The Origin And Progress Of The Art Of Writing: A connected narrative of the development of the art, its primeval phases in Egypt, China, Mexico, etc.

4to. 10.50" x 7.50" x 1.75" . pp.8/pp.176 + 28 plates. A very good binding, carefully rebacked. Embossed, pierced and moulded black relief plaque in black papier mache over red papered boards (imitating carved ebony), with a few small cracks and early repairs. Professionally rebacked in matching black leather. Spine with gilt title: "History Of Writing". All page edges gilt. Marbled endpapers. Illustrated with 28 full-page plates, many lithographed in colours by Day & Son, and many figures in the text. A well preserved copy of this scarce book. **"Henry Noel Humphreys (1810–1879), graphic artist and author, was born on 4 January 1810 in Birmingham, the son of James Humphreys and Dorothy Ann Knowles. He was educated at King Edward VI's Grammar School, Birmingham, and received artistic training in Brussels. After his marriage in 1833 he and his wife embarked upon a continental tour, the Italian portion of which inspired in Humphreys a keen admiration for the Italian Renaissance and baroque that stayed with him all his life. He also wrote about architectural materials and expressed radical sympathy for functionalism and engineering. *** Full Title reads: "The origin and progress of the art of writing : a connected narrative of the development of the art, its primeval phases in Egypt, China, Mexico, etc; its middle state in the cuneatic systems of Nineveh and Persepolis, to its introduction to Europe through the medium of the Hebrew, Phœnician, and Greek systems, and its subsequent progress to the present day / by Henry Noel Humphreys, illustrated by a number of specimens of the writing of all ages, and a series of facsimiles from autograph letters from the fifteenth to the nineteenth century.".…