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X

FRONTISPIECE TO BREYDENBACH'S PEREGRINATIO. MENTZ, 1466.

Early
Illustrated Books

A History of the Decoration and

Illustration of Books in the

15th and 1 6th Centuries

By Alfred W. Pollard

London
Kegan Paul, Trench, Triibner & Co., Ltd.

MDCCCXCIII

■^7
'13

Ediobursh : T. and A. Constablf, Printers to Her Majesty

Preface

As originally announced, the title of the present
volume was to have been The Decoration of Books.
The change of name has been made partly because
it proved impossible within my limits to include, as
I had hoped, the French livres a vignettes of the last
century ; partly because the title originally chosen
suggested an encroachment on the forthcoming volume
on Bookbindings by my friend Mr. Home.

The object of the original title was to emphasise
not only my abstention from dny attempt to write
a new history of wood-engraving, but also the possi-
bility that a book may be very profusely and even
very judiciously illustrated without being much the
better for it decoratively. Though I have taken all
possible pains to avoid ugliness, the present volume
itself affords a sufficient example of the distinction
which I wish to suggest. The pictures in it have
been chosen as illustrations of the books of the past,
not as a means of making my own book beautiful,
and some of them are out of harmony with the size
of the pages and the character of the types here used.

vi Preface

In a handbook like the present this is a necessary
evil, but the evil is equally conspicuous in a great
number of modern books in which the illustrations are
introduced solely for their decorative value. In this
matter we have much to learn from the old printers,
in whose books paper, type, illustrations, initial letters,
and borders were all so planned as to form a har-
monious whole — a point to which I have endeavoured
to draw attention in several places in my text.

Short as the present book is, I have incurred many
obligations in writing it. My chief literary debts are
to the monographs of Dr. Muther, Dr. Lippmann,
the Vicomte Delaborde, the Due de Rivoli, and Mr.
Conway, to which specific references are made in the
chapters for which they have been used. In attempt-
ing, I believe for the first time, to compress in a
small compass a general view of the history of book
illustration during the golden age of printing, I am
not ashamed to confess that my book is deeply
indebted to the works of these specialists, who often
have devoted a lifetime to a subject to which I
could give only a few pages. But I have missed
no opportunity of examining for myself every book
which I mention, and as the British Museum, despite
a few gaps in its collection, is splendidly rich in
illustrated books, I have been obliged to write at
second-hand only in a very few cases.

Preface vii

Of more personal debts the heaviest is that which
I owe to Mr. E. Gordon Duff, who has helped me
on many points connected with early printing, and
when illness in my family made it impossible for
me to complete my book without a very serious
delay, most generously came to my rescue by writing
for me the chapter on English illustrated books, a
special subject on which his knowledge so greatly
exceeds my own that I can very heartily congratu-
late my readers on the change of pen.

I am also indebted to Mr. Fairfax Murray and Mr.
William Morris for showing me their collections, to
Mr. Weale and his able assistant, Mr. Palmer, for
help given at the National Art Library, whose ex-
cellent arrangement and catalogues make its books
trebly useful, and to Dr. Kristeller of Berlin, not
only for the use of his published monographs and
for private information, but for the loan of seven of
the blocks from his forthcoming work on the Devices
of the Italian Printers. Five other illustrations are
from blocks previously used in my own History of
the Title-Page. All the rest are new, and not the
least of my obligations is to Mr. James Hyatt, of
47 Great Russell Street, for the pains he has taken
in reproducing them.

ALFRED W. POLLARD.

Contents

PAGE

CHAPTER I

RUBRISHERS AND ILLUMINATORS, I

CHAPTER II
The Completion of the Printed Book, ... 23

CHAPTER III
Germany—!., 39

CHAPTER IV
Germany— II., 59

CHAPTER V
Italy— 1 82

CHAPTER VI
Italy— II., in

CHAPTER VII
France, 145

CHAPTER VIII

The French Books of Hours, 178

X Contents

CHAPTER IX

PAGE

Holland, 200

CHAPTER X
Spain, 213

CHAPTER XI
England, 223

Index 251

Illustrations

Frontispiece to Breydenbach's ' Peregrinatio,'
Mentz, i486. Fol. (loj in. X85),* . . Frontispiece

PLATE PAGE

I. Part of Border from the 'Calendar' of Regio-

MONTANUS, 20

Ratdolt, Venice, 1476. Fol,

11. Part of Border from ' La Trabisonda Historiata,' 20
Venice, 1494. 4to.

III. Colophon from Schoeffer's Bible, .... 25

Mentz, 1462. Fol.

IV. The Sacrifice at Bethulia, from the 'Buck der

VIER HiSTORlEN,' 29

Pfister, Bamberg, 1462. 4to. {^\ x 3)

V. The First Printed Title-Page, 32

A. ther Hoernen, Cologne, 1470. 410.

VI, Initial from Ptolemy's ' Cosmographia,' ... 38
L. Holl, Ulm, 1482. Fol.

VII. Card-Players, from Ingold's 'GuLDiN Spiel,' . . 42
G. Zainer, Augsburg, 1472. Fol.

* These sizes, given where the illustrations have been reduced, show the size of
the printed page, without reckoning any margin, or of the original cut.

xii Illustrations

PLATE lACE

vin. Device of the Zainers. (From a tracing), 43

IX. The Death of Sophomsba, from Boccaccio's 'De

Claris Mulieribus,' 51

J. Zainer, Ulm, 1473. Fol. {j\ x 4)

X. King Log and King Stork, from Steinhowel's

•^sop,' 52

A. Sorg, Augsburg, c. 1480. Fol. (8^x4^)

XI. Scene FROM THE 'EuNUCHUs' OF Terence, 54

C. Dinkmuth, Ulm, i486. Fol. (7^x4!)

XII. Saracens, from Breydenbach's ' Peregrinatio,' . 61
Mentz, i486. Fol. (3J x 4I)

XIII. Portrait of Noah, from Schedel's 'Chronicle,'. 65

Koburger, Nuremberg, 1493. Fol.

