William Siborne (1797–1849)
History of the war in France and Belgium, in 1815: containing minute details of the battles of Quatre-Bras, Ligny, Wavre, and Waterloo; with remarks upon the Rev. G. R. Gleig’s “Story of Waterloo”
London: T. and W. Boone, 1848
Atlas.2.84.20, sheet VIII
This plan is from a folio of maps and plans issued to accompany William Siborne’s standard work on Waterloo, History of the war in France and Belgium, in 1815, first published in 1844. Each of the four battles depicted in the folio—Quatre Bras, Ligny, Waterloo and Wavre—is shown at two or more times of day, by overprinting the monochrome base sheets with the coloured unit markings: blue for French, red for the British and their allies, and green for Prussian. The sheet reproduced here shows the climax of Waterloo, at five minutes past eight o’clock in the evening.
For a full digitization of the maps and plans published to accompany Siborne’s History of the war in France and Belgium click on ‘Open Digital Library’.
William Siborne (1797–1849)
History of the war in France and Belgium, in 1815: containing minute details of the battles of Quatre-Bras, Ligny, Wavre, and Waterloo; with remarks upon the Rev. G. R. Gleig’s “Story of Waterloo”
London: T. and W. Boone, 1848
Atlas.2.84.20, sheet VIII
This plan is from a folio of maps and plans issued to accompany William Siborne’s standard work on Waterloo, History of the war in France and Belgium, in 1815, first published in 1844. Each of the four battles depicted in the folio—Quatre Bras, Ligny, Waterloo and Wavre—is shown at two or more times of day, by overprinting the monochrome base sheets with the coloured unit markings: blue for French, red for the British and their allies, and green for Prussian. The sheet reproduced here shows the climax of Waterloo, at five minutes past eight o’clock in the evening.
The close-packed contour lines of the plans were produced by means of the ‘anaglyptograph’. Of the engraver, Alfred Robert Freebairn (1794/5–1846), the art historian Sir Lionel Cust wrote in the Dictionary of National Biography that ‘His later work seems to have been entirely confined to the production of engravings by the mechanical process, invented by Mr. John Bate, known as the “Anaglyptograph”. This machine was specially adapted for reproducing in engraving objects with raised surfaces, such as coins, medals, reliefs, &c.’ The objects in this instance were battlefield models prepared by Siborne. At the top of each sheet is an instruction regarding the light source; a note on the plates in volume 1 of the History explains that ‘In examining these anaglyptographic engravings from models of the undulations of the ground represented, it is absolutely necessary that the reader should place the upper margin of the Plate nearest the light. If the upper side be placed furthest from the light, then everything will appear reversed—the heights will become hollows, and the hollows heights. In short, when in the former position, these plates represent the model or relievo; when in the latter, the mould or intaglio.’
