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Vintage Pictures, Engravings and Extracts From Old Books

Over 4,200 free images from old, rare, antique and vintage books. High-resolution images for sale.

Poppies and Tiger Lillies

Menu Card 2: Chef

Menu Card 3: Celler Master

11. Seal of Gusion.

Menu Card 4: Waitress

Menu Card 1: Court Jester

Initial Letter I With Art Nouveau Swirls

Decorative clip-art Victorian border, antique green

Venus danced for Apollo

Chapterhead with Boy’s Head

Sacrificial Rites of the Ancient British Druids

Sir Isaac Newton

English Manufacturing

Helen and Paris

Front Cover

53.8.—IHS

Title page, The Defence of Guenevere

That wall of stone

Jesus and Moses

Dark Passion Flowers

145.—Leading a Horse

Foliated initial capital letter S, coloured

Oval frame, scalloped

Armillary Sphere, Scanned Version

Tailpiece with peacock

Front Cover With Alice

Foliated Initial Letter S

Historiated decorative initial capital letter M in Blue

Tailpiece of hunting paraphernalia

Convolvulus Tricolor

70.—Border of cherubs climbing in trees

clipart: initial letter S from late 15th century printed book

Classical full-page border with goddess

Simon de Montfort: Knight on his Horse

Buckingham Palace

Full-page border with hearts and moons

Heralds’ College

Indian Civet, Fossa, Genet

The old tollbooth in Canongate, Edinburgh

Floriated initial capital letter “S”

The Cow Doctor

Vintage endpaper border with flowering vine

Gold endpaper

Free clip-art: Victorian border of twigs and leaves

Mephistophiles

Faust, detail from title page

The Magical Circle of King Solomon

Faust

Frontispiece: A bride’s dream

On the Terrace

Scrollwork Border from page 227

Usk Bridge

Usk Bridge, Monmouth, Coloured from aon old painting

733.—Oxford Cathedral.

Names of Angels and Days (overview)

Mount Edgcombe

Our Father Who Art In Heaven

clipart: initial letter O from late 15th century printed book

2.—Stonehenge. – Restored Plan.

clipart: initial letter P from late 15th century printed book

Fig 36. — A staircase of the catacombs

Fig. 37. — Tunnel in the Catacombs of Rome

Portrait of King Henry the Eighth

One Bay of the “Angel Choir,” Interior, Lincoln Cathedral

Initial letter I with Transitional Capital

Title Page

Decorative clip-art Victorian border, Black and White

Portrait of Ebeneezer Sibly, M.D>, F.R.H.S.

The white horse carried the earth king’s son and the princess over the sea

Front Cover

Clip-art: calligraphic decorative initial capital letter R from XIV. Century No. 1

Her mirror was the smooth water of the tide pool

Front Cover

Franciscan Monk Going Down Staircase

The Virgin Mary

God and my Divine Right: Royal Crest

Endpaper: gold leaf with central British royal coat of arms

An Egyptian Priest and Scribe

Free clip-art: Eighteenth-century Border from Figures pour les Missels

An Owl in the Pope’s Council

Wooden Church, Greenstead, Essex, A.D. 1013 (as it was in 1748)

A Display of Manuscripts on Reading Desks.

Decorative clip-art Victorian border, antique brown

Title Page

Summary of the Law, in gold

A genteel wheelchair in Paris

Clip-art: calligraphic decorative initial capital letter B from XIV. Century No. 1

Cherub with grin and cloven hoofs

Front Cover, Art of Decorative Design

Fig. 86.—Curves.

Clip-art: calligraphic decorative initial capital letter N from XIV. Century No. 1

Plate XXIV.—Knowledge Is Power

Plate XVIII.—Stylized Chinese Dragon

Plate XIV—Chinese Dragon

Free clip-art: Victorian border of brown twigs and green leaves

Title Page

And then began a murder, grim and great

Gibeon

Decorative initial (drop cap) D

Cupid with a Butterfly

December Night (Dezembernacht)

The Irmin Column in the Cathedral of Hildesheim

Purple Victorian Vine-leaf Border

Taymouth Castle

Rustic postcard border of interleaved twigs and vines

Old Bologna (1850s)

Clip-art: calligraphic decorative initial capital letter D from XIV. Century No. 1

Isaak Newton [Portrait of Sir Isaac Newton]

Battle in the Sacred Linden Groves

Initial letter V with a mermaid

Knight, Death and the Devil (1513)

Front Cover, Bohemia Part Two

Title Page, Bohemia Part Two

Battle of Knights

Early Victorian Border from Book Cover

Full-page border of repeated vine leaves

Votivkirche, Vienna

Avenue of Sighs

[Ancient] Greek Marble Mosaics 1: Olympia

Christmas Still Life

The Seranade

A schoolroom in Tunisia

Victorian vine-leaf page border

Llanthony Priory, Valley of the Honddu

The giants tore up trees

Visit the full list of Recently added images and of the most popular images.

Vintage Borders and Initials

Decorative Initials and Drop Caps: A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T Th U V W X Y Z
See all initials, or all alphabets, or the Decorative borders and frames

Quirky Old-Time Holiday Images

Curious Old Texts, Slang and Dictionaries

A Provincial Dictionary by Francis Grose (1790); 66 regional proverbs.
Dictionary of Phrase and Fable by E. Cobham Brewer (1894); over 17,000 entries! New 2008-02-15.
Smiley's Recipe and Housekeeping Guide, historical recipes transcribed and annotated by CatamountClyde Studios.
Canting Dictionary by Nathan Bailey (1736), a dictionary of the slang of the underworld, of thieves, gypsies and vagrants. Text complete
Dictionary of the Canting Tongue by Francis Grose (1811)
Musa Pedestris: Three Centuries of Canting Songs and Slang Rhymes [1536-1896] edited by John S. Farmer, 1896.
The Nuttall Encyclpædia, by the Rev. James Wood (1907) (over 14,000 entries)
Oratio Dominica, or, The Lord’s Prayer in over a hundred Languages, Versions and Characters (Scripts) by Dan Brown (1713). I have scanned every page, and also an insert folded in the back, so this book is complete.
Dictionary of Proverbs by Nathan Bailey, 1721. The whole book in text and images (complete)
The Grammar of Heraldry, by Samuel Kent 1718. I have typed the first chapter on how to Blazon, etc., and will do more if requested.
Universal Etymological English Dictionary, edited by Nathan Bailey, 1736. A little under 500 entries, but very incomplete; this is a transcription I started in 1991. It is a different book than the dictionary containing the Canting Dictionary.
The Itinerary of John Leland the Antiquary edited by Thomas Hearne, 1745. 122 page images including cover and title page; I have started to transcribe names that appear in the text.
More wonderful old texts at words.fromoldbooks.org

The Pictures: Woodcuts, Engravings & Clip art

Pictures of Old Books