Ten Thousand Wonderful Things Comprising whatever is marvellous and rare, curious, eccentric and extraordinary in all ages and nations — Background and Themes

The Preface as a Manifesto for the Marvellous

King's preface functions as a compact aesthetic statement. He insists that a 'marvel once explained away ceases to be a marvel,' and that the book's purpose is to register what is uncommon, not the regular course of events. This rationale justifies the inclusion of incidents that 'appear at first sight to be wholly incredible.' The preface also reveals a preference for scenes from nature, curiosities of art, and bygone customs, with a secondary emphasis on remarkable occurrences and landscapes. King explicitly prioritizes accuracy over beauty, claiming that 'whatever is lost of beauty, is gained by accuracy.' This principle shapes the entire work: entries are chosen for their strangeness or quaintness, not for their picturesque qualities. The editor's voice is confident and slightly defensive, anticipating criticism by arguing that polishing a fact—like scrubbing an old master painting—spoils it as a work of art.

Movement Between the Natural and the Historical

The excerpts show a rapid oscillation between topics. A list of notable deaths correlated with lunar phases—Rousseau, Garrick, Dr. Johnson, Washington—sits alongside a paragraph on the gluttony of monks, citing King John and Giraldus Cambrensis. This juxtaposition is typical of the volume's structure: it moves without transition from a quasi-scientific observation to a historical anecdote. The lunar death list is presented as a statistical curiosity, with the doctor's remark that the moon 'makes no distinction of persons.' The monkish gluttony entry, by contrast, is a moralizing historical note, complete with specific numbers of dishes. This structural pattern—a series of discrete, self-contained marvels—encourages browsing rather than linear reading. The reader is invited to dip in and out, encountering each wonder as a separate, surprising fact.

Visual Artifacts as Anchors for Description

Two entries in the excerpts are built around illustrations: the Egyptian garden and the ancient bell-shrine. The garden entry describes a diagram 'expressly curious' as an example of pictorial art and as a record of Egyptian pleasure-gardens. The description notes the garden's location beside a canal of the Nile, with an avenue of trees and an entrance on that side. The bell-shrine entry is more elaborate: it describes a bronze case containing a corroded iron bell, found in a wall in Argyleshire, and speculates on its concealment during the Reformation. The entry highlights that the figure of Christ wears a regal crown, not a crown of thorns, and mentions a brass chain and cross found nearby. In both cases, the image serves as the entry's centerpiece, and the text provides context, interpretation, and a sense of the object's materiality—its rust, its corrosion, its age.

Recurring Motifs: Rust, Corrosion, and the Value of Age

A striking verbal motif runs through the excerpts: the valorization of rust, corrosion, and the unpolished. The preface uses the metaphor of scraping rust off an antique coin, which renders it 'worthless in the eyes of a collector.' The bell-shrine entry describes the iron bell as 'so greatly corroded that its original form can only be imperfectly traced,' yet notes that this bell, not the ornate case, was 'the chief object of veneration.' The Egyptian garden sketch is valued for its 'curious' and 'characteristic' qualities, not for beauty. This recurring emphasis on the worn, the aged, and the imperfect aligns with King's editorial stance: the book collects wonders that retain their strangeness precisely because they have not been cleaned up or explained away. The reader is encouraged to appreciate the 'rust' of history—the odd, the quaint, the startling—as a source of value.

Readers approaching Ten Thousand Wonderful Things should expect a miscellany that rewards browsing rather than sequential reading. The volume's structure—short entries, frequent illustrations, and abrupt topic shifts—mirrors its content: a collection of marvels that resist easy categorization. Pay attention to the editorial voice in the preface, which frames the entire project, and to the recurring emphasis on material objects and their histories. The book is best enjoyed as a cabinet of curiosities, where each entry offers a self-contained surprise.

There’s something about King’s compendium, with its patient love for the rust on old facts, that makes me think of quieter afternoons spent with Wit and Wisdom of Don Quixote — Text and Context. Both feel like cabinets kept by someone who treasured the odd, crooked details of the world, not to polish them, but just to keep them company.