Feliks Bernatowicz - *Nałęcz: A Romance from Polish History*, vols. I–III [1828]

BERNATOWICZ, Feliks - NAŁĘCZ. A Novel from Polish History

Vols. 1–3. Józef Węcki Printing House, Warsaw 1828. Dimensions: 17x10.5 cm; pp. 156, 172, 160. Condition:

Condition: binding worn and frayed, leather scuffed, with cracks on the spine; water damage in Volumes 1 and 3 (extensive in the first, affecting the entire volume); soiling and stains (mainly on the outer pages, on the inside pages of the binding and in the margins from reading), in volume 3: signs of insect damage, a burn hole with several letters missing on pp. 34/35, a mark made with a pen on p. 77; despite the water damage, the paper is quite sturdy.

Ownership notes mainly on the title page, in pen—illegible (H. Jankowska? Catalog numbers), stamps reading “Cezar Zaleski” and a library stamp (illegible, presumably Polish, at the end—on the inside of the binding), a faded/bleached(?) stamp on the title page of volume 3; it may have read: “From the Library Collection of Stanisław Ławrynowicz Dzierżański” (several works bearing “Cezar Zaleski” stamps that still carry this designation have been digitized online), and they may have also been present in Volumes 1 and 2, but were more thoroughly removed.

The first edition of a historical novel by Feliks Bernatowicz—then a librarian at the Czartoryski Palace in Puławy, an amateur ethnographer, and a Romantic-era novelist.