Details
ASTLE, Thomas (1735-1803). The Origin and Progress of Writing as well Hieroglyphic as Elementary … also Some Account of the Origin and Progress of Printing. London: T. Bensley for J. White, 1803. 2° (464 x 285mm). Engraved frontispiece portrait of the author after H. Howard by W. Skelton, and 32 plates, some partly hand-coloured. (First few leaves, including frontispiece and title quite spotted, occasional light spotting or light marginal browning, light offsetting from plates, stronger from a few plates.) Contemporary crimson straight-grained morocco, decorated in blind and gilt, gilt edges (extremities quite rubbed). Provenance: Sir Foster Cunliffe (bookplate).
Second edition, LARGE-PAPER COPY. Astle’s work was ‘an authoritative source for the history of writing well into the nineteenth century, and was last reprinted in 1876’ (ODNB online). Lowndes describes it as ‘the completest work on the subject extant in this or any other language’. The first edition was published in 1784. Lowndes I, 82.
Second edition, LARGE-PAPER COPY. Astle’s work was ‘an authoritative source for the history of writing well into the nineteenth century, and was last reprinted in 1876’ (ODNB online). Lowndes describes it as ‘the completest work on the subject extant in this or any other language’. The first edition was published in 1784. Lowndes I, 82.
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