XIV. TheSickFool, from Brandt's 'StultiferaNavis,' 69

Basle, 1497. 4to.

XV. Border attributed to Lucas Cranacii, 78

Wittemberg, 1521. 410.

XVI. The Flight into Egypt, from Turrecremata's

'Meditationes,' 84

U. Hahn, Rome, 1473. Fol. (9x6*)

XVII. Mercury on his Car, from the 'Poeticon Astro-

NOMICON ' OF HyGINUS, 92

Ratdolt, Venice, 1482. 4(0. (4|x3|)

xviii. The Mocking of Christ, from the 1508 Reprint

OF S. Bonaventura's 'Deuote Meditatione,' . 95
Venice, 1489. 410. (5 x 4, part of a page 6| x 4)

Illustrations xiii

PLATE PAGE

XIX. Title-Page OF THE 'FiOR Di Virtu,' ... 97
M. Codecha, Venice, 1493. 4to. (6| X4^)

XX. PoLiFiLO Resting, from the ' Hypnerotomachia,' 105
Aldus, Venice, 1499. Fol. (8^ x 5)

XXI. Title-Page of a ' Missale Romanum,' . . 108

Giunta, Venice, 1509. 410.(6x4!)

xxii. An Author at Work, from the 'Epistole' of

PuLci, no

Florence, c. 1495. 4to.

xxiii. Title-Page of Savonarola's 'Della oratione

MENTALE,' II4

Florence, c. 1495. 4to.
XXIV. Savonarola and the Nuns, from the ' Libro

DELLA UITA UIDUALE,' II8

Florence, c. 1495. 4^o-

XXV. The Taverner, from the ' Giuocho delli Scacchi,' 121
A. Mischomini, Florence, 1493. 4to. (6|x4)

XXVI. Half-Page FROM the 'FiOR DI Virtu,' . . 123

Florence, 1498. 4to.

XXVI 1. Title-Page of Lorenzo de' Medici's ' Rapresenta-

tione di SAN GiouANNi «S: Paulo,' . . 127

Florence, s.a. 410.

XXVIII. Martyrdom of S. Dorothea, from her 'Rappre-

sentatione,' 131

Florence, 1555. 4to.

XXIX. First Page of ' El contrasto di Carnesciale e la "

quaresima,' 133

Florence, c. 1500. 410. (6:Jx4i)

xiv Illustrations

PLATE PAGE

XXX. Device of Bazalerius de Bazaleriis, . 137

XXXI. Device of Stephanos Guillireti,
xxxii. Device of Franciscus de Mazalts,

xxxiii. Device of Nicolaus Gorgonzola, .

xxxiv. Device of Simon Bivilaqua, .
XXXV. Device of Niccolo Zoppino, .

xxxvi. Device of Hieronymus Baldassaris,

138
139
140
141
142
143

xxxvii. First Page of Bonnor's 'Arbre des Batailles,

showing device of the printer, Jehan Du Pre, . . 144

xxxviii. Entry into a Captured town, from • Josephus,' 153
Verard, Paris, 1492. Fol. (12^x9)

xxxix. Initial L used by V£rard, 156

XL. Initial L USED BY Maillet, 157

XLi. An Invocation of the B. Virgin, from the • Art

DE BIEN VIVRE,' l6l

Verard, Paris, 1492. Fol.

XLii. Death at the Printer's and Bookseller's, from

a ' Danse Macabre,' 164

Lyons, 1499. Fol. (9^ x 7)

xLiii. Device OF AntoineCaillaut, . . .168

XLiv. The Recall of Absalom, from Holbein's ' His-

toriarum veteris Testamenti icones,' . .174
Trechsel, Lyons, 1538. 8vo.

Illustrations xv

PLATE PAGE

XLV. 'Les trois Vifs et les trois Morts,' from a

'HOR^,' 187

J, Du Pre, Paris, c. 1490. 8vo. (4^ x 3^)

XLVi, The Annunciation to the Shepherds, from a

' HoR^,' 189

Verard, Paris, c. 1490. 4to. (7f X5)

XLvii. Dives and Lazarus, from a ' Hor^e,' . . .193
Pigouchet, Paris, 1498. 8vo. (6i x 4^)

XLViii. The Tree of Jesse, from a ' Hor^e ad usum

Sarum,' 194

Pigouchet, Paris, c. 1495. ^^o-

xLix. The Adoration by the Magi, from a • Hor^,' . 198
G. Tory, Paris, 1525. 8vo. (6^x3^)

L. The Summoning of Christ, from ' Der Sonderen

Troest,' . . . . ' . . . . 205
Bellaert, Haarlem, 1484. Fol. (7^ x 4I)

LI. Device OF Jacob Bellaert (7^x4!), . . . 210

Lii. Beginning of the Romance of 'Tirant lo

Blanch,' 212

Valentia, 1490. Fol. (11x8)

Lin. Initial L, from A 'CoriLACiON de Leyes,' . . 217
A. Centenera, Zamora, c. 1485. Fol.

Liv. Title-Page of Diego de San Pedro's 'Carcer

d'Amor,' 219

Barcelona, 1493. 4to.

xvi Illustrations

PLATE PAGE

Lv. The Canon's Yeoman, from Chaucer's * Can i er-

BURY Tales,' 222

Caxlon, Westminster, c. 1484. Fol. (7J x 5)

i.vi. The Death of Manlius, from Lydgate's ' Fali.e

OF PrINCIS,' 231

Pynson, London, 1494. Fol. (4^ x \\)

i.vii. Title-Page of Elyot's ' Image of Governance,' . 241
Berthelet, London, 1540-41. 4to.

i.viii. Christ casting out a Devil, by Holbein, from

Cranmer's 'Catechism,' 246

W. Lynne, London, 1548. 8vo.

EARLY ILLUSTRATED BOOKS.

