Gibbon, Edward

According to which Gibbon grants "all my Title Rights and Property in and to a certain Book entitled The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire ... in three Volumes in Quarto ... (one Volume whereof hath already been published) together with all the Improvements Additions or Alterations whatsoever which ... shall at any time be made to the said Book" for a lump sum of £4,000, signed by Gibbon and his publishers, William Strahan and Thomas Cadell, also with the witness signature of Cadell's assistant Robert Lawless, one page, folio, 1 June 1780, the verso receipted and signed four times by Gibbon acknowledging receipt of the four instalments of his payment, the first receipt in the hand of the clerk responsible for writing out the contract, the later three instalments in Gibbon's autograph and dated 10 July 1780, 9 July 1781, and 2 April 1782, docketed by the publisher's office on the integral blank; damp staining, small neat repairs. Window mounted and housed in a pale cloth box

William Strahan, thence by descent to the Spottiswoode family, publishers — Phillips, 13 March 1997, lot 421. acquisition: Purchased at the foregoing sale through Bernard Quaritch

The second publishing contract for "the most celebrated historical work in English literature" (The Oxford Companion to English Literature). The first volume of the Decline had been published in 1776 to enormous acclaim and widespread controversy, and passed through three editions in less than two years. This contract relates to the three-volume set that was published on 1 March 1781, comprising a fourth edition of the first volume and two further volumes, which take Gibbon to the sack of Rome, fall of the Western Empire, and the Saxon invasion of Britain.

Gibbon's terms of £4,000 for the copyright — which equates, by the most conservative measure, to nearly £500,000 today — was a healthy sum for the time and reflects the high regard in which his work was held. He was fortunate in his partners in the enterprise: William Strahan (1715-85) and Thomas Cadell the elder (1742-1802) were among the most distinguished publishers of the day. Strahan had once been the partner of Andrew Millar (d.1768) — with whom he had printed Johnson's Dictionary — and the partnership with Cadell saw the publication of such works as The Wealth of Nations and Cook's Voyages.

The contract left open the possibility that Gibbon would continue his history of the Roman Empire. Gibbon did, of course, continue his work and he received a further £4,000 from Strahan and Cadell for the final three volumes of the Decline, which appeared in 1788. Gibbon remained on good terms with the publishers until his death, stipulating in his will (see lot 907) that his manuscripts be sold to a bookseller, "giving the preference to Mr Andrew Strahan and Mr Thomas Cadell, whose liberal spirit I have experienced in similar transactions."