author
William Andrew Chatto
1799–1864
Best remembered for a landmark history of wood engraving, this 19th-century English writer also published under the pen name Stephen Oliver, Junior. His work ranges from literary and historical studies to practical art history, reflecting a wide curiosity about books, images, and the past.
2 Audiobooks
Facts and Speculations on the Origin and History of Playing Cards
by William Andrew Chatto
A Treatise on Wood Engraving, Historical and Practical
by William Andrew Chatto, Henry G. (Henry George) Bohn, John Jackson
About the author
Born in Newcastle upon Tyne in 1799, William Andrew Chatto was an English writer whose name is most closely linked with A Treatise on Wood Engraving, Historical and Practical (1839), a substantial study illustrated by engraver John Jackson. The book became his best-known work and helped preserve the history of wood engraving for later readers.
Chatto also wrote under the pseudonym Stephen Oliver, Junior. His bibliography shows a broad set of interests, including literature, social history, and visual culture, rather than a single narrow specialty.
He died in 1864. Read today, he stands out as one of those energetic Victorian-era writers who moved comfortably between scholarship and lively general writing.