Can you identify these initials?

The International printing Museum has acquired these initials, and we are trying to find out their origin. They are copper, mounted on wood, about 2” high. (Obviously the 2 additional J’s don’t belong)

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I’ll take a stab at this and opine that you will probably never find the origin of these particular initials. I have never seen anything that even faintly resembles them. They were probably drawn for a specific use and then the cuts that you have were made from those drawings. They are very decorative but leave a lot to be desired as far as individual legability is concerned. It is an extremely long shot that someone might recognize them, but the only way you might find out is to post them at sites like this.

Good luck on getting an ID on them and thanks for sharing. My philosophy has always been that it never hurts to ask.

Rick

“My philosophy has always been that it never hurts to ask.”

Exactly my thinking. And you may be right about their usage, of course. They may be for some specific use, but it would be nice to know what.

They are stamped in the wood to show what letter they are, as you are right with regards to their legibility. I didn’t photograph the blocks themselves though, and so it was quite a challenge to “alphabetize them” later. Some letters I love (Q) some I don’t (H because it’s spacing is off, W because it could have been better.)

I also posted them because I love oddities, and typographic oddities even better, so I wanted to share.