Carriages 1600 original printed British Patents1625-1875.

      England. Collection of patents. The collection is bound with 703 patents in 34 volumes on carriages in volumes some of which are in scrappy condition due to the removal of many irrevelent patents, plus about 1 165 patents in 47 volumes in good condition labelled "Bearings Axels and Wheels, which includes other subjects (e.g. includes besides horse carriages: trams and other road vehicles including cars, rai lway, mining vehicles, traction engines, bicycle tires etc. (I didn't want to remove these after I saw the damage already done to the "coaches"volumes from plucking) plus2 volumes and a pile of paten ts on springs. The binding was carried out c. 1930 and is in typical black library buckram with gilt lettering on the spines. The number of patents per volume varies considerably between 1 and 50 depen ding upon the thickness of the patents (some could be merely a leaf or two of text, some have a single sheet illustration and some multiple folding illustrations) and the thickness of the volumes whic h could vary between 1.5 ins. to 4 ins. deep. The patents were published individually in blue printed wrappers, and, as a rule, they have been bound to include the upper wrapper but not the lower one on which there would have been no text. The general format is: wrapper, text, illustration. In terms of condition they seem to be very largely unused and unread: they do tend to show signs of dust and occasional wear at the outer margins, and the very occasional well-read individual patent and one or two used volumes, overall they are in very good condition. Originally the collection derives from Manchester Public Libraries and is exceptional in that it put together this substantially complete run of patents relating to the subject. The extraction of such a collection was clearly an enormous task when one considers the vast number of patents issued covering all subjects. Possibly there has been the occasional slight error in compilation when a totally unrelated patent has been included, and in some cases a patent may have been issued not obviously related to the subject, or which pertains to more than one subject area in which case its function may have been assigned to a different ar ea of classification. However, we are confident that this collection is as thorough as one can reasonably expect, and, as such, it comprises the most remarkable body of knowledge. The inventors had to lodge a written description, and full drawings, of their new invention. The principle was that enough information must be given for anyone to copy the invention - but then he wasn't allowed to. Much of the information contained in patents is unavailable in any other form, since it may well have been deemed too abstruse or speculative to attract the attention of the editors of journals or publishe rs of books. Many ideas are described in patents long before they become well known or acceptable to be published in other forms of literature. At the same time it is safe to presume that virtually al l significant developments are contained in patents. The Patent Law Amendment Act of 1852 proposed that an Office of the Commissioners of Patents be set up and under its first superintendent, Bennet Woodcroft, it set about the task not only of publishing newly deposited specifications but also collecting together and publishing all earlier patents from 1617. Previously they had only been recorded on the Patent Rolls. An important step in publishing history. The printing of the patents in this collection thus date from 1852 to 1875 (although some of the patents may date back to an earlier period note the individual patent titles are not listed.