I occasionally check my building book exchange. Yesterday someone ditched a six volume edition of Edward Gibbons, “The Roman Empire”. It’s dated 1902 so, not exactly an early rare edition but still a cool find.
The quality is still good with tight bindings and there is some writing on the first page of the first volume that says-“To Robert, Love Isabelle-Christmas 1903”. The cursive style of writing was extremely elegant and beautiful, you just don’t see writing like that anymore. I loved seeing that, it brings something extra to these volumes that allows me to create stories about Robert, Isabelle and Christmas 1903, very charming. I’ve never read Gibbons but I know he’s highly referred to by his contemporaries. My plan is to start Vol 1 in the Winter and determine if I want to take up this large endeavor of reading them all.
… in the same haul, I snagged a four volume set of “The History of Rome” by Theodore Mommsen. This edition is from the 1880’s and is in incredibly good condition. So, someone in my building is laying off all their Roman history texts and now, I’m going to make a habit of checking the shelves every week or so.