CHAPTER I.

RUBRISHERS AND ILLUMINATORS.

No point in the history of printing has been more
frequently insisted on than the perfection to which
the art attained at the very moment of its birth.
Nor is this insistence unwarranted. The great
double-columned Bible, with forty-two lines to a
column, completed at Mentz some time before
August 1456, may or may not be absolutely the first
printed book. For our present purpose it is sufficient
to remember that it was undoubtedly the first im-
portant work for whose production ample funds were
available, and that, as a piece of printing, it has never
been surpassed. For nearly a generation this high
standard of excellence was almost universally main-
tained among the German printers, who so quickly
found their way over the greater part of Europe.
In whatever country, or with whatever types, they
established their presses, their work is distinguished

A

Early Illustrated Books

by a sharpness and brilliancy of impression to
which few of their craft have attained in modern
times.

The reason of this technical excellence is as trite
as the fact itself The early printers were compelled
to make the very utmost of their new art in order to
justify its right to exist. When a generation had
passed by, when the scribes trained in the first half
of the century had died or given up the struggle,
when printing-presses had invaded the very mon-
asteries themselves, and clever boys no longer
regarded penmanship as a possible profession, then,
but not till then, printers could afford to be careless,
and speedily began to avail themselves of their new
licence. In the early days of the art no such licence
was possible, and the striking similarity in the appear-
ance of the printed books and manuscripts produced
contemporaneously in any given city or district, is
the best possible proof of the success with which the
early printers competed with the most expert of the
professional scribes.

All this, as we have said, is trite enough, but we are
somewhat less frequently reminded that, after some
magnificent experiments by Fust and Schoeffer at
Mentz, the earliest printers deliberately elected to do
battle at first with the scribes alone, and that in the
fifteenth century the scribes were very far, indeed,
from being the only persons engaged in the produc-
tion of books. The subdivision of labour is not by
any means a modern invention ; on the contrary, it

Rubrishers and Illuminators

is impossible to read a list of the mediaeval guilds in
any important town without being struck with the
minuteness of the sections into which some ap-
parently quite simple callings were split up. Of this
subdivision of labour, the complex art of book-
production was naturally an instance. For a proof
of this, we need go no further than the records of the
Guild of St. John the Evangelist at Bruges, in which,
according to Mr. Blades's quotation of the extracts
made by Van Praet, members of at least fourteen
branches of industry connected with the manufacture
of books joined together for common objects. In the
fifteenth century a book of devotions, commissioned
by some wealthy book-lover, such as the Duke of
Bedford, might be written by one man, have its
rubrics supplied by another, its small initial letters
and borders by a third, and then be sent to some
famous miniaturist in France or Flanders for final
completion. The scribe only supplied the ground-
work, all the rest was added by other hands, and it
was only with the scribe that the early printers
competed.

The restriction of their efforts to competition with
the scribe alone, was not accepted by the first little
group of printers until after some fairly exhaustive
experiments. The interesting trial leaves, preserved
in some copies of the 42-line Bible, differ from the rest
not only in having their text compressed into two lines
less, but also in having the rubrics printed instead of
filled in by hand. Printing in two colours still involves

Early Illustrated Books

much extra labour, and it was easier to supply the
rubric by hand than to be at the pains of a second im-
pression, even if this could be effected by the compara-
tively simple process of stamping. Except, therefore,
in the trial leaves, the rubrics of the first Bible are all
in manuscript. Peter Schoeffer, however, before he
took to the new art, had himself been a * clericus,'
or copyist, and when he joined with the goldsmith
Fust in the production of the magnificent Mentz
Psalter of 1457, he was not content to rely on the
help of his former colleagues for his rubrics and
capitals, or, as the disuse of the word majuscules
compels us to call them, initial letters. Accord-
ingly, the Psalter appeared not only with printed
rubrics, but with the magnificent B at the head of
the first psalm, which has so often been copied, and
some two hundred and eighty smaller initials, printed
in blue and red.

Schoeffer's experiment belongs essentially to the
story of the invention of printing : in a study of
the decoration of books, inasmuch as it was not
followed up by other printers, it remains a splendid
experiment and nothing more. An account of the
various theories as to the manner in which the initial
letters were coloured, has, therefore, been given by Mr.
Gordon Duff in his volume on Early Printed Books
in the present series, and to this the reader may be
referred. For our purpose, it is sufficient to mention
that these initial letters appear again (i) in the
Psalter of 1459, and in the four antiquarian reprints

Rubrishers and Illuminators

of it between 1490 and 1516; (2) in two editions of
the Canon of the Mass attributed by Mr. Duff to 1458 ;
(3) in the Rationale Durandi, 1459 ; (4) in a 35-line
Donatus printed about 1460 ; (5) in a Donatzis printed
in the type of the 1462 Bible. Mr. Duff also notices
that in some sheets of this Bible itself, the red initial
letters are printed and the outline of the blue ones
impressed in blank for the guidance of the illuminator
in filling them in. Doubtless Schoeffer was sorry that
he could no longer print in the colophon of a book
that it was ' venustate capitalium decoratus, rubrica-
tionibusque sufficienter distinctus,' but while illumi-
nators were still plentiful, handwork was probably
the least expensive process of decoration. It is
noteworthy, also, that Mr. Duff's discovery as regards
the 1462 Bible brings us down to the beginning of
those troublous three years in the history of Mentz,
during which Schoeffer only printed ' Bulls and other
such ephemeral publications.' When he resumed the
printing of important works in 1465 with the Decreta/s
of Boniface vill. and the De Officiis of Cicero, he was
content to leave the decoration of his books to the
illuminator. His own expenses were thus diminished,
and his purchasers were able to economise in the
amount of decoration bestowed upon the copy they
were buying. It is noteworthy, indeed, that even in
1459, when he was habitually using his printed initial
letters, Schoeffer did not refuse his customers this
liberty, for while one of the copies of the Rationale
Durandi at the Bibliotheque Nationale has the

Early Illustrated Books

initials printed, in the others they are illuminated by
hand.

