(BLACKWELL, Thomas.)

London, 1735. 8vo. Engr. front,+ (4),+ 335,+ (81 ) pp.+ fold. engr. map. With engr. title vignette and end-vignettes and 12 vignettes in text. Worn contemporary English full calf, gilt spine with raised bands, with crack in hinges but still firm. With the engr. book plate of James Ibbetson, and from the library of Ericsberg, with the book plate of Carl Jedvard Bonde pasted over Ibbettson’s. Graesse I, 434. Lascarides, The Search for Troy, 37. First edition of the first English study entirely devoted to Homer as a historical person. A second edition appeared in 1736, a third in 1757. A German translation was published in 1776 by Voss, and a French in 1799. The vignetts are after Gravelot and mostly engraved by Van der Gucht but also by G. Scotine. The 12 vignettes are listed in the list of plates at the end. Blackwell concludes that Homer wust have been a real person, and his study is important in giving the picture of Homer as a simple and unspoilt Greek ”Naturmench”, undestroyed by civilisation. He also assumes that Homer must have been aquainted with the field of action of the Iliad, and therefore an guide to the place of Troy. Thomas Blackwell (1701-57), Greek scholar, translator and professor at Aberdeen, and an important representant for the Scottish enlightenment.