The Phantom Byron Book Sale Catalogue

This essay argues that there exist four sale catalogues of Byron’s library, not three as hitherto thought, and that the fourth auction, held at the same time as the third and by the same auctioneer (under the title ‘Library of a GENTLEMAN DECEASED’), contains titles of a religious and philosophical nature which John Cam Hobhouse did not want posterity to know that Byron had read: they include theological works which Byron mentions, with seeming facetiousness, in Don Juan. The essay includes analyses of various aspects of the existing catalogues, and lists titles which Byron is known to have read but which appear in none of the catalogues.