Very little attention has as yet been devoted to the
study of the illumination and rubrication of printed
books, and much patient investigation will be needed
before we can attain any real knowledge of the relation
of the illuminators to the early printers. Professor
Middleton, in his work on Illuminated Manuscripts,
has something to say on the subject, but the pretty
little picture he draws of a scene in Gutenberg's (?)
shop seems to have been rather hastily arrived at.
* The workshop,' he tells us, * of an early printer
included not only compositors and printers, but also
cutters and founders of type, illuminators of borders
and initials, and skilful binders, who could cover books
with various qualities and kinds of binding. A pur-
chaser in Gutenberg's shop, for example, of his
magnificent Bible in loose sheets, would then have
been asked what style of illumination he was prepared
to pay for, and then what kind of binding, and how
many brass bosses and clasps he wished to have.'
What evidence there is on the subject hardly favours
the theory which Professor Middleton thus boldly
states as a fact. The names we know in connection
with the decoration of the 42-line Bible are those of
Heinrich Cremer, vicar of the Church of St. Stephen
at Mentz, who rubricated, illuminated, and bound the
paper copy now in the Bibliotheque Nationale, and
Johann Fogel, a well-known binder of the time, whose
stamps are found on no less than three of the extant

Rubrishers and Illumiyiators

copies of this Bible. We have no reason to believe
that either Cremer or Fogel was employed in the
printer's shop, so that as regards the particular book
which he instances, it is hard to see on what ground
Professor Middleton builds his assertion.

As regards Schoeffer's practice after 1462, the evi-
dence certainly points to the great majority, if not
all, of his books having been rubricated before they
left his hands, but the variety of the styles in the
copies I have seen, especially in those on vellum,
forbids my believing that they were all illuminated in
a single workshop. A copy in the British Museum
of his 147 1 edition of the Constitutions of Pope
Clement V. presents us with an instance, rather
uncommon in a printed book, though not unfre-
quently found in manuscripts, of an elaborate border
and miniatures, sketched out in pencil and prepared
for gilding, but never completed. The book could
hardly have been sold in this condition, and would
not have been returned so from any illuminator's
workshop. We must conjecture that it was sold
unilluminated to some monastery, where its decora-
tion was begun by one of the monks, but put aside
for some cause, and never finished.

The utmost on this subject that we can say at pre-
sent is that as a printer would depend for the sale of
his books in the first place on the inhabitants of the
town in which he printed, and as these would be most
likely to employ an illuminator from the same place,
the predominant style of decoration in any book is

8 Early Illustrated Books

likely to be that of the district in which it was
printed ; and if we find the same style predominant
in a number of books this may give us a clew to
connect them all together, or to distinguish them from
some other group. In this way, for instance, it is
possible that some light may be thrown on the
question whether the 36-line Bible was finished at
Bamberg or at Mentz. Certainly the clumsy, heavy
initials in the British Museum copy are very unlike
those which occur in Mentz books, and if this style
were found to predominate in other copies we should
have an important piece of new evidence on a much
debated question. But our knowledge that Schoeffer
had an agency for the sale of his books as far off
from the place of their printing as Paris,^ and the
occurrence of a note in a book printed in Italy that
the purchaser could not wait to have it illuminated
there, but intrusted it to a German artist on his re-
turn home, may suffice to warn us against any rash
conclusion in the present very meagre state of our
knowledge.

Apart from the question as to where they were
executed, the illuminations in books printed in Ger-
many are not, as a rule, very interesting. Germany
was not the home of fine manuscripts during the
fifteenth century, and her printed books depend for
their beauty on the splendour of their types rather

' Since this was written I have been shown two copies of books
printed by Schoeffer in which the illuminations are unmistakably
Italian.

Rtibrishers and Ilhiminators

than on the accessories added by hand. The attempts
of the more ambitious miniaturists to depict, within
the Hmits of an initial, St. Jerome translating the Bible
or David playing on the harp, are,^for the most part,
clumsy and ill-drawn. On the other hand, beautiful
scroll-work of flowers and birds is not uncommon.
As a rule it surrounds the whole page of text, but
in some cases a very good effect is produced by the
stem of the design being brought up between the
two columns of a large page, branching out at either
end so as to cover the upper and lower margins,
those at the sides being left bare. It may be men-
tioned that much of the best scroll-work is found
on paper copies, the vellum used in early German
books being usually coarse and brown, and some-
times showing the imperfections of the skin by holes
as large as a filbert. In Italy and France vellum
was used as a luxurious refinement ; in Germany,
apparently, chiefly for its greater resistance to wear
and tear. An extreme instance of the superiority
of a paper copy to one on vellum may be found
by comparing the coarsely-rubricated 42-line Bible
in the Grenville Collection at the British Museum
with the very prettily illuminated copy of the same
book in the King's Library. The Grenville copy is
on vellum, the King's on paper ; but there can be
no question that the latter is the finer. Even in
Germany, however, good vellum books were some-
times produced, for the printers endeavoured to match
the skins fairly uniformly throughout a volume, and

lo Early Illustrated Books

a book-lover of taste would not be slow to pick out
the best copy. The finest German vellum book with
which I am acquainted is a copy of the 1462 Bible,
specially illuminated for a certain Conradus Dolea,
whose name and initials are introduced into the lower
border on the first page of the second volume. The
scroll-work is excellent, and the majority of the large
initials are wisely restricted to simple decorative de-
signs. Only in a few cases, as at the beginning of the
Psalms, where David is as usual playing his harp,
is the general good taste which marks the volume
disturbed by clumsy figure- work.

