About This Site

I have lots of old and antiquarian books, and many of them have got really neat pictures in them even if they are not very valuable or expensive books. I thought it was a shame that no-one but me could see them so I started putting them online.

I also collect old dictionaries, and over the years I've typed (and later scanned) some of the dictionary entries.

I am not a book-seller. I do not buy books to make money by selling them.

The images here are mostly scanned at 1200dpi or higher, often up to 2400dpi; if you would like a high-resolution scan, just ask, either with email or using the Comment link on the page for the image you need. For non-commercial or educational use they are generally free, although a donation would be appreciated. For commercial use, give me an idea of how you will use the image; they are not expensive, but they are also not free.

Some of the images are avilable through Alamy, a stock image site, so that you can get them without waiting for me to reply; they are royalty-free but prices are slightly higher than I charge. There's a link to the Alamy image from each of my Web pages where that's available.

I can also scan images on request. There is usually a $40 scanning fee on top of the price of the image, although you might get a discount if you provide evidence that you're not wearing shoes.

The Search facility uses an XML database called BaseX. Read more about how the search works. Most other pages are static (X)HTML generated by either a perl script mkgallery or using XSLT and/or XQuery.

I use an Epson E10000XL museum-quality flat-bed scanner together with xsane and GIMP on GNU/Linux[tm].

This is a hobby, a private interest site. The good news is that the Google ads and the occasional stock image sale make it pay for itself, I hope without being too obtrusive. But please don't click on the ads just to help me; follow the ads only if they are useful to you. If you want to donate, there's a button on the main page to use paypal, or help the project by scanning images yourself, or by improving the keywords and metadata. Or just enjoy the texts and pictures, and that's fine too!

Contacting Liam

I am liam at fromoldbooks dot org; let me know if you'd like me to scan specific images, or higher resolution copies, or have any interesting uses for these images, or like them. Tell me what colour socks you are wearing. For faster service include a picture of your ankles.

This site is run by a Canadian citizen who lives in Canada; the site is hosted in Canada.