4,500 objects on 415 plates illustrate the remarkable variety of decorative ironwork from Roman times to the first part of the nineteenth century in this inexpensive Dover edition of all the illustrative material from the 1924 French catalogue of the extensive collection in the Le Secq de Tounelles Museum in Rouen. This pictorial documentation by the French scholar and collector Henry René d'Allemagne is the most valuable source of information now available for scholars, art historians, crafters, dealers, collectors, and those interested in antique ironwork.
The work is divided into two parts. The first part, Architectural Ironwork, includes grilles, locks and padlocks, keys, escutcheons, door knockers, doorknobs, hinges and mountings, handles and pulls, bolts and latches, signs, and brackets. The second part, Small Iron and Steel Objects, includes jewelry, toilet accessories, key rings and handbag frames, small boxes, scissors and sewing accessories, smoking accessories, religious symbols and liturgical objects, sundials, tower and table clocks, bindings, notebook covers, furniture, lighting fixtures, grilles, fireplace accessories, kitchen equipment, and various tools and instruments.
Informative captions include places of origins, materials used for new purposes, characteristics of the objects, and historical facts connected with them. The captions have been translated and supplemented with a new introduction and bibliography of d'Allemagne's work by Vera K. Ostola, Associate Curator of Medieval Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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