[av_heading heading=’English 18th-century feminist tract exceeded $26K at Lyon and Turnbull’ tag=’h1′ style=” subheading_active=” show_icon=” icon=’ue800′ font=’entypo-fontello’ size=” av-desktop-font-size-title=” av-medium-font-size-title=” av-small-font-size-title=” av-mini-font-size-title=” subheading_size=” av-desktop-font-size=” av-medium-font-size=” av-small-font-size=” av-mini-font-size=” icon_size=” av-desktop-font-size-1=” av-medium-font-size-1=” av-small-font-size-1=” av-mini-font-size-1=” color=” custom_font=” subheading_color=” seperator_color=” icon_color=” margin=’,,35px,’ av-desktop-margin=” av-desktop-margin_sync=’true’ av-medium-margin=” av-medium-margin_sync=’true’ av-small-margin=’,,20px,’ av-mini-margin=” av-mini-margin_sync=’true’ headline_padding=” headline_padding_sync=’true’ av-desktop-headline_padding=” av-desktop-headline_padding_sync=’true’ av-medium-headline_padding=” av-medium-headline_padding_sync=’true’ av-small-headline_padding=” av-small-headline_padding_sync=’true’ av-mini-headline_padding=” av-mini-headline_padding_sync=’true’ padding=’10’ av-desktop-padding=” av-medium-padding=” av-small-padding=” av-mini-padding=” icon_padding=’10’ av-desktop-icon_padding=” av-medium-icon_padding=” av-small-icon_padding=” av-mini-icon_padding=” link=” link_target=” title_attr=” id=” custom_class=” template_class=” av_uid=’av-lsj2654o’ sc_version=’1.0′ admin_preview_bg=”][/av_heading]

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EDINBURGH, Scotland — An exceptionally rare first edition of an early feminist text sold for £16,000 ($26,485 with buyer’s premium) at Lyon & Turnbull’s Rare Books, Manuscripts, Maps & Photographs auction on February 7. In A Letter to the Women of England on the injustice of Mental Subordination published in 1799, Mary Robinson argues for the intellectual liberation of women: “is not woman a human being, gifted with all the feelings that inhabit the bosom of man?”

Robinson, later called ‘the English Sappho’, was all too familiar with the patriarchal constraints of her era. As an actress, she had caught the attention of the Prince of Wales, future George IV, and agreed to an offer of £20,000 to become his mistress. After spoiling her reputation and ending her career in the theater, he then refused to pay the promised amount.

In this first edition, she wrote under the pseudonym Anne Frances Randall. In the second edition, Robinson used her own name and placed an advertisement at the start revealing her identity. This, one of only five known first edition copies, was sold in its contemporary quarter calf (the front cover now detached) well above its £300-£500 ($375-$630) estimate.

A cache of material from the Stevenson family – designers across four generations of many of the U.K.’s lighthouses – provided the sale with a specialist focus. Robert Stevenson (1772-1850), the grandfather of Treasure Island author Robert Louis Stevenson, built 19 lighthouses in an impressive career that began with the erection of the Little Cumbrae lighthouse in Ayrshire when he was just 19 years old. His masterpiece was the Bell Rock Lighthouse, constructed off the coast of Arbroath between 1807-10, which is the oldest working rock lighthouse in the United Kingdom.

Through 28 hand-drawn and colored illustrations, a manuscript titled Signals from the Bell Rock Lighthouse to the Arbroath Signal Tower demonstrates the workings of its communication system. The main methods of signaling were via colored flags and large copper balls that were raised to indicate all was well. It was estimated at £1,200-£1,800 ($1,515-$2,270) but sold at £5,500 ($9,095 with buyer’s premium).

As befitting a family of Scottish civil engineers, the works of architect Robert Adam were prominent in the Stevenson family library. A first edition of one of Adam’s most influential books, his 1764 Ruins of the Palace of the Emperor Diocletian at Spalatro in Dalmatia, including 61 numbered engraved plates, sold at £4,400 ($5,765 with buyer’s premium) against an estimate of £3,000-£5,000 ($3,785-$6,315).

Sold at £6,500 ($10,750 with buyer’s premium) against an estimate of £3,000-£5,000 ($3,785-$6,315) was a November 1566 second issue copy of The Actis and Constitutionnis of the Realme of Scotland, the first collected edition of all public Scottish acts of parliament since 1424. Commissioned by Mary Queen of Scots in a year of crisis, a first edition was printed in October 1566 with a second issue rushed out a month later with several pieces of anti-Protestant legislation removed.

The ‘Black Acts,’ as they became known on account of the gothic typeface, are remarkable for a reason unintended by the compilers. They contain the first printed references to golf and football in a succession of acts intended to prevent Scots from neglecting their military duties.

As indicated by various inscriptions, this copy was acquired in 1730 by by Alexander Boswell, a leading judge, later remembered by Sir Walter Scott as ‘an able lawyer, a good scholar, after the manner of Scotland, and … a strict presbyterian and whig of the old Scottish cast.’

A letter penned on September 28, 1589, by James VI of Scotland (the future James I of England) seeking news on the progress of his marriage to Anne of Denmark sold at £4,800 ($7,935 with buyer’s premium) against an estimate of £3,000-£5,000 ($3,785-$6,315). Letters entirely in James’s hand are very rare, with this one written in broad Scots to George Keith, the 4th Earl Marischal and the magnate charged with securing the Danish match. In its seven lines, he references ‘the contrairiousness of the windes’ — the recurrent storms preventing the embassy’s return to Scotland he would later become convinced were the work of a treasonous coven of witches.
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‘A Letter to the Women of England on the injustice of Mental Subordination,’ which sold for £16,000 ($26,485 with buyer’s premium) at Lyon & Turnbull.
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‘Signals from the Bell Rock Lighthouse to the Arbroath Signal Tower,’ which sold for £5,500 ($9,095 with buyer’s premium) at Lyon & Turnbull.
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James VI and I (1566-1625), King of Scotland, England and Ireland signed autograph letter, which sold for £4,800 ($7,935 with buyer’s premium) at Lyon & Turnbull.
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‘Ruins of the Palace of the Emperor Diocletian at Spalatro in Dalmatia,’ which sold for £4,400 ($5,765 with buyer’s premium) at Lyon & Turnbull.
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‘The Actis and Constitutionnis of the Realme of Scotland,’ which sold for £6,500 ($10,750 with buyer’s premium) at Lyon & Turnbull.
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