Beschreibung:

A Letter from William Penn Proprietary and Governour of Pennsylvania In America, to the Committee of the Free Society of Traders of that Province, residing in London.
London: Andrew Sowle, 1683. Small folio (280 x 166 mm). Title, [3]-10 pp; lacking the terminal leaf containing the Directions of Reference. Folding plan by Thomas Holme supplied in facsimile. Tan calf with title stamped in gilt on the spine, by Sangorski & Sutcliffe. Condition: browning and staining, significant restoration with the title paper-backed at an early date closing tears and small holes, outer edges of each text leaf remargined with losses supplied; a few scratches to the covers. william penn’s best account of his colony and the first description of philadelphia. “WP’s most informative and valuable promotional tract was the one written to the Free Society of Traders … after he had lived in Pennsylvania for ten months” (Bronner & Fraser). Among the notable features of this tract are Penn’s personal observations of the Native Americans of the region. Philadelphia is described by Penn as follows: “The city of Philadelphia, now extends in length, from river to river, two miles, and in breadth near a mile … and as its now placed and modelled between two navigable rivers upon a neck of land, and that ships may ride in good anchorage, in six or eight fathom water in both rivers, close to the city, and the land of the city, dry and wholesome; such a scituation is scarce to be parallel'd … The city (as the Model [i.e. Holme’s plan] shows) consists of a large Front-street to each river, and a High street near the middle from Front to Front, of one hundred foot broad, and a Broad street in the middle of the city, from side to side, of the like breadth. In the centre of the city is a square of ten acres; at each angle are to be houses for publick affairs, as a Meeting-House, Assembly or State-House, Market-House, School-House, and several other buildings for public concerns. There are also in each quarter of the city a square of eight acres, to be for the like uses, as the Moore-fields in London; and eight streets, besides the High Street, that run from Front to Front, and twenty streets, besides the Broad street, that run cross the city, from side to side; all these streets are of fifty foot breadth.” Four versions were published by Penn in 1683 with variant text to the title and varying collations. This copy corresponds to Bronner & Fraser’s second edition, third issue. All editions of Penn’s Letter are rare, and copies with the Holme map exceedingly so. Referring to the terminal leaf and the map, Church states “this list and plan are usually lacking.” No complete copy of this work has appeared at auction since the 1967 Streeter Sale. Alden & Landis 683/156; Bronner & Fraser 67d; Church 686; Dunn, “William Penn and the Selling of Pennsylvania” (Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. 127 No. 5, pp322-329); JCB II: 1271; Sabin 59712; Streeter Sale 944; Wing P1321; Winsor III:498.