First thus. Facsimile reprint of the original 1860 publication. 104pp, followed by 100 colour plates. Illustrated endpapers. Black cloth-covered boards with gilt titles to spine. 4to. Cloth just a little pushed at spine tips else volume is neat, clean, bright and tight throughout. Glossy, illustrated dust wrapper, shelf worn, rubbed and bumped on extreme edges, with short open nick on the lower leading corner.
The classic Victorian treatise on illumination and lettering from ancient times to the late Renaissance, The Art of Illumination is beautiful volume for its colour plates alone. It is a classic pictorial reference work and a Victorian masterpiece of scholarly and practical research, with essays by M Digby Wyatt which are impressive for their range and depth, covering the historical background of manuscript illumination, practical application, and descriptions of colour palettes.
