The Glossary is Pugin's largest and most magnificent book. He intended that his two Dublin Review articles of 1842 would be accompanied by a third dealing with ornament and decoration. However, this developed into a grand survey church ornaments, vessels and vestments which are dealt with alphabetically, including long-forgotten ones he hoped to revive. This masterly survey reveals the extraordinary breadth and depth of Pugin's researches.
Its chief glory lies in 73 superb chromolithographs showing 'correctly' vested clergy and a wide range of patterns for embroidery, monograms and emblems. 'Never - in modern days at least - were illuminations more exquisite, concluded The Ecclesiologist (1844).
Even today, Pugin's Glossary remains a locus classicus for the church furnishing. The edition reproduced is that of 1846, revised and enlarged by the Rev. Bernard Smith. To it has been added an insightful introduction by Michael Fisher, author of the acclaimed 'Gothic Forever' A.W.N. Pugin, Lord Shrewsbury and the Rebuilding of Catholic England.
