author

Edmund Goldsmid

A prolific late-Victorian editor and historian, he is remembered for reviving rare texts on witchcraft, folklore, travel, and early printing. His books open a window onto the strange, curious corners of the past.

2 Audiobooks

Quaint Gleanings from Ancient Poetry A Collection of Curious Poetical Compositions of the XVIth, XVIIth, and XVIIIth Centuries

Quaint Gleanings from Ancient Poetry A Collection of Curious Poetical Compositions of the XVIth, XVIIth, and XVIIIth Centuries

by Edmund Goldsmid

Explanatory Notes of a Pack of Cavalier Playing Cards, Temp. Charles II. Forming a Complete Political Satire of the Commonwealth

Explanatory Notes of a Pack of Cavalier Playing Cards, Temp. Charles II. Forming a Complete Political Satire of the Commonwealth

by Edmund Goldsmid

About the author

Born in 1849 and dead by 1894, Edmund Marsden Goldsmid was a Scottish historian, editor, and translator who also wrote under the pseudonym "Piscator." He is associated with a remarkable body of nineteenth-century reprints and edited volumes, especially works that rescued obscure historical and literary texts from near-forgotten shelves.

His bibliography shows a strong taste for the unusual and the archival. Among the works linked to him are Confessions of Witches Under Torture, Un-natural History, or Myths of Ancient Science, Explanatory Notes of a Pack of Cavalier Playing Cards, and editions connected with early voyages and Tudor-Stuart history. He also worked on bibliographical studies of famous presses, including the Aldine and Elzevier presses, which points to a deep interest in the history of books as well as the history inside them.

For modern listeners and readers, Goldsmid stands out less as a novelist than as a curator of fascinating material. His legacy is that of someone who gathered, translated, edited, and preserved neglected texts so later generations could keep discovering them.