Catherine II, Nakaz, St Petersburg, 1770, the Hamilton-Rosebery copy

CATHERINE II, EMPRESS OF RUSSIA

Nakaz... dannyi Kommissii o sochinenii proekta novago ulozheniya [Instruction... to the Commission on the Work of the new Code of Laws]. St Petersburg: Imperial Academy of Sciences, 1770

4to (290 x 210mm.), title-pages and parallel text in Russian, Latin, German and French, engraved head- and tailpieces, contemporary half calf neatly rebacked, edges uncut

THE HAMILTON-ROSEBERY COPY. Catherine's progressive manifesto for a new code of laws for Russia was drawn up by her personally with large sections extracted from the works of Montesquieu, Voltaire and Beccaria; the German and Russian texts were first printed in 1767 and an English edition appeared in 1768. While something of a window onto the Enlightenment for Russia, incorporating its educational and anti-clerical ideals, it had little practical effect and was not put into use, though it did ensure Catherine's reputation abroad.

LITERATURE:

Drage 208; Fekula 2013

PROVENANCE:

Alexander Douglas-Hamilton (1767-1852), tenth duke of Hamilton ("Hamilton sale 1884, lot 479", inscription on inside front cover) and son-in-law of William Beckford, also ambassador to the court of St Petersburg in 1806, his sale, Sotheby's, 2 May 1884; Archibald Philip Primrose (1847-1929), fifth earl of Rosebery, armorial bookplate