In turning from the illuminations of the first Ger-
man books to those printed by Jenson and Vindelinus
de Spira at Venice we are confronted with an in-
teresting discovery, first noted by the Vicomte Dela-
borde in his delightful book La Gravure en Italic
avant Marc-Antoine (p. 252), carried a little further
in the Due de Rivoli's Bibliographie des Livres a
figures Vdnitiens, and since greatly extended by the
researches of Dr. Paul Kristeller, some of the results
of which, as yet unpublished, he has kindly com-
municated to me. In a considerable number — the
list given me by Dr. Kristeller enumerates about
forty — of the works published by these two printers,
from 1469 to 1473, the work of the illuminator has
been facilitated in some copies by the whole or a
portion of his design having been first stamped for
him from a block. The evidence of this stamping
is partly in the dent made in the paper or vellum,

Rubrishers and Illuminators 1 1

partly in the numerous little breaks in the lines
where the block has not retained the ink. On the
score of this stamped work the eminent French
writers I have named have brought back the date
of the introduction of engraving into Venice from
1476 to 1469, but the work, so far as I am acquainted
with it, is so entirely subservient to the illumination
that this seems to me rather misleading than helpful.
According to the description of the Due de Rivoli,
a copy of the Pliny of 1469 in the Bibliotheque
Nationale, illuminated by means of this device, has
an upper and inner border of the familiar white
elliptical interlacements on a gold and green ground.
In the centre of the lower border is a shield sup-
ported by two children, and at the feet of each child
is a rabbit. The outer border shows two cornu-
copias on a green and gold ground. The upper and
inner borders are repeated again in the Livy and
Virgil of 1470, in the Valerius Maximus of 147 1, and
in the Rhetorica of George of Trebizond of 1742. In
this last book it is joined with another border, first
found in the De Officiis of Cicero of the same year.
All these books proceeded from the press of Johannes
and Vindelinus de Spira. A quite distinct set of
borders is found in Jenson's edition of Cicero's
Epistolae ad Familiares of 1471 ; but in an article
in the Archivio Storico delle Arti Dr. Kristeller has
shown that the lower border of the Pli72y of 1469,
described above, occurs again in a copy of the De
Evangelica Proiparatione, printed by Jenson in 1470.

1 2 Early Illustrated Books

The apparent distinction of the blocks used in the
books of the two firms is thus broken down, and in
face of the rarity of the copies thus decorated in
comparison with those illuminated by hand, or which
have come down to us with their blank spaces still
unfilled, it seems impossible to maintain that either
the preliminary engraving or the illumination was
done in the printers' workshop. We should rather
regard the engraving as a labour-saving device em-
ployed by some noted illuminator to whom private
purchasers sent the books they had purchased from
the De Spiras or Jenson for decoration. No instance
has as yet been found of a book printed after 1473
being illuminated in this way.^

Apart from the special interest of these particular
borders, the illumination in early Italian books is
almost uniformly graceful and beautiful. Interlace-
ments, oftenest of white upon blue, sometimes of gold
upon green, are the form of ornament most com-
monly met with. Still prettier than these are the

^ In his valuable history of The Art of Wood Engraving in Italy in
the Fifteenth Century (p. 3), Dr. Lippmann writes : ' Sweynheim
and Pannartz, the prototypographers of Italy, in the Subiaco Lac-
tantius of 1465, made use of wood engraving for the purpose of de-
corating the first page with an ornamental border. It is a simple linear
design, showing white interlacements on a black ground, and was
evidently borrowed from a mediaeval manuscript.' Dr. Lippmann does
not specify the copy or copies which he has found thus ornamented.
No such border exists in any copy I have seen, and I think there can
be no doubt that the border was supplied after the book left the
printers' hands. We may account in the same way for the printed
initials, which, I am told, are found in some copies of the Sweynheim
and Pannartz Bible.

Rubrishers and Illuminators 1 3

floral borders, tapering off into little stars of gold.
Elaborate architectural designs are also found, but
these, as a rule, are much less pleasing. In the
majority of the borders of all three classes a shield,
of the graceful Italian shape, is usually introduced,
sometimes left blank, sometimes filled in with the
arms of the owner. More often than not this shield
is enclosed in a circle of green bay leaves. The
initial letters are, as a rule, purely decorative, the
designs harmonising with the borders. In some in-
stances they consist simply of a large letter in red
or blue, without any surrounding scroll-work. We
must also note that in some copies of books from
the presses of the German printers at Rome we find
large initial letters in red and blue, distinctly German
in their design, the work, possibly, of the printers
themselves.

Germany and Italy are the only two countries
in which illumination plays an important part in
the decoration of early books. In England, where
the Wars of the Roses had checked the develop-
ment of a very promising native school of illumi-
nators, the use of colour in printed books is almost
unknown. The early issues from Caxton's press,
before he began to employ printed initials, are either
left with their blanks unfilled, or rubricated in the
plainest possible manner. In France, the scholastic
objects of the press at the Sorbonne, and the few re-
sources of the printers who succeeded it during the
next seven or eight years, forbade competition with

1 4 Early Illustrated Books

the splendid manuscripts which were then being
produced. In Holland and Spain woodcut initials,
which practically gave the death-blow to illumination
as a necessary adjunct of a book, were introduced
almost simultaneously with the use of type.

