AN ASSOCIATION COPY. SIR RICHARD HOARE’S COPY of this large scale map of Wiltshire for which HE SUPPLIED MUCH INFORMATION AND WROTE A COUNTY HISTORY. This is one of three large scale county surveys published by the partners John Andrews (fl.1766-98) and Andrew Dury (fl.1742-78). The other counties were of Hertfordshire published c.1766 and Kent in 1769. This, the last of their counties, was first published in 1773. All three were undertaken at the very large scale of TWO INCHES TO THE MILE, only a handful were published with this much detail in the eighteenth century.

This is an example of the second edition published by William Faden, it is rarer than the first. Indeed, the general index map is known by only the one example in the Royal Geographical Society and one other example found in the Kentish Catalogue of 1997. Faden improved the map considerably with new information. A further feature is the introduction of a title page and a list of the towns, villages and ‘Principal Seats of the Nobility and Gentry’. The numeration of the plates was also altered; it now starts in the north west corner of the county. He removed the old list of subscribers and replaced it with a new title. The ornate dedication cartouche to the landowners of the county was the designed by Giovanni Battista Cipriani and engraved by James Caldwell (1739-1822).

Credit is given in the map’s title for the ‘information liberally communicated by the Earl of Radnor and Sir Richard Hoare. This example is the latter’s own copy! Sir Richard Colt Hoare (1758-1838) was an antiquarian, historian, archaeologist, artist and traveller. Hoare was the first recorded archaeologist along with William Cunnington to dig at Stonehenge. Provenance: With the gilt crest of a raised eagle’s head, that of Hoare at the top of the spine, pencil on front free endpaper of ‘Sir R C Hoare’s copy’; with bookplate of Anthony Robert Alwyn Hobson. Kentish Large Scale County Maps of England and Wales 1705-1832, no. 63; Rodger (1972) 495; Worms & Baynton-Williams (2011).