Excerpt from Mezzotinto Engraving It is conceded that Ludwig Von Siegen, who resided at Amsterdam in 1642, dis covered and completed in the month of August of that year, a portrait of Amelia Elizabeth, Dowager L-andgravine of Hesse, in mezzotint, this being the first engraving of the kind known. In 1654 this engraver met Prince Rupert at Brus sels, and to him confided his secret.bwtutp. Ctr. (ruminant) Prince Rupert afterwards disclosed it to Wallerant Vaillant and to Evelyn and Sherwin when he was in England. Theo dore Gaspara F ustenbergh was also an other artist who obtained the knowledge, ior there is a work by him dated the same year as the first one by Prince Rupert The art then passed from one to another, there being engravings by men who flourished during the latter half of the 17th century, among them John Thomas, called Thomas of Ypres (his earliest mezzotint is dated John F redrich Leonard, 1669; John Van Somer, 1668; J. Vander Brugen, 1681. In 1668 Prince Rupert went to England, and nine years afterwards, in the hands of William Sherwin, the development of the new mezzotinto engraving began in the country where it was destined to rise to its highest state. Sherwin's first print is dated 1669. There were a number of en gravers at this period who were success ful in producing good work, the most noted being Place, Cascar, Blootelling, Valck, and J. Smith. At the opening ofthe 18th century J. Smith was the foremost binary, artist in mezzotinto engraving. When m, this style of art had become concentrated in England, artists flocked there from (toutmue'fl) other countries; from France, J. Simon. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.