A Picturesque Tour of Italy from Drawings made in 1816-1817, by James Hakewill, Archt.

London: John Murray, Albermarle-Street, 1820.. FIRST EDITION. Large paper copy. (37 x 26.5 cm). 52 leaves of text (unpaginated). Contemporary half green morocco over marbled boards, spine with raised bands and gilt-decorated compartments, marbled endpapers and edges. Complete with engraved title page and 63 engraved plates after Hakewill. Upper joint just starting but holding strong, light toning, offsetting, and occasional foxing (notably to engraved title), lightly rubbed, withal a very good, large copy. 'James Hakewill (1778�1843), architectural draughtsman, was born on 25 November 1778, the second son in the family of eight surviving children of John Hakewill (1742�1791), landscape and portrait painter, and decorator, and his wife, Anna Maria Cook (1747�1818). The architect Henry Hakewill (1771�1830) was his brother. He was trained as an architect and entered the Royal Academy Schools in 1807, from which date he became a regular exhibitor there. The same year he married Marie Catherine, daughter of W. Browne of Green Street, Grosvenor Square, London. She was a portrait painter and frequent exhibitor at the Royal Academy and the Society of Arts. They had four sons, the youngest of whom were Frederick Charles Hakewill, a portrait painter, and Richard Wentworth Hakewill. James Hakewill is chiefly known for his architectural publications. In 1813 he published The History of Windsor and its Neighbourhood, illustrated with engravings from his own drawings. In 1816�17 he travelled in Italy, and on his return published A Picturesque Tour of Italy (1818�20), his best-known work, illustrated with plates engraved from watercolours painted by J. M. W. Turner, based on sketches by Hakewill. After a visit to Jamaica, Hakewill published A Picturesque Tour in the Island of Jamaica (1825), from his own drawings. Other works included Plans, sections, and elevations of the abattoirs in Paris, with considerations for their adoption in London (1828) and An Attempt to Determine the Exact Character of Elizabethan Architecture (1835). At the end of his life he worked on drawings for a book on the Rhine, to be a companion volume to Italy, but this was not completed.' (DNB) (Pine-Coffin, 816.7)