Author: CHARLETON (Walter):
Title: Matrona Ephesia. Sive Lusus Serius de Amore, à Gualt. Charletono, M.D. ante decennium Anglicè conscriptus, Et nunc demum Latinitate donatus à Barth. Harrisio, A.M [sic] ejusdémq[ue] impensis excusus.
Description: Londini, Anno Domini, 1665. 12mo, 133 x 80 mms., pp. [xii], 82, engraved frontispiece, later sheepskin, probably early 19th century, borders in blind on cover, compartments on spine in blind, green morocco label; small piece missing from upper corner of A3 just affecting one letter, joints slightly cracked, corners a little worn but a good copy. Walter Charleton (1620–1707) possibly studied under John Wilkins (1614–1672), at Magdalen Hall, Oxford. He studied medicine and upon attaining his degree was, in 1643, appointed physician-in-ordinary to Charles I. He began publishing works on medicine and religion some time after that and in 1659 ventured into prose romance with The Ephesian Matron: Based on the Tale in the "Satyricon" of Petronius. "Charleton's version of this famous and often retold tale is an attack on the fashionable cult of Platonic love of his day, in which he insists that physical love and lust are both manifestations of 'an appetite to procreation'. Charleton sees his lascivious heroine as an Epicurean who lives by 'the simple dictates of mother-Nature'" (ODNB). This Latin translation is by Bartholomew Harris. ESTC notes two different states of the title-page: as above, R15293 (BL, Cambridge, Trinity Cambridge, Bodleian, Oxford: Exeter and Queens, National Trust; Folger, Harvard, Clark, Illinois. The imprint for the other state is "Londini: Impensis Authoris, 1665," R215215 (BL, Cambridge, Cambridge: Magdalen and Trinity, Oxford Worcester, Royal College of Physicians; Huntington, Stanford, Illinois, Yale; Bibliotheque Nationale. Wing C 3683.

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