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Stock# 94267
Description

Unique Manuscript Compilation

Extensive manuscript volume of notes and extracts mainly concerning early Mexican history compiled by Capt. William H. Shippard.  A sort of commonplace book for all manner of historical, geographical, cartographical, and bibliographical information concerning the New World. Summaries and commentary taken largely from Waldeck, Kingsborough, Humboldt, Adriano Balbi's Atlas Ethnographique du Globe, Hans Sloane's Jamaica, Dampier, Jedidiah Morse, Dampier, and others. Many of the entries by Shippard are dated in the year 1841 at Southend, Essex, while others were made in the British Museum where he clearly had access to many important American works, including atlases. The latest dated entries are from 1850.

This volume provides evidence of Shippard's assiduous collecting of information on early American discovery and exploration, shedding light on his comparative work concerning the origins of Mesoamerican peoples.

A window into the busy mind of a little-known early 19th-century Americanist in Britain whose work awaits scholarly attention.

Section titles:

  • Architectural Antiquities of Central America. Yucatan. Notes from Voyage Pittoresque et Archeologique by Frederic de Waldeck
  • Plate XI. The Kingsborough Pyramid
  • Colours
  • Plan of the Palace
  • Temple of the Sun
  • Temple for the Fire Virgins
  • Plate XIII must be Temple of the Two Serpents
  • Plate XIV & XV, Temple of Sun and the Temple of the Asterisms
  • Plate XVI Study of a part of the Temple of the Sun
  • Statements of Former Authors. Uxmal or Itzalane (pages 67-72)
  • Central America, Vera Cruz to River Atrato, S.A. Maps. 29 June 1849. W.H.S. Brit. Mus. (pages 101-103)
  • Mountains of Central America (pages 104-107)
  • The Panama Railroad: "The following account of this important work is supplied by Colonel Hughes, the chief engineer." from Times of 6 July 1849.
  • Grey Town
  • Maps. [Listing of early maps of the New World, Mexico, New Spain, West Indies, Florida, and the like, ending with Arrowsmith's 1841 map of Texas] (pages 127-130)
  • Nicaragua: Louis Napoleon. Canal of Nicaragua or a Project to Connect the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans by means of a Canal. London. 1846 (page 147)
  • River Tipitaka
  • Caledonian Canal (page 153)
  • Earthquakes of New World (page 155)
  • List of Medicines for Mosquito Shore (page 260)
  • Mails in the Pacific, 22 Jan. 1850 (page 263)

Tabular listing of American Languages taken from Balbi's Ethnographical Atlas (pages 201-205)

Capt. William H. Shippard (1803-1865), a friend of George Catlin, appears in British newspaper notices from the 1840s as a London-based lecturer associated with the Royal Society. He was involved in attempts to organize early London museum exhibitions of Mexican antiquities. In these efforts Shippard would seem to coincide with a  group of like-minded prominent English collectors interested in Mexican topics active during the 1820s and 1830s, including Lord Kingsborough and the bibliomaniac Sir Thomas Phillipps, among others. He seems to have been an armchair anthropologist and would-be museum founder, whose ambitious ideas for a London-based museum never got off the ground - at least not beyond the prospectus-printing stage. Certain aspects of Shippard's career are akin to William Bullock, the showman and connoisseur of Mexican antiquities who actually did travel to Mexico. Bullock published a notable book about his Mexican travels and achieved a level of recognition in his day as the empresario of London's Egyptian Hall, wherein he thrilled large London audiences with his elaborate exhibitions of exotica, including Mexican pre-conquest treasures. Agostino Aglio created a pair of detailed lithographs of Bullock's Modern Mexico and Ancient Mexico exhibitions.

Besides his assocation with George Catlin, Shippard may have known Frédéric de Waldeck, Agostino Aglio, Sir Thomas Phillipps, and others prominent figures in English collecting circles during the 1830s and '40s.

William Henry Shippard's Mexican Paintings

William H. Shippard (1803-1865) was a pioneering 19th-century British museologist - an unsung progenitor of modern-day museum anthropology. While he is chiefly remembered as a friend of George Catlin, Shippard's profound interest in the ancient civilizations of Mexico connects him with a cohort of British contemporaries that include Lord Kingsborough and the showman William Bullock. Shippard's fascination with Mesoamerica propelled him to amass a significant collection of visual material derived from Aztec codices which he copied himself. A figure of some intrigue and scholarly ambition, Shippard endeavored to establish the Museum of Mankind in London, which seems to have evolved from his deep interest in early Mexican cultures. Although the museum did not come to fruition, Shippard's original artwork, mainly pen and ink drawings enriched with vibrant hand coloring, based on Mexican codices held in European libraries and collections, remains a valuable historical source, particularly for understanding the allure of Mexican antiquity within early 19th-century British collecting circles.

Condition Description
Folio. Early 19th-century sheep over marbled boards. 268 pages on lined laid paper with lion rampant watermark. Ownership name on front pastedown: "W. H. Shippard / 5 Caroline Street / Bedford Square / 17 June 1835."
William Henry Shippard Biography

Capt. William H. Shippard, a friend of George Catlin and an avid watercolorist and museologist, was also a pioneering British Mesoamericanist. Shippard appears in British newspaper notices from the 1840s as a London-based lecturer who spoke about Native Americans and Mexican antiquities. We know he was a friend of George Catlin, and that he was involved in attempts to organize early London museum exhibitions of Mexican antiquities. In the latter efforts Shippard would seem to coincide with a  group of like minded prominent English collectors interested in Mexican topics active during the 1820s and 1830s, including Lord Kingsborough and the bibliomaniac Sir Thomas Phillipps, among others. He seems to have been an armchair anthropologist and would-be museum founder, whose ambitious ideas for a London-based museum never got off the ground - at least not beyond the prospectus-printing stage. Certain aspects of Shippard's career are akin to William Bullock, the showman and connoisseur of Mexican antiquities who actually did travel to Mexico. Bullock published a notable book about his Mexican travels, and achieved a level of recognition in his day as the empresario of London's Egyptian Hall, wherein he thrilled large London audiences with his elaborate exhibitions of exotica, including Mexican items.