GAME and THE ENGLISH LANDSCAPE: THE INFLUENCE OF THE CHASE ON SPORTING ART AND SCENERY. By Anthony Vandervell and Charles Coles.

1980 1st edition. Large square 4to (246 x 276mm). Pp159. Colour and b/w photographs and paintings, illustrations, bibliography. Light brown cloth, spine titled in gilt.

"The imprint of the hunter on the landscape has probably been more marked in England than in any other country. This role of the sporting man has been far from fully appreciated and sometimes even blatantly misunderstood. Written by the Chairman and Director of the Game Conservancy, this is the first book to pay tribute to the hunter, the angler and the shooting man, and to their great contributions to the shape, texture and beauty of our countryside. The authors trace the history of all traditional rural sports and the evolution of farming and forestry, pointing out the interaction between them. We are reminded how thousands of mixed woodlands have been planted and carefully sited for pheasant shooting; how streams, lakes and insignificant farm ponds have benefited from the attention of fishermen; and how the shooting farmer is more selective about the chemical sprays he uses than the farmer whose land is mainly a food factory. To enhance and illustrate the text, a wide variety of prints are included from great collections of British sporting art and landscape paintings, including those of Her Majesty the Queen and the Mellon Collection in the United States. These show how rural sports have shaped not only our woodlands, farms, hedgerows and wetlands, but have also influenced an individual school of British artists from Richard Barlow to George Stubbs and through to the artists of the 20th century." Chapters include:- The hunter's imprint on the landscape; The beginnings of the hunting sports; The evolution of farming and forestry; Sporting art as a pictorial archive; Rural sports and the landscape; Sporting waters; Designs for game; Pressures on the countryside.