Farnace drama. Da rappresentarsi nel Regio Teatro di Hay-Market, per la Reale Accademia di Musica.

A FINE COPY IN RED MOROCCO

First Edition. 8vo (194 x 120mm). 87, [1] pp., with the half-title, text in Italian and English on facing pages. Some very minor spotting in places but otherwise fine. Contemporary red morocco, cover with a wide gilt border containing a central gilt panel with a large tool at each corner, gilt spine, lettered in the second panel, marbled endleaves, green ribbon marker (spine and headcaps a little worn).

London: Printed by Tho. Wood, 1723

Rare. No copies recorded in the USA. ESTC records British Library (imperfect "wanting pp.79-82 and the last leaf of the English translation"), National Library of Scotland, Birmingham Central Library, Foundling Museum (purchased from Travis & Emery in 2009, "bound with several other libretti").

 

A sumptuous copy of the rare English and Italian libretto of Bononcini's opera Farnace. One of the principal roles in the opera being undertaken by Anastasia Robinson, who was secretly married to the dedicatee, Charles Mordaunt, third earl of Peterborough.

 

"From 1722 stories began to circulate about Peterborough's relationship with the singer Anastasia Robinson (d. 1755), the daughter of the portrait painter Thomas Robinson, whom he had seen that year in the role of Griselda in Buononcini's opera. Peterborough secretly married her. The exact date of the marriage is not known, but in August 1723 Peterborough made a brief visit to the continent, and temporarily settled her, along with her stepmother, in a house at Fulham near his own at Parson's Green. The marriage is believed to be the first between a peer and an actress, singer, or dancer. Sometime later he rented for her a cottage and property named Bevis Mount overlooking the River Itchen at Padwell, Southampton" (ODNB).

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Stock Code: 229554