19th Century Small Size Handmade School Slate with Charming Etched Monogram, Stars and Shapes carved handle form backed with a couple of

backed with a couple of pieces of matboard

and here all those straight lines in red and blue

The image itself was created by Rudolf Falb (1838-1903)

and not especially fragile though one wants to take a little care with it

So much more pleasurable to the throw a pair of old handmade bone dice than new plastic ones

19th Century Small Size Handmade School Slate with Charming Etched Monogram, Stars and Shapes carved handle form backed with a couple ofLots of different reasons for falling in love with antique school slates beautiful old mends, carvings into the wood, or, in this case, etchings into the surface of the slate itself. It's a lovely, unusually small, 19th century example to begin with, with wooden pegs at the jointed corners, but it is the work of R. P. T that really sold me, between those dimensional block initials, and cubes for periods, and stars and shapes and flourishes