The decorative art of embossed book binding was a small but significant facet of the Gothic Revival. Mrs Jamieson studies the social and technological conditions which made possible the mass-production of handsomely bound books and analyses recurrent motifs and styles of binding of a number of books produced in the second quarter of the nineteenth century. She gives detailed bibliographical descriptions of sixty-two bindings, twenty-four of which are illustrated. The plates are reproduced by a fine screen letterpress process from rubbings made by the author.