Report Of The Committee Of The Society Of Arts, &C. Together With The Approved Communications And Evidence Upon The Same, Relative To The Mode Of Preventing The Forgery Of Band Notes

London: Sold by the Housekeeper at the Society's House in the Adelphi, 1819. First edition. Hardcover. Later, quarter light green cloth and darker green boards. Very good. 72 pages. 25.5 x 16.5 cm. T.C. Hansard's Plan for a Typographic Bank Note; finely engraved plate of a Bank of England £1 note design submitted by Thomas Ransom; an exceptional engraved plate of bank note design elements submitted by R.H. Solly; an engraved folding plate of a printing press for bank notes also submitted by Solly; and 2 finely engraved steel-printed plates of geometric designs submitted by Richard Williamson. A landmark work. In the three or four years preceding publication, "convictions before the criminal courts for the circulation of Forgeries of the Bank of England Note" had risen precipitously, resulting in the "increasing reluctance of Juries to visit with the extreme penalty of the law." The committee's findings, largely penned by Thomas Curson Hansard, had great impact on the course of anti-counterfeiting measures and technology in America as well as Great Britain. Many of the suggestions for technological improvements were in fact derived from American sources. Discussed at some length in Hewitt & Keyworth's 1987 As Good as Gold: 300 Years of British Bank Note Design. GOLDSMITHS. 22503. KRESS C414. McKERCHAR 217. Minor toning and offsetting from plates to text.