For the Year of our Lord God MDCCLVII.

Bookseller Notes

The scene is an elaborate allegory - celebrating the arrival of The Arundel, or rather Pomfret, Marbles - on the benefits of adding the study of antiquity, sculpture and architecture to the traditional academic syllabus, with a figure representing the University at right, attended by her three faculties, being led by Minerva from a gothic building towards a scene of classical statuary, ruins, temples and allegorical figures, including a group at left in which in which Time attempts to destroy a marble, prevented by the Genius of antique learning who leads History forward to read its inscription. The 'antiquity' is not all classical: there is a pyramid.The dimensions of this copy far exceed those recorded by Petters, and the BL.