The Henry Davis Gift

You will be dazed by their descriptions

The Henry Davis Gift comprises almost 900 original bookbindings from around the world created from the 12th century to the 20th

Henry Davis, who was managing director of a cable-making firm died January 10, 1977. He collected books with beautiful bookbindings.¹

Until the development of mass production, books were made by hand and each was unique. These items retain their earliest or most significant historic coverings and structure and allow researchers to trace the progress of the craft of bookbinding, shedding light on the craftsmen, their patrons and the society in which they lived. The majority of the Henry Davis collection of book bindings has been gifted to the British Museum.²

The Henry Davis collection has been carefully documented by Mirijam Foote in a series of catalogues.Highlights of the Gift collection are described in much bibliographical detail followed by long notes on both the binding and the binder.³

Here are descriptions of a few⁴

• Jean Charlier de Gerson, De passioni animae (1470-73) has a different design on each cover, built up of small tools among which is a pelican in her piety depicted twice on one stamp and by herself.

• Orlando Furioso (Venice, 1584) in red goatskin, inlaid in yellow-brown marbled calf and tooled in gold.

• Novelle Otto (London, 1790) in citron goatskin, inlaid in dark blue and red and tooled in gold to a pattern reminiscent of Moorish tiles.

You can log into the British Museum and see these books at the Database of Book Bindings.

1. Romme, Mirjam M. (1969). “The Henry Davis Collection I: The British Museum Gift.” The Book Collector 18 no 1 (spring): 23-44.

2. Henry Davis Gift. The British Museum.

3. Foot, Mirjam M. THE HENRY DAVIS GIFT, A COLLECTION OF BOOKBINDINGS.Volume I. London: The British Library, (1978).

Foot, Mirjam M.THE HENRY DAVIS GIFT, A COLLECTION OF BOOKBINDINGS. VOLUME II.Volume II, A Catalogue of North-European Bindings.
London: The British Library, (1983).

Foot, Mirjam M.THE HENRY DAVIS GIFT: A COLLECTION OF BOOKBINDINGS (VOL. III). Volume III: A Catalogue of South-European Bindings. New Castle, Delaware and London: Oak Knoll Press and The British Library, 2009.

4. FOOT, MIRJAM M. “THE BRITISH BINDINGS IN THE HENRY DAVIS GIFT.” The British Library Journal 3, no. 2 (1977): 114–28.