So far we have considered illumination merely as a
means of completing in a not immoderately expensive
manner the blanks left by the earliest printers. We
may devote a few pages to glancing at the subsequent
application of the art to the decoration of special
copies intended for presentation to a patron, or com-
missioned by a wealthy book-lover. The preparation
of such copies was practically confined to France and
Italy. A copy on vellum of the Great Bible of 1540,
presented to Henry VIII. by his * loving, faithfull and
obedient subject and daylye oratour, Anthony Marler
of London, Haberdassher,' has the elaborate wood-
cut title-page carefully painted over by hand, but this
is almost the only English book of which I can think
in which colour was thus employed. In Germany its
use was only too common, but for popular, not for
artistic work, for at least two out of every three early
German books with woodcut illustrations have the
cuts garishly painted over in the rudest possible
manner, to the great defacement of the outlines, which
we would far rather see unobscurcd. It is tempting,
indeed, to believe that in many cases this deplorable
addition must have been the work of the ' domestic '
artist ; it is certainly rare to find an instance in which
it in any way improves the underlying cut.

Rubrishers and Illuminators 1 5

In France and Italy, on the other hand, the early
printers were confronted by many wealthy book-
lovers, accustomed to manuscripts adorned with every
possible magnificence, and in a few instances they
found it worth while to cater for their tastes. For this
purpose they employed the most delicate vellum (very
unlike the coarse material used by the Germans for
its strength) decorating the margins with elaborate
borders, and sometimes prefixing a coloured fronti-
spiece. In France this practice was begun by Guillaume
Fichet and Jean Heynlyn, the managers of the press
at the Sorbonne. Several magnificent copies of early
Sorbonne books — so sober in their ordinary dress —
are still extant, to which Fichet has prefixed a large
miniature representing himself in his clerical garb
presenting a copy of the book to the Pope, to our
own Edward IV., to Cardinal Bessarion, or to other
patrons. In some cases he also prefixed a specially
printed letter of dedication, thereby rendering the
copy absolutely unique. Some twenty years later
this practice of preparing special copies for wealthy
patrons was resumed by Antoine V^rard, whose
enterprise has bequeathed to the Bibliotheque
Nationale a whole row of books thus specially
decorated for Charles viii, and to the British
Museum a no less splendid set commissioned by
Henry VII. Nor were Verard's patrons only found
among kings, for a record still exists of four books
thus ornamented by him for Charles d'Angouleme,
at a total cost of over two hundred livres, equivalent

1 6 Early Illustrated Books

to rather more than the same number of pounds
sterling of our present money.

V^rard's methods of preparing these magnificent
volumes were neither very artistic nor very honest.
The miniatures are thickly painted, so that an under-
lying woodcut, on quite a different subject, was
sometimes utilised to furnish the artist with an idea
for the grouping of the figures. Thus a cut from
Ovid's Metamorphoses, representing Saturn devour-
ing his children and a rather improper figure of
Venus rising from the sea, was converted into a Holy
Family by painting out the Venus and reducing
Saturn's cannibal embrace to an affectionate fond-
ling. This process of alteration and painting out was
also employed by V^rard to conceal the fact that
these splendid copies were often not of his own
publication, but commissioned by him from other
publishers. Thus Henry vii.'s copy of UExamen de
Conscience has the colophon, in which it is stated
to have been printed for Pierre Regnault of Rouen,
rather carelessly erased, and in Charles Vlll.'s copy
of the Compost et Kalendrier des Bergiers (1493)^
Guiot Marchant's device has been concealed by paint-
ing over it the royal arms, while the colophon in
which his name appears has been partly erased, partly
covered over by a painted copy of V^rard's well-known
device. V^rard's borders, also, are as a rule heavy,

^ A full description of this copy will be found in Dr. Sommer's
introduction to the facsimile and reprint of the English translations of
Paris, 1503, and London, 1506 (Kegan Paul, 1892).

Rubrishers and Illuminators 1 7

consisting chiefly of flowers and arabesques arranged
in clumsy squares or lozenges. Altogether these
princely volumes are perhaps rather magnificent than
in good taste.

The custom of illuminating the cuts in vellum
books was not practised only by Verard. Almost all
the French publishers of Books of Hours resorted to
it — at first, while the illumination was carefully done,
with very splendid effect, afterwards to the utter ruin
of the beautiful designs which the colour concealed.
Under Francis I. illumination seems to have revived,
for we hear of a vellum copy of the De Phtlologia of
Budaeus, printed by Ascensius (1532), having its first
page of text enclosed in a rich border in which
appear the arms of the dukes of Orleans and Angou-
leme, to whom it was dedicated. In another work by
Budaeus (himself, as Mr. Elton has told us, a book-
lover as well as a scholar), the De Transitu Hellenismi^
printed by Robert Estienne in 1535, the portrait and
arms of Francis I. are enclosed in another richly
illuminated border, and the King's arms are painted
in other books printed about this time. In a vellum
copy of a French Bible printed by Jean de Tournes
at Lyons in 1557, there are over three hundred
miniatures, and borders to every page. Even by the
middle of the seventeenth century the use of illumina-
tion had not quite died out in France, though it adds
nothing to the beauty of the tasteless works then
issued from the French presses. One of the latest
instances in which I have encountered it is in a copy

B

1 8 Early Ilhistrated Books

presented to Louis xiv. of La Lyre du Jeune Apollon,
ou la Muse naissante du Petit de Beauchasteau (Paris,
1657) ; in this the half-title is surrounded by a wreath
of gold, and surmounted by a lyre, the title is picked
out in red, blue, and gold, and the headpieces and
tailpieces throughout the volume are daubed over
with colour. By the expenditure of a vast amount
of pains, a dull book is thus rendered both pretentious
and offensive.

