Brightly colored prints of biblical scenes. One depicts a scene from the book of Exodus, in which Moses descends from Mt. Sinai with the laws commonly referred to as the “ten commandments.” He is portrayed cautiously making his way down a path, as the Israelites wait below. The other illustrates a dramatic scene of the young David grabbing a lion by the throat with one hand, while preparing to strike it with a club, referring to the verse where David asserts to Saul that he is prepared to fight the Philistines, despite his youth: “But David said to Saul, ‘Your servant used to keep sheep for his father; and whenever a lion or a bear came, and took a lamb from the flock, I went after it and struck it down, rescuing the lamb from its mouth; and if it turned against me, I would catch it by the jaw, strike it down, and kill it…The Lord, who saved me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear, will save me from the hand of this Philistine.’”
The Religious Tract Society was founded in London in 1799 as a charitable society dedicated to publishing affordable books and pamphlets for converting and educating and working classes in Christianity and its values. By the mid 19th century it had become a major publisher of inexpensive non-fiction books (Fyfe 13).
Joseph Martin Kronheim (b. 1810) was a printer and lithographer. Born in Germany, he established himself in London around 1846. His earliest signed book illustrations are found in children’s books published by the Religious Tract Society, London, in the early 1850s. At this time he also became licensed to use the printing process patented by George Baxter, which employed oil-based inks to obtain gradations of unusual luminosity. Kronheim made his own adaptation of the Baxter process, using zinc blocks instead of wood. He also produced plates using standard lithography processes.
Condition: Generally very good with usual toning and wear and very good color.
Brown, Linda W. “Nineteenth Century Rare and Victorian Books for Young People: an Insider’s View of the Lee Library Collection.” 20 March 1997. Lee Library, Brigham Young University. p. 37. http://www.lib.byu.edu/~catalog/catalogwebsite/Lecture%20and%20slide%20presentation.pdf (17 May 2006).
Fyfe, Aileen Kennedy. “Industrialised Conversion: The Religious Tract Society and popular science publishing in Victorian Britain.” National University of Ireland, Galway. pp. 8, 13. http://www.nuigalway.ie/history/fyfe/thesis.html (17 May 2006).
“George Baxter (1804-1867): A Bicentary Exhibition of Prints at the E. J. Pratt Library, Victoria University.” 13 June 2005. E.J. Pratt Library, Victoria University. http://library.vicu.utoronto.ca/exhibitions/baxterexhibit/prints/kronheim.htm (17 May 2006).