Joseph Gulston and the sale of his collection of prints

Joseph Gulston (1745–1786) was one of the most important collectors of prints in eighteenth-century London. During his brief lifetime, he built a massive collection of over 60,000 pieces. His mania for prints, despite his great inherited wealth, pushed him near to bankruptcy, forcing Gulston to sell his collection at auction. This article discusses the sale and, through elaborating on the contents of the collection and the purchasers, provides an overview of the scale not only of the Gulston collection but also of the British print market in the late eighteenth century.