Roman Lettering: a book of alphabets and inscriptions. (Victoria and Albert Museum Large Picture Book No. 12)

Oblong 8vo. Wrappers. With the pencilled note of Evan Gill on p.[3]; loosely inserted a carbon-copy typed letter from him to the Director of Publications, Victoria & Albert Museum, 1p. 4to, 18 May 1962 (initialled by Gill and with his autograph footnote), and a news-cutting of The Times Literary Supplement's review [by Reynolds Stone], 4 May 1962, of Edward M. Catch's Letters Redrawn from the Trajan Inscriptions in Rome. "I venture to draw your attention to an error of date," writes Evan Gill, Eric Gill's younger brother, "in the caption for Alphabets by Eric Gill reproduced as Plate 7 in this admirable handbook published in 1958." Gill's excellent letter explains that these were cut in April 1909 and reproduced from collotypes in Edward Johnston's Manuscript & Inscription Letters for schools & classes & for the use of craftsmen (1909) - and that the V&A had published them in 1936 as Lettering Sheets. "I believe I am right in saying that the alphabets of 1909 were the first my brother cut; this being so and in view of the later developments, you will readily appreciate how important it is that they should be correctly dated." Roman Lettering has 27 pages of plates, reproducing alphabets by Gianfrancesco Cresci, G.B. Bodoni, Eric Gill (here dated 1925) and Edward Johnston, as well as lettering from the Trajan Column and elsewhere. "The text is composed in Pilgrim type after designs by Eric Gill.".…