We have just found three of the original plates which were
used at Christ Church, Oxford to print bookplates. One is
a steel plate, and dates from the turn of the century. Two
are copper and are plainly very much older: one certainly
from the middle of the eighteenth-century (an example of
the so-called Chippendale style), and the other probably
ca. 1840, but copied from an earlier example.
The find has been a considerable surprise to me. I am
familiar with the entries of payments to engravers which
can be found in our 18C and 19C library accounts, and
equally with the long list of Christ Church bookplates in
Franks. But had always assumed that the original plates
were destroyed long ago - melted down or thrown away when
they became too worn to use.
Fine art plates exist in some numbers - there are hundreds
in the Plantin-Moretus Museum and at OUP to name but too.
But I have never seen old plates for bookplates. Is this
because they are unusual? Or is it simply because the
surviving examples are buried in libraries, known only to
the librarians, and sometimes not even to them?
Does anyone else have any?
Mark Purcell
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