The Romance of King Arthur and His Knights of the Round Table by Malory, Sir Thomas; Pollard, Alfred W. (Preface) - 1917

64-66 Fifth Avenue, New York: The Macmillan Company, 1917. Stated: Copyright, 1917, by The Macmillan Company. Published October, 1917. Fine navy cloth boards, gilt embossed cover and spine titles, generally moderate shelf wear. A notorious 'bookworm' of lore and its mate have burrowed side-by-side while never touching through back board, and making their way to the front endpapers from apprx. 1/8" down to 1/16" at completion; most fortunately, occurring near top corner and outside of text and illustration. Bright gilt cover design features finely detailed bugler knight on regaled horseback; gilt spine design features stylized royal lion w/gilt bands. Frontispiece color plate by Rackham: "How Arthur drew his sword Excalibur for the first time". Pages generally very good with the afformentioned minimal and charming burrowage. Feature sixteen color plates in brilliant subdued hues and seven in black & white by Arthur Rackham. Each color plate features fine tissue guard w/red captions. Additional partial-page imagery, headers, tailpieces, symbology and decoration throughout. Generally attractive, near very good first edition. Sir Thomas Malory (1405 - 1471) collected all the ancient tales of the mythical Arthur and published them under the title Le Morte D'Arthur. The characters are familiar: Lancelot and Guinevere, and Tristan and Isolde, here in the definitive account of the Arthurian legends. The vigorous, eloquent epic tale of valor is noted for having been written in the best English prose of the Fifteenth Century. Include 5-page detailed glossary. Printed in the United States of America at the Norword Press, Norwood, Mass, USA. 517 pages with three pages of adverts for illustrated volumes from Macmillan. Insured post.. First Edition Thus. Hard Cover. Good. Illus. by Rackham, Arthur. 8vo - over 7¾ - 9¾" Tall.