The " Panorama of London Circa 1544: No 151 (London Topographical Society publications) - Tapa dura

The Topographical Society of London was founded in 1880. The Society's first publication, issued in 1881-82, was a facsimile of Wyngaerde's Panorama of London, then in the guardianship of the Bodleian Library. It was printed on seven large sheets (31 x23 -inches), each with two drawings, showing North and South of the Thames. Reproduction was by collotype, an expensive but exquisitely faithful process; a single sheet of text accompanied the facsimilie. That reproduction has long been out-of-print, and its vulnerably large sheets were always difficult to handle, so 115 years later, the London Topographical Society in association with the Ashmolean Museum are trying again. In 1880, the fourteen drawings which make up the Panorama were stuck together on a roll; very properly, they have now been separated and mounted individually. They have been reproduced here in book form using the duotone process, each drawing accompanied by a numbered outline and key.

Howard Colvin and Susan Foister