1921. Small 8vo, pp. 128; with steel engraved frontispiece depicting Adam and Eve, and numerous small steel-engravings throughout the text, the engravings of the four Evangelists half-page; lightly browned throughout due to paper quality; with presentation inscription on front free endpaper dated 1921; in contemporary blue card wrappers, upper cover with printed floral border and title and imprint, rear cover repeating the frontispiece image of Adam and Eve, head of spine worn, and with small split to upper joint at tail, covers a little soiled and lightly scuffed with loss of lower upper corner, otherwise very good copy. An appealing later edition, still in the original card wrappers, of this popular picture-book for children introducing them to the Scriptures. The earliest hieroglyphic bible, A curious hieroglyphick Bible’, was published by T. Hodgson in 1783 and was to go through some twenty editions by 1812. A new hieroglyphical Bible first appeared in 1794 and was published by G. Thompson. They continued to find a popular audience for nearly a century, printed provincially in Chelmsford, Derby and Manchester, as well as by London publisher’s such as Dean & Munday. In 1859 Milner & Sowerby of London and Halifax (later Milner and Co., Ltd), issued their own cheap reprint, which according to Clouston was in all probability a reproduction of a Manchester edition of that of Dean and Munday which had first appeared in 1841. Bearing the Milner and Co., Ltd imprint, the present copy appears therefore to be a later variant, possibly published sometime between 1874-1883, when they operated at the Paternoster Row address, according to Brown London publishers and printers.
On each page, an isolated verse from either the New or Old Testament is set out, with certain key words replaced with images. For ease of use, a full text version of the passage has been printed at the bottom of each page.
Following the hieroglyphic representations, we find a ‘Life of our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ’, followed by brief biographies and depiction’s of the four Evangelists. The description of Doomsday, together with a rather Dante-like image of the Last Judgement, which concluded previous versions, has been now been omitted.