VERTUE, George.

A Plan of the Great Oke call’d the Green-Dale Oke in the Lane near Welbeck in Nottingham Shire. These Draughts taken 31 August 1727.

      First edition of Vertue’s delightful and rare plates recording the result of a high-spirited wager between Vertue’s patron Edward Harley, 2nd Earl of Oxford and the Duke of Portland in 1724. Oxford bet his dinner companion that he had a tree on his estate with a trunk wide enough to drive a coach and six through. Portland accepted the bet, and a steward was duly instructed to cut such an opening overnight into the Greendale Oak in Welbeck Park, Nottinghamshire. Welbeck had always been famous for its tremendous oaks, and furnished timber used in the building of St. Paul’s Cathedral and York Minster. The next morning Lord Oxford drove a coach and six through the Greendale Oak. In 1727 Lady Oxford had a cabinet made from the oak taken from the heart of the tree, which had inlaid illustrations of the Greendale Oak and its tunnel. The cabinet also displayed a quote from Ovid, and a quote from Chaucer, which Vertue reproduced on his plates no. II and no. IV respectively. The mutilated Greendale Oak survived until well into the 20th century and was thought to have been older than a thousand years.Vertue’s plates show the tree from three sides with a lone rider and a coach driving through. The first plate shows a cross section of the tree trunk recording the height of the tunnel at more than 10 feet, the width at 6 feet and the length at 12 feet. The first plate also incorporates the title lettering, Vertue’s initials, Lord Oxford’s coat-of-arms, and a map of the location.David Alexander, George Vertue as an engraver, no. 656-60 (curiously dates the set of plates as from ‘1733’, no explanation given why this should be; we would date it nearer ‘1727’ when the cabinet was made), in Walpole Society, vol. 70, 2008; COPAC record only the British Library copy. Folio, 5 engraved plates by and after Vertue (numbered I-V), measuring 355 x 210 mm, four of which are on a full sheet, while the last is on a smaller sheet, inlaid to fit the size of the other sheets (490 x 325 mm); two with a little dust spotting in the margins, but very good impressions; bound by Birdsall & Sohn, Northampton, c. 1900, in dark green half morocco and marbled side, gilt lettered spine. Bookplates of James Ward (dated 1892); and bookplate of William Allen Potter.