On the General Principles which Regulate the Application of Machinery to Manufactures and the Mechanical Arts IN Encyclopaedia Metropolitana
[London]: [John Joseph Griffin and Co] [1848]. Later printing. v-vii [1], [iii]-vii [1], 834 pages plus 86 (of 87) engraved plates. Thick 4to. Roughly 11 1/4 x 9 inches. Disbound. Original blind-stamped green cloth covers present but faded, worn and detached from the textblock. Defective, lacking the first 2 leaves of front matter including the title page and one plate. "Encyclopaedia Metropolitana" stamped in blind on boards. Faded and worn spine cloth lettering includes "Encyclopaedia of Manufactures and Machinery by Barlow and Babbage" and "Encyclopaedia Metropolitana" at base. Internally generally clean but paper browned throughout. Marginal hole in pages 315-317 (not affecting text), plates 40 and 45 badly foxed with (plate 40 bound in backwards), plate 83 torn into the image and foxed (no loss), and plate 86 chipped at the edges but with no loss.
All constituting a single volume of Barlow's "The Encyclopaedia of Arts, Manufactures and Machinery of Great Britain". The most important article in this volume, "On the General Principles which Regulate the Application of Machinery to Manufactures and the Mechanical Arts" by Charles Babbage, is present and complete on pages 1-84. Cloth. [18688]
Lacking the title page, we have attributed the publication date of 1848 and the printer John Joseph Griffin and Co. based on the differences in pagination between the 1836 and 1848 printings. The earlier 1836 printing was London: Printed for Baldwin and Cradock.
"The Encyclopaedia Metropolitana was compiled over a 28 year period from 1817-45 and volumes were issued as finished. These early volumes are nearly impossible to find, but the whole work was first published in 1845." (Sinderen #31) The order of publication of the volumes has not been clearly established, but it appears that the publication dates do not match the final numbering of the volumes. Sinderen #36 notes that the present article was first published in 1829 based on Babbage's own estimation, and also that it forms the basis of Babbage's 'On the Economy of Machinery and Manufactures', a pioneering work in "operations research". (Sinderen #45). But we find at least 2 examples of the first portion of this work in institutional collections with a separate title page dated 1827 (and not mentioned in Sinderen). Although additional work needs to be done, this is clearly a later issue of this article contained in a volume replete with a wealth of additional information about the industrial practices of the time.
LITERATURE:
Hook and Norman, Origins of Cyberspace #s 53 and 54.
Van Sinderen, The Printed Papers of Charles Babbage, 1980.
Price: $375.00