Page:De Vinne, Invention of Printing (1876).djvu/47

Rh We have some evidences that the old Romans practised, at least experimentally, the art of printing with ink. The British Museum has a stamp with letters engraved in relief, that was found near Rome, and which seems to have been made for the purpose of printing the signature of its owner. The stamp is a brass plate, about two inches long and not quite one inch wide. A brass ring is attached to the back of the plate which may have been used as a socket for the finger, or as a support when it was suspended from a chain or girdle. On the face of the stamp are engraved two lines of capital letters, huddled together in the usual style of all old Roman inscriptions, cut the reverse way, as it would now be done for printing, and enclosed by a border line. An impression taken from this stamp would produce the letters in the accompanying illustration, which may be translated, the signature of Cecilius Hermias. Of Cecilius Hermias we know nothing. He may have been a civic official who used this stamp to exempt himself from the trouble of writing, or a citizen who tried to hide his inability to write.

If this stamp should be impressed in wax, the impression would produce letters sunk below the surface of the wax in a manner that is unlike the impressions of seals. The raised surface on the wax would be rough where it should be flat and smooth. This peculiarity is significant. As this rough field unfitted it for a neat impression on any plastic surface, the stamp should have been used for printing with ink.

The accompanying illustration is that of a brass printing stamp in the British Museum, which is preserved as a specimen of old Roman workmanship. The letters were cut in relief, in reverse order, and with a rough counter or field. This roughness proves that it could not have been used to impress wax.