THE ART OF DYING WOOL AND WOOLLEN STUFFS...TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH BY ORDER OF THE DUBLIN SOCIETY, AND PUBLISHED AT THEIR EXPENCE, FOR THE USE OF DYERS OF IRELAND by Hellot, Jean - 1767

Dublin: Printed by S. Powell, Printer to the Society, 1767. vi,[7]-290pp. 12mo. Recent half calf and marbled boards, gilt label. Formerly a quite ragged copy, now professionally restored to sound, functional condition, as detailed below. First edition in English of Hellot's ART DE LA TEINTURE DES LAINES..., originally published in Paris in 1750, and for the rest of the century, one of the standard works on the subject. The importance of having a translation of this text available in Ireland at the time is self-evident, and in fact, this Irish printing precedes the first London printing by twenty-two years, where it appeared conjoined with two other topically- related works in 1789, and an English language edition bearing a Paris 1785 imprint by eighteen years. This edition is of considerable rarity: ESTC online locates only two copies, one at the National Library of Ireland, and the second at the Royal Irish Academy. And, according to the ESTC entry as of 2009, the latter copy is quite imperfect, lacking all leaves after p.96. OCLC does not report those copies, but includes a microfilm reprint, as well as somewhat incomplete references to copies at National Art Library Victoria & Albert Museum (AVA) and National Art Library (VAU). The text consists of a detailed guide to the mechanics of dyeing, as well as a fascinating formulary for the production of specific colors and types of dyes from materials, both organic and inorganic, local as well as imported. By its very nature, it is a work which would have been employed by hands involved in the work, and inevitably subject to considerable wear and tear. Such was the case with this copy, which bears the faint stamp of a defunct mercantile library, and exhibits the following cosmetic flaws: a) lower margin of title clipped away, costing imprint date, and that area, as well as the blank corners of the first three leaves, have been carefully replaced with archival rice paper; b) there are occasional small spots and discolorations scattered in the text block; c) D6, F4, and F6 have old tears, the first and last mended at an early date, the last costing some words at the outer margin, and the second recently mended; d) a few fore margins have suffered relatively shallow losses not approaching the text; and f) the last ten leaves were formerly quite creased and ragged, but have now been rendered flat, with archival rice paper restoration to corners of the first few leaves in the sequence, but with substantial marginal restorations to the last three leaves, costing the page numbers on two of those leaves, and part of the headline on the other. While obviously far from a perfect copy, this is now a quite useable copy, in far better state than one of the two copies of record. And in terms of the context of publication and intent, it is certainly the most interesting of the 18th century editions (including the Paris original). It is not in Bradshaw or Black. ESTC T186441. HIGGS 4036.