Welsh Journals

BOOKBINDINGS IN THE NATIONAL LIBRARY OF WALES 10. Sir Edward Sullivan. An almost exact contemporary of Henry Blackwell was Sir Edward Sullivan (1852-1928). Their background was totally different, however, and they are linked only by their respect for the art of bookbinding. Sir Edward Sullivan was the son of Sir Edward Sullivan, Lord Chancellor of Ireland and a bibliophile. He was a lawyer, like his father, and would have won a place in the history of Irish bookbinding even if he had never touched a bookbinding tool because his record in photographs and rubbings is all that remains of the magnificent set of-journals bound for the Irish Parliament; they were destroyed with the Public Record Office in the siege of the Four Courts in 1922.1 In February 1911, Sir Edward Sullivan addressed Ye Sette of Odd Volumes on the subject of 'Decorative Book-binding in Ireland'.2 In his talk, he defends bookbinding as an art and draws attention to the fine tradition of bookbinding in Ireland. He says that he is 'now dealing with Bookbinding in its highest forms, forms into which artistic designers have at various times contrived to throw their greatest powers, achieving results which, in the beauty of their outline and in the harmony of deftly blended gold and colours, are in no sense inferior to the finest work we know in pottery, wood- carving, metal-chasing, or any of the textile crafts whose very excellence makes it a matter of extreme difficulty to determine the boundary line which really separates Craft from Art'. His words echo those of people involved in the turn-of-the-century Arts and Crafts movement and it comes as no suprise to find that his work was exhibited in 1895 in an exhibition organised by the Arts and Crafts Society of Ireland, a year after its foundation by Dermot Wyndham, 7th Earl of Mayo.3 He closes his lecture with an account of his involvement with the art: 'Towards the end of the nineteenth century a certain Irish lover of well-bound books took it into his head to study in a practical way the interesting processes by which decorative book-bindings are produced. He has worked at it intermittently ever since in his own amateurish way, endeavouring all the time to keep before his eyes that artistic standard without which no good work can ever be accomplished'. His usual practice was either to decorate books already bound or to have books bound for him in full leather, which he could proceed to decorate. The National Library of Wales purchased from Charles Sawyer in January 1981 a small volume, 14.3 x 9.8 cm, entitled The Image of God by Roger Hutchinson (London: John Day, 1560). Incongruously, the 16th century black letter text is bound in blue morocco, barely visible under the gilt tooling and crimson, purple, citron and green onlays. The tooling is similar on both covers but the upper cover has a centre panel formed from crimson and citron onlays, over which the design is gilt-tooled and rosettes and leaves are onlaid. Gilt leaf- sprays, pointille tooling and purple circular onlays fill the outer border. The spine is gold-tooled and has crimson rosette onlays and the title in gilt capitals. The top edge is gilt and there are gilt inner dentelles. Below the centre panel of the upper cover is Sir Edward's customary signature on bookbindings, in gilt: E.S.AURIFEX'.