An Embroidered German Bureaucratic Almanack for George III
[ALMANACK.] Königl. Groß-Brittannischer und Churfürstl. Braunschweig-Lüneburgscher Staats-Kalender auf das Jahr 1798 Lauenburg: ‘gedruckt mit Berenbergschen Schriften [i.e. Eberhard Friedrich Justus Heinrich Berenberg] und zu bekommen bey dem Burgermeister Meyer. [1798.]
8vo. In a handsome contemporary binding of white silk, upper board with the cypher of King George III worked in silver threads and embellished with sequins surmounted by his crown embroidered in red, rear board with cornucopia embroidered in green, brown, pink, and metallic threads, both boards with floral sequin cornerpieces and within an embroidered foliate border with red flowers embellished with small sequins, original bright green endpapers, housed in a modern drop-backed box of burgundy buckram; pp. [xxxii], 264, 34, [16]; woodcut crowned cypher of George III against ground of clouds to f. C1r, British Royal coat of arms to title; outer border of small sequins removed at an earlier date, sequins to foliate border largely perished, neatly rebacked in oatmeal cloth, some wear to boards with loss of some threads to central panels, slight tarnishing and discolouration; some foxing to flyleaves; else internally clean and bright; a very good copy.
A rare almanack-cum-bureaucratic directory for 1798, provincially printed in Lauenberg in honour of George III – the first British Hanover monarch to be born in England – as King of Great Britain, and Ireland Elector of Hanover, and Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg, our copy in a handsome embroidered binding bearing his crowned cypher.
Although George III spoke English as a native language and was the first British Hanover monarch not to have travelled to Germany, this almanack is indicative of his political significance as Elector of Hanover and Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg. The calendar provides notable feast days and holidays as well as a Jewish calendar marking the Sabbath and rosh chodesh, and is followed by a register of thousands of members of the Royal Electoral Ministry (featuring an orchestra, three librarians, a copper-engraver, and a bookbinder) and of local administration throughout Lower Saxony, including an index of physicians; there follows a list of officers, a list of professors at the Georg-August University in Göttingen, a list of cloisters and monasteries detailing the names of dozens of nuns, and an index of nobles and their lands. The almanack also includes the names and birth dates of George III, Queen Charlotte, and their children, as well as those of several influential noble families throughout Germany, also noting the religious denomination of each family.
This is the first almanack in the series printed by Eberhard Friedrich Justus Heinrich Berenberg, whose father, Johann Georg Berenberg, had recently died, as reported in a prefatory note by Ludwig, Count of Kielmansegg, himself a member of the House of Hanover and here described as ‘Royal British Privy Councillor appointed to the Elector of Brunswick-Lüneburg’; Eberhard’s privilege allowed him to continue to donate a portion of the almanack’s proceeds to the orphanage at Celle.
We find other examples of the Lauenberg Staats-Kalender bound in calf with the cypher of George III blocked to both boards in gilt, as well as examples in embroidered bindings similar to ours on Berenberg almanacks printed c. 1789–1801. A copy of the 1799 edition in an embroidered binding was sold by Sotheby’s (The Property of the Dowager Viscountess Wolseley, of Hampton Court Palace, Middlesex, 17 October 1918), described as ‘for K. George III, by one of his daughters’. Queen Charlotte was an expert embroiderer (see the 1781 needlework pocketbook made by her at the Royal Collections), providing financial support to the needlewoman Mary Knowles and of Mrs Pawsey’s school for ‘embroidering females’, and it is possible that these bindings were made for presentation. ‘The works of art made by Queen Charlotte’s daughters are inevitably linked to those of their mother, who ensured that they stayed at court and continued to work alongside her for much of their lives. Much of the royal women’s time was spent at Kew and Frogmore reading, drawing and making paper cut-outs’ (Royal collections, online).
We find a single copy of the 1798 Staats-Kalender outside Germany, at the Bodleian.
VD18 90282272.
SKU: 2124916