Antwerp: Robert Bruney, 1605. First edition. 4to (180 x 134 mm). Ten in-text engravings. Contemporary full morocco with central lozenge in gilt, spine rebacked, rubbing, spotting; toning, spotting throughout; book-plate of Frederick Haile Stebbins. Kennedy/Johnson V, 102; Lowndes IV, 2764.

A Restitution of Decayed Intelligence was written with the aim of correcting centuries of mythology about the founding of England by demonstrating the English descent from Germanic tribes; it was one of the first books to correct the long-held but inaccurate notion that English culture and language was rooted in its pre-Saxon inhabitants. It also marks the first appearance in English of "The Pied Piper of Hamelin."