The Great Stone of Sardis
by Frank R. Stockton 1834–1902
The book, and the century it came out of.
The year 2000: an inventor has built a shell that can bore to the centre of the earth, and another man is fitting out a ship to reach the Pole under electric light — and what the drill finds under Sardis is not rock. Stockton was a wood engraver before he wrote The Lady, or the Tiger?, the most argued-over story in American literature; this 1898 romance is his last, and the technology in it is described with an engraver’s patience. Illustrated with 60 full-page plates — paintings by Inness, Leutze and Mount among them.
It was about noon of a day in early summer that a westward-bound Atlantic liner was rapidly nearing the port of New York.
The Great Stone of Sardis, by Frank R. Stockton, complete and unabridged. Spelling and punctuation follow present-day American usage; the sentences, the paragraphs and the voice are the author’s, word for word.
It was written in another era and may carry attitudes a reader today will find dated. They are kept for the sake of the work and do not reflect the views of this house.
- Series
- Science Fiction
- Format
- Ebook
- Extent
- about 176 pages
- Reading time
- about 4 hours
- Illustrations
- Full-page plates, credited
- Text
- Complete, unabridged
- Language
- en
- This edition
- 2026
- ISBN
- 9785501745131
60 paintings are bound into this edition
Six of them are shown here, taken from the volume itself. Each is reproduced full page and named with its painter and year.
A page from this edition
Not a mock-up: this page is taken from the finished volume. The ornament above the chapter belongs to its shelf and to no other, the opening letter is set as a drop capital, and the plate below carries the name of the painter and the year.
Both photographed from the finished volume.
The Great Stone of Sardis, issued in this edition by Aeneas Press in 2026 on the Science Fiction shelf. Newly set, with the ornament of its series above each chapter and a drop capital on the opening page. Illustrated with full-page plates, each named with its painter.
Published as an ebook and not issued in print by this house; it carries one ISBN, 9785501745131, and is supplied worldwide. This edition — its setting, its ornament, its cover art, and the selection and attribution of its plates — © 2026 Aeneas Press.
Questions readers ask
- Is this the whole of The Great Stone of Sardis?
- Yes — complete and unabridged. Nothing is cut, condensed or paraphrased. This is the book, not a summary of it.
- What exactly did you change?
- The spelling and the punctuation follow present-day American usage. Frank R. Stockton's sentences are untouched — same words, same order, same rhythm.
- Are the pictures really in the book?
- Yes. The edition carries full-page plates bound into the text, each one named with its painter and the year it was made. Six of them are shown on this page.
- How long is it?
- About 176 pages, which is roughly about 4 hours of reading.
- What do I actually get?
- An illustrated ebook with its own ISBN, sold worldwide. One file, yours to keep, readable on any device.
