CP Baudelaire wrote:
I know this is a shot in the dark, but---

Anyone have any idea what book this frontispiece may be from:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...ade/skels1.jpg

--or can anyone recommend a good place to ask? I'm looking to find an
original or at least a 300 dpi high res scan of the image.

Thanks so much for your time!

Brian

Dallas, TX

Dear Brian,

It doesn't look so much like a frontispiece as it does like a vignette.
Possibly as TP vignette or a vignette on the last page of the book. I
am not familiar with it, though.

I do see something which looks like initials in the lowest form. That
might help you to identify the thing, with the name of the draftsman or
engraver.

Actually, there is a lot of good information buried on the plates in
books, and not referred to by many librarians or bibliographers. One of
the reasons I like the AAS[MWA] catalog so much is that they almost
always list the draftsman and the printmaker, as well as the names of
all the craftsmen involved in a book including the printer and
stereotyper. That gives their descriptions a lot of currency. They also
will mention the changing address of any of these as an aid to
establishing the issue or date of publication.

Some of their dating feels almost miraculous, since it is based on the
dates at which various titles advertised in a book were published,
working from catalogs of the publisher involved. This enables them to
work out a date of publication very precisely, even without a date or a
copyright date in the book.
Sincerely,
Annibale