8vo (197 x 117 mm). Half-titles; 3pp. publisher's advertisements in vol.3. (Spotting throughout.) Original drab boards (rebacked to style with new labels, soiling to covers); slipcase. Provenance: Partially illegible ownership inscription dated 16 January 1823 on inner front board of each volume.

FIRST EDITION OF SIR WALTER SCOTT'S MOST BELOVED NOVEL IN THE ORIGINAL BOARDS.

FIRST EDITION, FIRST ISSUE. Greville Worthington, in his bibliography of the Waverley novels, notes that there are two states of the first edition and provides a list of 14 points as follows: p. [iii] bears the forme–mark “9”; p. iv, line 6 the first word is “Peter”; p. v, line 12 the third word is “which”; p. v bears the forme-mark “6”; p. vi, line 14 the first word is “observed”; p. ix, line 1 there is no comma after “fought”; p. xii, line 5 there is no comma after “people”; p. xv, line 3 the sixth word is “toilsome”; p. xvi, line 20 the first word is “ton”; p. xvi there is no forme–mark; p. xix there is no forme–mark; p. xxiv there is no forme–mark; p. xxix, line 1 there is a comma after “paste” and p. xxx bears the forme–mark “12”. The present copy conforms with all these points except for Worthington’s third point: p. v, line 12 the second and fourth words are “which” and the third word is “works”.

Sir Walter Scott began work on Ivanhoe shortly after completing A Legend of Montrose in May 1820. Due to severe stomach pains, Scott had been forced to dictate Montrose, The Bride of Lammermoor, and the first part of Ivanhoe to publisher John Ballantyne and poet William Laidlaw, who acted as scribes. By the time the first half of the story had been completed, however, Scott was well enough to write on his own, and he completed Ivanhoe in mid-November. Although the first edition carries the publication date of 1820, the book was in fact published on 20 December 1819; as with all of the previous Waverley novels and indeed all published up to 1827, its author was not identified. Ivanhoe proved to be a massive success and remains one of Scott's most beloved and widely-read novels. Todd & Bowden 140Aa.