Bound in later red half-morocco and red cloth.

In English.

With the decline of the woolen-cloth trade Coventry turned in the 18th century to silk weaving; between about 1765 and 1857, silk was the dominant industry in the city, the Jacquard mechanism being introduced in the early 19th century. In the second half of that century Coventry experienced a revival in silk weaving led by Thomas Stevens, inventor of the "Stevengraph."

The 1891 census in Coventry records a Bryan Rotherham, clerk, aged 15, second son of George S. Rotherham, maltster and corn merchant in Coventry. According to baptism records, the same Bryan Rotherham was born Feburary 8, 1876, and baptized September 13, 1877.

Manuscript treatise on the art of weaving, with numerous hand drawn diagrams and illustrations, and mounted fabric samples, by Bryan Rotherham, 1897. The text appears to be original and unpublished. The volume is divided into five chapters, some of which are divided into sub-sections: 1. The silk worm -- 2. Reeling, spinning, dyeing, winding, and warping -- 3. Passing, staying, satins, double satin, satinette, terry, Ottoman, tubular fabrics, sectional passing, interrupted passing, and irregular passing -- 4. Textures, ground, grogram, twill, double twills, fancy twills, diamonds, analyses -- 5. Description of the Jacquard machine, the reading-in machine, draft paper, mounting.

Text is written in black ink throughout, in informal cursive. Interspersed are numerous ink drawings illustrating machines and mechanisms involved in the weaving process. Even more prevalent are detailed patterns, in ink of multiple colors, for various fabrics. The large section of analyses in chapter 4 records details of 26 different fabrics. For each, a fabric sample is mounted to the page, to accompany information on the fabric's texture, threads, dents, description, pass note, warping note, and harness, along with a diagram of the pattern.

An elaborately illustrated title page, heightened with gold, incorporates the City of Coventry coat of arms, with elephant and castle, cat-a-mountain as crest, and motto "Camera Principis."

Weaving > Handbooks, manuals, etc.

Silk industry > Great Britain.

Textile design > Great Britain.

Textile fabrics > Specimens.

Diagrams.

Ink drawings.

Watercolors.

Textile materials.