Fine Printed Books & Manuscripts, Including Americana

8vo. Half-title; 1p. publisher's ad at end. (Light spotting to preliminaries.) Modern quarter morocco. Provenance: Craig V. Showalter (bookplate).

FIRST AND ONLY EDITION, the first substantive work on the law of copyright in Britain. Robert Maugham, grandfather of William Somerset, was a major legal figure in London during the nineteenth century. In this work, Maugham emphasized the historical evolution of copyright, surveying the period from the advent of printing to the Statute of Anne (1710), and criticized what he saw as two principal injustices: the statutorily limited copyright term and the requirements for library deposit, which he considered both economically unfair and detrimental to authors. Maugham advocated for significant reform. He argued passionately for the extension—if not perpetuation—of literary copyright and for reduction in the number of copies authors were required to deposit for public libraries, especially the British Museum. To support his stance, Maugham marshaled various historical sources and cited authorities from British and continental traditions, including John Milton and continental perspectives from France and Germany, presenting these in an appendix to the treatise. His arguments helped shape the ongoing nineteenth-century debate on copyright law, and his treatise became a standard reference, informing legal discussion in Britain and the United States throughout the century. RARE: according to online records, this work has never been offered at auction.