MAHAFFY, J. P. The Plate in Trinity College, Dublin: A History and a Catalogue

London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, St. Martin’s Street, 1918. Quarto. pp. xii, 120 (approx.) with numerous photographic plates illustrating pieces from the historic silver collection of Trinity College Dublin. Original burgundy cloth, upper cover with mounted photographic plate illustration of a ceremonial mace or staff, spine lettered in gilt. In the original publisher’s printed dust jacket.

A very good copy in the scarce dust jacket, the jacket lightly worn with small losses at the lower edge and minor chipping at the head of the spine. Internally clean and bright, a well-preserved example.

A scholarly and historically important study of the ceremonial silver and plate belonging to Trinity College Dublin, written by the distinguished classical scholar and Provost John Pentland Mahaffy (1839–1919). Published during the final year of the First World War, Mahaffy’s work documents the development, provenance, and artistic significance of the College’s historic plate collection, including tankards, cups, salvers, and ceremonial pieces presented to the College across several centuries.

The work combines historical narrative with a detailed catalogue of individual objects, many of which are illustrated in photographic plates. Mahaffy reflects in the preface on the neglect and dispersal of earlier collections of silver in Britain and Ireland during the nineteenth century, when many institutions valued objects merely for their bullion value rather than for their artistic or historical importance. His study therefore represents an early and important attempt to record and preserve the history of Trinity’s surviving treasures.

For historians of Irish universities, collectors of works relating to Trinity College Dublin, and students of historic silver and decorative arts, the volume remains a valuable reference. Copies retaining the original dust jacket are increasingly difficult to find.

[L4 6G]