob Tonson. His translation of Juvenal's notorious ninth satire appeared in The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis, Translated... by Mr. Dryden and Several other Eminent Hands (1693 [i.e. 1692]). His translation of 'The Passion of Byblis' from the ninth book of Ovid's Metamorphoses, which borrows some phrases from John Oldham's translation of the same episode, and of 'Jupiter and Europa' from the fourth book, both appeared in The Annual Miscellany: for the Year 1694 (1694). All three poems treat of an unusual sexual situation without prurience, and Harvey shows himself to be a fluent versifier whose competence occasionally rises to excellence." - Oxford DNB..