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HOLD THE PRESS!

8. Facsimile Printing Plates and the Published Book of Abraham (1842 ed.)
The drawing plates that appear in our present Book of Abraham were produced by one of Joseph Smith’s associates, Reuben Hedlock. Hedlock carefully carved “woodcuts” that is, a flat block of wood with the image of an Egyptian vignette carved in its surface and then used as a mold for a lead copy.

This is the closest I’ll ever get to the original of facsimile no. 2.

?

Is he saying that there was a flat block of wood with the original vignette carved into it and it was cast over with lead to make the printing block?

I'm confused. What the hell? Will someone please explain this damned thing to me. Jesus.

Shulem wrote:I'm confused. What the hell? Will someone please explain this ____ thing to me. Jesus.

Is this a misdirection tactic to move credit for the chiseling out of Joseph’s hand?

Dr Moore wrote:

Shulem wrote:I'm confused. What the hell? Will someone please explain this ____ thing to me. Jesus.

Is this a misdirection tactic to move credit for the chiseling out of Joseph’s hand?

I don't know. I figured the only wood block involved was a wood block in which a lead plate having the original carving -- was fastened thereto by screws. I figured the carving was in lead not wood. But from the above it seems to suggest that the carving was in wood and that lead was the medium poured into it to make a printers block. But really, I don't know the facts because the facts remain hidden, compliments of the church and it's long history of hiding the facts.

I would think Brian Hauglid knows the basic mechanics of how the printers block was formed and fitted. I also think that Brian Hauglid has a opinion about the snout that was removed from the lead plate. I wonder how he's processing that new information. It threw a wrench into his mix.

The Wikipedia article on woodcut seems to say that the image was carved in wood and the carved wood block itself was then rolled with ink and used to print. Lead moulds aren't mentioned at all in the article. And I don't see why they would be.

Lead is used for type because to print a book you need a whole lot of A's and E's and S's, each of them all the same. So you don't want to hand-carve hundreds of each letter. You make one mould for each letter and pour hundreds of copies in lead. The only reason I know for using lead is that it's a metal with a low melting point, so you can mass produce durable type pieces by pouring. I don't believe lead has any special affinity for ink or paper or anything like that.

You don't normally print more than one copy of the same picture in a single book, so one printing form of the picture is all you need. There's no point in making a mould and pouring lead into it just so that your single printing block can be made of lead instead of wood. Wood works fine.

The only reason I can think of to make lead copies of this particular woodcut is just to create multiple replicas of the woodcut itself as a historical artifact, to show in museums or for scholars to study. Today one might instead scan the woodcut to record its precise 3D shape and then make plastic replicas by 3D printing.

Physics Guy wrote:The Wikipedia article on woodcut seems to say that the image was carved in wood and the carved wood block itself was then rolled with ink and used to print. Lead moulds aren't mentioned at all in the article. And I don't see why they would be.

Lead is used for type because to print a book you need a whole lot of A's and E's and S's, each of them all the same. So you don't want to hand-carve hundreds of each letter. You make one mould for each letter and pour hundreds of copies in lead. The only reason I know for using lead is that it's a metal with a low melting point, so you can mass produce durable type pieces by pouring. I don't believe lead has any special affinity for ink or paper or anything like that.

You don't normally print more than one copy of the same picture in a single book, so one printing form of the picture is all you need. There's no point in making a mould and pouring lead into it just so that your single printing block can be made of lead instead of wood. Wood works fine.

The only reason I can think of to make lead copies of this particular woodcut is just to create multiple replicas of the woodcut itself as a historical artifact, to show in museums or for scholars to study. Today one might instead scan the woodcut to record its precise 3D shape and then make plastic replicas by 3D printing.

thanks for that

Facsimile Printing Plates

Have you looked at the plates of all three Facsimiles closely? Click the link above and you can scroll to all three Facsimile plates. Clearly they are made of lead.

I'm wondering if there are actual wood carved plates somewhere in the church vault? Is there more to this story? The reason I ask is because I would want to examine the Facsimile No. 3 wood cut and see if Anubis has a nose.

I confess that the printing process is over my head and has been a learning experience trying to figure this out.

Where the hell is philo when you need him?

So, my neighbor found this metal detecting in his yard (he's a character):






Hey, Shulem. We need your expertise! What does this look like to you? I should note our neighborhood is an old one and we live minutes from temple square, so it wouldn't be too wild to find an early Mormon artifact at what was an old homestead.

- Doc

I'm not Shulem but I am an expert in this sort of thing. You won't believe this, but it is another ancient depiction of King Pharoah, cast by Abraham himself! There are many more marvelous secrets depicted on this plate. Tell your neighbor that I will reveal more to him soon. Also, are his wife and/or daughters pretty?

It looks like the dude is up to no good.

Notice on top of the round wooden table there are a couple of bottles of wine, one of which is tilting on the other. A half filled wine glass to the right sits on the table. Perhaps there is a stack of Playboy magazines all in disarray?

Thanks for keeping this thread alive. The Mormons are going to pay for what they've done to Anubis and for continuously slandering the ancient Egyptian religion. Once it's shown and understood that Anubis's snout really was hacked off to suit Joseph Smith's own purposes there will be a shift in Book of Abraham apologetics and new pressure to get rid of the Facsimiles.