Author: MOTTLEY (John), compiler:
Title: Joe Miller's Jests. Or, the Wit's Vade Mecum: Being A Collection of the most Brilliant Jests, the excellent Bon Mots, and the most pleasant short stories, in the English Language, man of them transcribed from the Mouth of the Facetious Gentleman whose Name they bear. To which are added, Choice Collections of Moral Sentences, And of the most pointed and truly valuable Epigrams in the British Tongue; With the Names of the Authors to such as are known. Most humbly Inscribed To those Choice Spirits of the Age, His Majesty's Poet-Laureat, Mr. David Garrick, Mr. The Cibber, Mr. Justice Boden's Horse, Tom Jones, the most Impudent Man living, the Rev. Mr. Henley, and Joe Baker the Kettle-Drummer. The Fourteenth Edition.
Description: London: Printed for S. Crowder...; W. Nicol...; and J. Williams..[ no date [1772]. 12mo (in 6s), 168 x 100 mms., pp..192, engraved frontispiece, bound in later full calf, gilt rules on covers, spine ornately gilt in compartments, olive morocco label; cover a bit scratched, but a very good copy with the autograph in pencil of W. I. P. Chatto on the title-page, and the bookplates of William Turner and T. N. Abdy on the front paste-down end-paper. Joe Miller's Jests was first published in 1739, and there have probably been umpteen jillion later editions, along with facsimiles of the first edition offered for sale as a genuine first edition. The work was compiled by Elijah Jenkins under the pseudonym of John Mottley. The comic actor and singer Josias Miller (1683/ - 1738) provided a name for the "jests," but very little of the material comes from him. ESTC T63550 suggests a date of 1772 and locates copies in BL and Bodleian in this islands and McMaster in Canada and Sydney

Keywords: humour style literature


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