In Italy, the difference between ordinary copies of
early books and specially prepared ones, is bridged
over by so many intermediate stages of decoration
that we are obliged to confine our attention to one or
two famous examples of sumptuous books. The
Italian version of Pliny^ made by Cristoforo Landino
and printed by Jenson in 1476, exists in such a form
as one of the Douce books (No. 310) in the Bodleian
Library. This copy has superb borders at the begin-
ning of each book, and is variously supposed to have
been prepared for Ferdinand li., king of Naples, and
for a member of the Strozzi family of Florence, the
arms of both being frequently introduced into the
decoration. Still more superb are the three vellum
copies of Giovanni Simoneta's Historia delle cose facte
dallo invictissimo Duca Francesco Sforza, translated
(like the Pliny) by Cristoforo Landino, and printed
by Antonio Zarotto at Milan in 1490. These copies
were prepared for members of the Sforza family,
portraits of whom are introduced in the borders. The
decoration is florid, but superb of its kind, and pro-

Rubrishers and Illuminators 1 9

voked Dibdin to record his admiration of tlie copy
now in the Grenville Library as * one of the loveliest
of membranaceous jewels ' it had ever been his
fortune to meet with. In the case devoted to speci-
mens of illuminated printed books in the King's
Library at the British Museum are exhibited vellum
copies of the Aldine Martial of 1501, and Catullus
of 1502, and side by side with them, printed re-
spectively just twelve years later, and also on vellum,
an Aulus Gellius and Plautus presented by Giunta,
the Florentine rival of Aldus, to the younger Lorenzo
de' Medici.

The use of illumination in printed books was a
natural and pleasing survival of the glories of the
illuminated manuscript. Its discontinuance was in
part a sign of health as testifying to the increased
resources of the printing press ; in part a symptom of
the carelessness as to the form of books which by the
end of the seventeenth century had become well-nigh
universal throughout Europe. So long as a few rich
amateurs cared for copies of their favourite authors
printed on vellum, and decorated by the hands of
skilful artists, a high standard of excellence was set
up which influenced the whole of the book-trade, and
for this reason the revival of the use of vellum in our
own day may perhaps be welcomed. It may be noted
that the especially Italian custom of introducing the
arms of the owner into the majority of illuminated
designs left its trace in the blank shields which so
frequently form the centre of the printed borders in

20 Early Illustrated Books

Italian books from 1490 to 1520. For a long time I
tried hard to persuade myself that these shields were
intended to be filled in with the owner's arms in
colour, but as I have never met with an instance in
which this has been done, and the Italians had, as a
rule, the good taste to avoid mixing colour with their
beautiful engravings, it is best to regard these empty
shields as a mere survival. Two examples of their
use are here shewn, one from the upper border of the
Calendar, printed at Venice in 1476 (the first book
with an ornamental title-page), the other from the
lower border of the first page of text of the Trabisonda
Istoriata, printed also at Venice in 1494. We may
note also that the parallel custom of inserting the
arms of the patron to whom a book was dedicated
was carried on in Spain in a long series of title-pages,
in which the arms of the patron form the principal
feature.

In England, also, a patron's coat was sometimes
printed as one of the decorations of a book. Thus on
the third leaf of the first edition of Golden Legend there
is a large woodcut of a horse galloping past a tree, the
device of the Earl of Arundel, the patron to whom
Caxton owed his yearly fee of a buck in summer and
a doe in winter. So, too, in the Morton Missal, printed
by Pynson in 1500, the Morton arms occupy a full
page at the beginning of the book. Under Elizabeth
and James I. the practice became fairly common. In
some cases where the leaf thus decorated has become
detached, the arms have all the appearance of an

ii

22 Early Illustrated Books

early book-plate, and the Bagford example of Sir
Nicholas Bacon's plate (reproduced by Mr. Hardy in
his work on Book-Plates in this series), has endured
suspicions on this account. In this instance, how-
ever, the fortunate existence of a slight flaw in the
plate, which occurs also in the undoubtedly genuine
gift-plate of 1574, offers a strong argument in favour
of its having been in the possession of Sir Nicholas
himself, and therefore presumably used by him as a
mark of ownership.

CHAPTER II.

THE COMPLETION OF THE PRINTED BOOK.

As we have seen, the typical book during the first
quarter of a century of the history of printing is one
in which the printer supplied the place of the scribe
and of the scribe alone. An appreciable, though not
a very large, percentage of early books have come
down to us in the exact state in which they issued
from the press, with a blank space at their beginning
for an illumination, blanks for the initial letters,
blanks for the chapter headings, no head-lines, no
title-page, no pagination, and no signatures to guide
the binder in arranging the sheets in the different
gatherings. Our task in the present chapter is to
trace briefly the history of the emancipation of the
printer from his dependence on handwork for the
completion of his books. We shall not expect to
find this emancipation effected step by step in any
orderly progression. Innovations, the utility of which
seems to us obvious and striking, occur as if by hazard
in an isolated book, are then abandoned even by the
printer who started them, and subsequently reappear
in a number of books printed about the same time at
different places, so that it is impossible to fix the
chronology of the revived fashion.

23

24 Early Illustrated Books

We have already noted how the anxiety of the
earliest Mentz printers to rival at the very outset the
best manuscripts with which they were acquainted,
led them to anticipate improvements which were not
generally adopted till many years afterwards. Among
these we can hardly reckon the use for the rubrics or
chapter headings of red ink, which appears in the trial
leaves of the 42-line Bible, and was systematically
employed by Schoefifer. Many of the best printers
of later days seem to have deliberately eschewed
it as too garish, and on the other hand we find it
used in the first printed English book, and the first
book printed in France, a proof that its employment
presented no difficulty even to inexpert printers.

