Recently, I came upon an auction that included a lot with an original 1816 Catalogue by William Tassie entitled “Descriptive Catalogue OF A COLLECTION OF DEVICES AND MOTTOS, ENGLISH, FRENCH, AND ITALIAN FROM Engraved Seals, FORMED IN COMPOSITION PASTE, AND SOLD BY WILLIAM TASSIE”

I had read about the existence of this catalogue, but was never able to find a copy online or otherwise. I bid and was lucky enough to win at a reasonable price. (There were several other books in the lot including TWO copies of Gray’s, “James and William Tassie, A Biographical and Critical Sketch”.)

I’ve used the catalogue in research a couple of times already and decided that others may also find it useful. So I scanned and digitized a copy (being as careful as possible not to damage the booklet) and HERE IT IS!

CLICK HERE to access William Tassie’s 1816 Catalogue of Devices and Mottos.

A little over three years ago I wrote about the set of red sulfur coin impressions that I had acquired and what I had discovered.  Link to original post   The evidence indicated that they were by Tassie (James and/or William), but more needed to be done to find additional proof and to track down other companion impressions or sets.  This is an account of my “journey” and of what I have discovered.

• More “proofs” that the double-faced coin impressions were produced by Tassie
• A strong indication that a couple of sets of impressions in the Beazley Archive are by William Tassie
• Tassie (William?) probably did produce gem and coin impressions in plaster as well as other documented media types.

To view the full post Click Here

In 1792, not too long after his 16 year stint in Rome, Nathaniel Marchant published a catalogue listing 100 impressions of gems he had engraved, which together with a set of the impressions, was made available by subscription.  The catalogue listing was by subject or name and short text description having no images included as reference.

Complete original sets of impressions found today (I could only locate 6) are not always organized to reflect the order followed in the listing.  The most informative literature about Marchant and his works, “Nathaniel Marchant, Gem-engraver 1739-1816”, by Gertrud Seidmann, Walpole Society, vol. LIII, 1987, pp. 1-105, while having images of each impression, does not make it easy to relate each catalogue item to its image because the subjects are listed alphabetically interspersed with additional, other, items by the artist.

In order to present each individual item in the catalogue together with its image, a new, reproduction catalogue has been prepared.  Two sample pages are shown below.

This reproduction catalogue can be downloaded as a .pdf file from  THIS LINK

The impressions of engraved gems (and their copies) by Marchant are some of the most recognizable of all of the impressions from the Georgian and Victorian ages.  The hundred included in the catalogue are almost exclusively of classical figures and allegories.  It’s rare today to find a set of Grand Tour era casts that do not include several by or based on engravings of Marchant.

It is hoped that this reproduction catalogue will be useful to all who are interested in Marchant and his works and that it may even generate some new interest in them.

Enjoy.

The following is a brief overview of a post on EngravedGem.com, the sister site to MyIntaglios.com. To go to the blog page CLICK HERE or use the link at the end of this summary post.

The Tassie’s, James (1735-1799) and William (1777-1860), were primarily known for their white enamel, sulfur and paste intaglio gem impressions, but they (primarily William) also produced impressions of ancient coins.  This aspect of their business, which resulted in well over 1,000 impressions, has been rarely reported on and is little known.  In fact, even though images of coin impressions, in general, are plentiful in publications and online, images of coin impressions with source credits are very difficult to find.

The 1820 and 1830 Tassie Catalogs attest to their coin impression production.  In addition, their letters to Alexander Wilson, a bookseller in Glasgow, as presented in THE LETTERS OF JAMES AND WILLIAM TASSIE TO ALEXANDER WILSON 1778 TO 1826 give many details about this work.

Evidence is provided supporting the belief that the red sulfur impressions shown in the accompanying photo are Tassie coin impressions.

To read the full post CLICK HERE.

I have to start doing a better job of surveying upcoming auctions for interesting Intaglios – just missed another.

On October 14, 2021 there were seven lots of various types of intaglios up for bid at Dominic Winter Auctioneers. (Scroll down a little to see and expand each lot). They included some rather unique collections of red sulfur and Original and paste intaglios. They seemed to go at attractive prices; ones which I would have been very interested in. What do you think?

On May 12 & 13, 2021 Dominic Winter Auctioneers, based in the Cotswold Water Park in Gloucestershire (UK)  held an auction entitled “Printed Books, Maps & Documents, Numismatics: The Patricia Milne-Henderson Collection” which included three lots of 19th century plaster intaglio impressions.  As shown below, the prices realized for the impressions were impressive!