Adam

38715 — ANDERSON Adam. AN HISTORICAL AND CHRONOLOGICAL DEDUCTION OF THE ORIGIN OF COMMERCE. Two Volumes. London: A. Millar J. and R. Tonson and others 1764. Folio. Contemporary quarter calf marble papered boards. x xxxiv iii 500 pages; ii 434; Chronological Index 126; Postscript 4; Appendix 111; Index 5 pages. Fir edition. According to the title page it contains the "Origin of commerce from the earliest accounts of time to the present time. Containing an history of the great commercial interests of the British Empire. To which is prefixed an introduction exhibiting a view of the ancient and modern state of Europe; of the importance of our colonies; and of commerce shipping manufactures fisheries &c. of Great Britain and Ireland: and their influence on the lande interest. With an appendix containing the modern politico-commercial geography of the several countries of Europe." There are regular references the colonies. Those for Virginia begin with Sir Walter Raleigh's attempt to establish a colony in the New World in 1584 up to references in 1740 to tobac shipments to England from both Virginia and Maryland. Copies of the book wer in Virginia libraries including those of John Mercer of Marlborough Lord Botetourt the royal governor of the colony Thomas Jefferson and Ralph Wormeley in Rosegill Plantation in Middlesex County. Jefferson and Wormeley owned the later 1790 octavo edition of this popular work. While many copies but not all of this edition of Anderson's work have up to three folding map in the first volume there is no evidence our copy was ever bound in the eighteenth century with maps. Being that it is an untrimmed copy it probabl was never intended to have plates. Bookplates of Colonial Williamsburg Foundation library on the inside of the front boards of both volumes. Hinges cracked. Lacks the three folding maps however copies of the three maps are loosely laid-in. Text collates complete with untrimmed leaves. Boards worn along edges. unknown books