PBA Galleries

[viii], 168, lxiv pp. Engraved folding map at the rear. (8vo) 18x11.5 cm (7x4½") period calf. First Edition.

A very scarce English road guide, the map: "Kitchin's most Accurate Map of the Roads of England and Wales: with the Distances by the Mile-Stones, and other most exact Admensurations between Town & Town." measures 33.5x 34 cm (13¼x13½"). A study of the then-present principal roads of England and Wales, with detailed descriptions of way-stations, landmarks, distances, etc. Includes a section about the itinerary of Antoninus and Roman stations in England.

Front pastedown with the handsome armorial bookplate of R.P.L. Booker. His name in very small neat ink writing on front endpaper. R.P. Lee Booker [died 1922?] was educated at Winchester and New College, Oxford, where he gained a first class in Mods. and a second class in Lit. Hum. in 1887. No later than 1888 he was appointed to the faculty at Eton College, Windsor, eventually serving as a House Master. Booker apparently served in WWI. By 1920 Booker had left Eton in hopes that he would find suitable employment elsewhere, though he made some critical remarks about the education system. He commented on the difficulty of getting his work printed. Booker was exceptionally interested in English antiquity, archaeology and history. He was a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries [FSA]. Specific interests apparently included: Prehistoric monuments and earthworks; Roman monuments and Roman earthworks; English ecclesiastical monuments; English secular monuments. In that regard, and commencing around 1908, he was active in contributing extensively to an inventory of the ancient and historical monuments and constructions connected with or illustrative of the contemporary culture, civilization and conditions of life of the people in England from the earliest times to the year 1700.