Marrin's Bookshop

Item Description

4to. 8.5 x 10.75 inches. xi + 310 pp. Title page, other preliminaries and some headings in red and black. In card wrapper. A little wear to extremities, but otherwise a very good copy. Illustrated by 235 text figures. Decorated by vignettes, initials, etc. mainly in red, but also green. The serif is the short cross stroke at the beginning and end of letters; one of the uncharted areas of palaeography, it originated in Roman inscriptions. The author provides a detailed explanation of letter cutting in stone and the manner in which the brush differs from all other writing tools. The Rev. Edward Catich was a well known stonecutter and calligrapher, educated at the Chicago Art Institute and the University of Iowa. He made a linkage between the letter-making of Imperial Rome, he researched in the city, 1935-39 and his previous work as a Chicago sign-writer. The first edition was published 1968.