Does a primary or scholarly source confirm Lepsius as a founding practitioner of the epigraphic squeeze, and pin the size of his Egypt-expedition squeeze/cast corpus?

claim-lepsius-founding-practitioner-of-the-squeeze-method rests on the Tier 4 Wikipedia "Squeeze paper" article for the technique definition, and on secondary sources not directly quoted in the capture for the attribution of a founding role to Lepsius. The much-cited corpus size (~6,000 squeezes from the 1842–45 Prussian expedition to Egypt) is [unverified-quant — search-synthesized, no primary]: a specific count, which the sourcing floor requires to clear Tier 1–2.

What would answer it.

• A scholarly history of epigraphic/archaeological method (or a museum/archive catalog of the Lepsius squeeze collection, e.g. holdings tied to the Denkmäler aus Aegypten und Aethiopien) that (a) credits Lepsius among the founders/early large-scale users of the squeeze-and-cast technique and (b) states an actual count of surviving squeezes or casts.
• Failing a count, an authoritative statement that the corpus was "large" or the largest of its era, which would let the note keep the qualitative claim and drop the unverified number outright.

Why it matters beyond the one note. The founding-practitioner fact is what makes the capture's cross-domain bridge real — the same person behind the Standard Alphabet also helped establish a physical text-reproduction technology. If the founding role turns out to be overstated (Lepsius as prolific user rather than originator, with the technique predating him), the bridge weakens and the note needs rewording. Philippe Le Bas's parallel 1843 Greek squeeze corpus (a French-institution mirror, noted in the capture's further leads) is a useful cross-check on who actually originated the method.