Signa antiqua
Signa antiqua is an engraved plate book of ancient statues, published in Amsterdam in 1700 by Jacob de Wilde, who issued it at his own expense for students of classical sculpture. Its plates show single statues drawn in fine crosshatched line against a plain ground, with Latin verses printed beneath, and a designer could take from them the clean contour drawing, the drapery folds and the plinth-and-pedestal framing used to present sculpture on a blank page.
