Wood (Anthony)

Athene Oxonienses. An exact history of all the writers and bishops who have had their education in the most antient and famous University of Oxford…, 2 vol., The Second Edition, very much Corrected and Enlarged, (ESTC T59423), separate title page and register for Fasti, each vol. contains Writers, Prelates and Fasti sections, head and tailpiece vignettes, some spotting and offsetting, armorial bookplates of Viscount Birkenhead, ownership inscription of I Allen Trin Coll: Camb: bought at Chelmsford Aug: 1751 at head of title, Vol. 1; and abbreviated for Vol. 2., contemporary red morocco, gilt, vol. 2 boards detached, worn, folio, printed for R. Knaplock, D. Midwinter, and J. Tonson, 1721 (2)

*** The enlarged Second Edition of a work of collective biography, including an early example of the Oxford Fasti, or calendar, chronologically based lists of the degrees and qualifications bestowed by the University of Oxford, from 1500 onwards, based on extensive research in the archives. The writers section covers all Oxford educated authors, including lawyers, clergymen and nobles. Anthony Wood (1632-95), born and educated in Oxford (MA 1655) also published, in 1674, A Latin history of the University and its individual colleges, this and the Athense forming a valuable source of early information on the institution. A controversial figure and an ardent Royalist, Wood provides some interesting details on the Civil War years (when the city was the King's HO) and is quite vituperative about Fairfax and Cromwell in the Fasti section, when the the University created the Parliamentary generals Doctors of Civil Law in 1649. This copy was owned by F. E. Smith, later 1st Earl of Birkenhead (1872-1930), notable barrister and Conservative politician, holding high office, who was himself educated at Oxford. Its acquisition by Birkenhead may perhaps be dated to 1921-22 as he held the title Viscount (between those of Baron and Earl) only during this period.