Attractively bound first editions of the two series of fables written by the celebrated English poet and dramatist John Gay (1685-1732). Gay became famous with the present publication of Fables and the opera The beggar's opera, first published in 1728. Gay wrote his fables for Prince William, Duke of Cumberland (1721-1765), to whom the first series is dedicated. The dedication is followed by a list of contents, an introduction in the form of a fable, and the 50 fables, all with an engraved illustration. Most of the illustrations are based on drawings by the British painter and illustrator John Wootton (d. 1764) and William Kent (d. 1748).
Gay started to write a second series of fables in 1731, a year before his death. The 16 finished fables were posthumously published 7 years later, in 1638, and became very successful as well. Gay wrote to his good friend, the English poet Alexander Pope, that these fables were of much greater length because the morals were mainly political. The illustrations, much larger than those of the first series, were engraved after designs by the well-known French engraver and illustrator Hubert-François Gravelot (1699-1773).
Robert Riviere (1808-1882) established his famous bindery in Bath and moved it to London in 1840, gaining a reputation as one of Englands best binders for the quality of his materials and workmanship. He signed his bindings "Bound by Riviere" from 1860 to 1880, thereafter "Riviere & son".
Marbled endpaper in first volume detached. Browned, otherwise in very good condition. ESTC T13818 & T13828; Lewis, The English fable: Aesop and literary culture, 1651-1740, p. 149; New Cambridge bibliography of English literature II, col. 498.