?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 5,000 - $ 7,000
Heywood, Thomas (early 1570s-1641) If You Know Not Me, You Know No Body. Or, the Troubles of Queene Elizabeth. Parts One & Two.
London: Printed by B[ernard] A[lsop] and T[homas] F[awcet] for Nathanell Butter, 1632. [and]
London: Printed for Nathanael Butter, 1633.
Two separate quarto volumes in non-uniform bindings, part one with large full-length woodcut portrait of Elizabeth to title; author's name added in a contemporary hand; bound in full red morocco by Sangorski & Stucliffe; ex libris Mitford, with dated inscription from 1819, and George P. Baker circa 1893, both with notes on ffep; 7 x 4 3/4 in.; part two title page with same woodcut, the page trimmed and mounted with vertical tear, and margins severely trimmed, removing the imprint completely, without any further loss to other parts of the title; A2 formerly torn in half horizontally (repaired); stage direction on H4 verso cropped; some catchwords cropped; bound in 19th century half blue morocco, ex libris Ernest E. Baker and Alec Sanford, with bookplates, 7 x 4 7/8 in.
I: STC 13334; Greg I 215 (g); ESTC S104045, locating five copies in American libraries; II: STC 13339; Greg I 224 (d); ESTC S104043, locating nine U.S. copies. (2)
Rare at auction, the last copy of this edition offered in 1920; the last copy of any edition sold in 1956.
This two-part production focuses both on the history of Elizabeth's ascension to the throne, and on a sub-plot regarding the laziness of young apprentices, and the gullibility of their masters. It was first performed by Queen Anne's Men (referring to Anne of Denmark, James I's wife) circa 1605. Heywood, along with Christopher Beeston, Richard Perkins, Thomas Greene, and others founded the company in 1604, performing at the Curtain Theatre. The troupe was dissolved as a result of a lawsuit in 1623.
