Library Illustrative of Social Progress, Reprints Seven Tracts on Flagellation

Description

Library Illustrative of Social Progress, Reprints Seven Tracts on Flagellation, compiled by Henry Thomas Buckle [false, most-likely Henry Spencer Ashbee] (Printed for G. Peacock, London, 1777 [actually John Camden Hotten, c. 1872-73])
8″ X 5.25″, 7 vol. 67pp 84pp, 106pp, 83pp, 57pp, 54pp, 120pp, original publishers hard binding, 5 raised bands, deckled edges, binding very good, very good condition for age, tears and splits to spines, spines labeled with number #6 is upside down, bumping on corners, slight wear to boards, inner pages clean.

The Library Illustrative of Social Progress was a series of pornographic books published by John Camden Hotten around 1872-73 (falsely dated 1777). They were mainly reprints of eighteenth-century pornographic works on flagellation. Hotten claimed to have found them in the library of Henry Thomas Buckle (1821_1862) but they were most-likely from the collection of Henry Spencer Ashbee. Approx. 475 copies of each volume were printed (not 250 as reported). Very few were sold before Hotten’s death. The remainder were shipped to Mr. J. W. Bouton of New York. No 1&2. “Exhibition of Female Fagellants”, No. 3. “Lady Bumtickler’s Revels”, No. 4. “The Use of Flogging in Venereal Affairs”, No. 5. “Madame Birchini’s Dance”, No. 6. “Sublime of Flagellation”, No. 7. “Fashionable Lectures”