A practical guide to collecting antique firearms with a method rather than on instinct. The book starts with how to read a piece: maker's marks and proof marks, serial numbers and what they actually tell you, proof testing, and how a barrel and a stock are dated. It explains the difference between ignition systems — matchlock, wheellock, flintlock, percussion — because that is the first thing that places a gun in time and in price. It teaches how to spot reassembled pieces, replaced barrel...

A practical guide to Chinese jade and antiques for people who want a method rather than instinct. The book starts with telling real jade apart: the difference between jadeite and nephrite, the checks you can make without instruments — heft, sound, coolness, hardness — and the ones that genuinely need a laboratory. It explains why colour alone says very little, and what actually drives value: translucency, evenness, absence of fractures, quality of the carving. It covers the treatments the ...

Originally curated by Harvard President Charles W. Eliot as a complete liberal education in fifty volumes, the Harvard Classics gathers philosophy, science, literature, and history into a single indispensable library. Plato's dialogues and Marcus Aurelius's meditations sit alongside Dante's Divine Comedy, Francis Bacon's essays, Charles Darwin's scientific writing, and Benjamin Franklin's autobiography, tracing the foundations of Western thought from ancient Greece to the modern age. Homer...

A practical guide to recognising, valuing and caring for art glass with a method. The book starts from technique — filigrana, lattimo, murrine, sommerso, incalmo, aventurine — because the working of the glass is what reveals the hand of a furnace and the period of a piece. It explains how to examine an object: the pontil mark on the base, the bubbles, the wall thickness, the behaviour of colour and what the metal oxides say, from cobalt blue to iron greens. It teaches how to separate a Ven...

A practical guide to collecting whisky and fine spirits with a method rather than on instinct. The book starts with how to read a bottle: what the label actually claims, bottling codes, fill level, the state of the capsule and cork, and why an original box changes the value. It explains what separates a single malt from a blend, what an age statement and its absence really mean, and how cask type, peating and cask strength affect both taste and price. It teaches how to spot fakes — reprint...

Tobacco pipes reward collectors who learn to read materials, makers, and age. This guide explains how briar grain and density affect both smoking quality and value, how meerschaum acquires its prized patina, and what hallmarks and stampings reveal about a pipe's origin and era. Readers work through grading criteria for bowl condition, stem integrity, and finish, then apply seasoning and storage principles that protect long-term collectibility. Whether you are evaluating a estate-sale find ...

A practical guide for anyone entering the world of antique cartography and period prints with a method. The book explains how to read a sheet: the printing technique, the watermark, the quality of the paper, the plate mark, original colouring as opposed to colour added later. It teaches how to tell a first edition from a late restrike and from a modern reproduction, how to grade condition, and how much folds, restoration and trimmed margins really weigh on value. It covers rarity and how p...

Contents: Compiled and Edited by Charles W. Eliot LL D in 1909, the Harvard Classics is a 51-volume Anthology of classic literature from throughout the history of western civilization. The set is sometimes called "Eliot's Five-Foot Shelf." This e-book is all 51 volumes, the equivalent of over 20,000 printed pages in one e-book. It is fully searchable with a completely linked table of contents. + - All 20 volumes of the 'Harvard Classics Shelf Of Fiction' Each volume is also available separ...

A sweeping journey through the foundations, triumphs, and transformations of British literature. This monumental volume gathers fifty of the most influential and enduring works ever written in the English language. From the heroic epic of Beowulf to the philosophical sublimity of the Romantic poets, from Shakespeare's immortal tragedies to the visionary science fiction of H. G. Wells, this collection traces the evolution of a literary tradition that shaped the modern world. Organized chron...

Enjoy this anthology of Neo-Gothic fiction inspired by the imagination of Edgar Allan Poe.  Winner of the Paris Book Festival Award – Best anthology of the yearNominated for a Bram Stoker Award – Superior Achievement in an Anthology"Make sure your belt is done up good and tight when you read nEvermore!. It's very embarrassing to have your...

Step into the brilliant mind of Sir Thomas More as he imagines a perfect world in Utopia — a timeless exploration of justice, equality, governance, and human dignity. Written in 1516, this foundational philosophical and political work still inspires debate and admiration today. More's masterpiece presents a fictional island society governed by reason, community welfare, and shared values — offering a sharp critique of the corruption, inequality, and moral failings of 16th-century Europe. T...

This edition includes:-Several illustrations from the original work-Extended and up to date introduction-A discussion of the structure of the bookFirst published in 1516, Saint Thomas More's Utopia is one of the most important works of European humanism. Through the voice of the mysterious traveller Raphael Hythloday, More describes a pagan, communist city-state governed by reason. Addressing such issues as religious pluralism, women's rights, state-sponsored education, colonialism...