'Fingal' title page (2nd ed)

This is a title page from 'Fingal', part of the epic cycle of Ossian poems published by Scottish poet James Macpherson in 1762. The epigraph 'fortia facta patrum' derives from Book I of Virgil's 'Aeneid' and translates to 'of the brave deeds of [their] ancestors' — referring to the titular Fingal, whose deeds and heroics are narrated by his son Ossian throughout the poems.

This is the earliest image of Ossian, engraved by Isaac Taylor, adapted from the original drawing by the English artist Samuel Wale. The vignette depicts Ossian as a now blind and aged man. Next to him is Malvina, the intended bride of his dead son Oscar. Five spirits of warriors and maidens look at them from a cloud. A harp is suspended in an oak above Ossian’s head, referencing his role as the narrator-bard.

[Shelfmark Oss.5]