The use of a colophon, or crowning paragraph, at
the end of a book, to give the information now con-
tained on our title-pages, dates from the Mentz
Psalter of 1457, and was continued by Schoeffer in
most of his books. A colophon occurs also in the
Catholicon of 1460, though it does not mention the
printer's name (almost certainly Gutenberg). There
is an admirably full one in rhyming couplets (set out
as prose) to Pfister's Buck der vier Historien von
Joseph^ Daniel^ Esther^ und Judith^ and the brothers
Bechtermuntze, who printed the Vocabularius ex quo
at Eltvil in 1467, are equally explicit. In many cases,
however, no colophon of any sort appears, and the
year and place of publication have to be guessed, or
inferred from the chance entry by a purchaser or
rubricator of the date at which the book came into

J&mtimnniixlu cn(lt cuoiriiM^bm ameo

cufd^ia^tciniduflncftiom^tc Q^agiui^
jxrlobatittc fiift auc^^tScfrmfcboipxf ie
igeriiflxpmcimcufaotcPcmrdcsdtxoii^
inatu.AtmabQrjTatoist)fii»^<»r4;:tj*
^nvtgt(ia^IH(m{n35iVgfQrcinrgfmamamv

Colophon from Schoeffer's Bible of 1462.

26 Early Illustrated Books

or left his hands. We may claim colophons as part
of the subject of this book, because they early received
decorative treatment. Schoeffer prints them, as a rule,
in his favourite red ink, and it was as an appendix to
the colophon that the printer's device first made its
appearance. Schoefifer's well-known shields occur in
this connection in his Bible of 1462. No other in-
stance of a device is known until about 1470, when they
became common, some printers imitating Schoeffer
in the modest size of their badges, while others made
them large enough to decorate a whole page.

Of Schoeffer's coloured capitals enough has already
been said. Woodcut initials for printing in outline,
the outline being intended to be coloured by hand,
were used by Giinther Zainer at Augsburg at least
as early as 147 1, and involved him in a controversy
to which we shall allude in our next chapter. Their
use spread slowly, for it was about this date that the
employment of hand-painted initials was given a
fresh lease of life, by the introduction of the printed
' director,' or small letter, indicating to the illuminator
the initial he was required to supply. The director
had been used by the scribes, and in early printed
books is sometimes found in manuscript. It was, of
course, intended to be painted over, but the rubrication
of printed books was so carelessly executed that it
often appears in the open centre of the coloured letter.
In so far as it delayed the introduction of engraved
letters, this ingenious device was a step backward
rather than an improvement.

The Completion of the Printed Book 2 7

In the order of introduction, the next addition to a
printer's stock-in-trade which we have to chronicle
is the use of woodcut illustrations. These were first
employed by Albrecht Pfister, who in 1461 was
printing at Bamberg. Like Schoefifer's coloured
initials, Pfister's illustrated books form an incident
apart from the general history of the development of
the printed book, and it will be convenient, therefore,
to give them a brief notice here, rather than to place
them at the head of our next chapter. They are four
in number, or, if we count different editions separately,
seven, of which only two have dates, viz. : one of the
two editions of Boden's Edelsteiti, dated 1461, and the
Buck der vier Historien von Joseph, Daniel, Esther ^ und
Judith^ dated 1462, with Pfister's name in the rhyming
colophon already alluded to. The undated books are
(i) another edition of the Edelstein ; (2) a Biblia
Paupermn ; (3) two closely similar editions of this in
German ; (4) the Rechtstreit des Menschen mit dem
Tode, also called Gesprdch zwischen einem Wittwer
ufid dem Tode, Attention was first drawn to these
books by the Pastor Jacob August Steiner of
Augsburg in 1792, and when the volume which he
described was brought to the Bibliotheque Nationale,
with other spoils from Germany, a learned Frenchman,
Camus, read a paper on them before the Institute in
1799. The three tracts which the volume contained
were restored to the library at Wolffenbiittel in 18 15,
but the Bibliotheque has since acquired another set
of three, and a separate edition of the German Biblia

28 Early Illustrated Books

Paiiperum. The only other copies known are those
in the Spencer Collection, and a unique example of
the undated Edelstein at Berlin.^

These four books contain altogether no less than
201 cuts, executed in clumsy outline. One hundred
and one of these cuts belong to the Edelstein, a
collection of German fables written before 1330. The
book which contains them is a small folio of 28 leaves,
and with a width of page larger by a fourth than the
size of the cuts. To fill this gap, Pfister introduced
on the left of the illustration a figure of a man. In
the dated copy, in which the cuts are more worn, this
figure is the same throughout the book, in the un-
dated there are differences in the man's headgear, and
in the book or tablet he is holding, constituting three
different variations. In the Buck der vier Historien
the cuts number 55, six of which, however, are
repeated, making 61 impressions. In the impossi-
bility of obtaining access to the originals, while the
Spencer Collection is in the course of removal, I
reproduce the careful copy of one of these, made for
Camus in 1799, as likely to be less familiar than the
illustrations from Pfister's other books given by
Dibdin in his Bibliotheca Spenceriana. The subject
is the solemn sacrifice of a lamb at Bethulia after
Judith's murder of Holofernes. The Biblia Pauperiim
is in three editions, two in German, the third in Latin ;
each consists of 17 printed leaves, with a large cut

* A leaf of the Rechtstreit is in the Taylorian Institute at
Oxford.

Early Illustrated Books

formed of five separate blocks illustrating different
subjects, but joined together as a whole, on each
page.

The last book of Pfister's we have to notice, the
Complamt of the Widower against Death, is probably
earlier than either of his dated ones. It contains 24
leaves, with five full-page cuts, showing (i) Death
on his throne, and the widower and his little son in
mourning ; (2) Death and the widower, with a pope,
a noble, and a monk vainly offering Death gold ; (3)
two figures of Death (one mounted) pursuing their
victims ; (4) Death on his throne, with two lower
compartments representing monks at a cloister gate,
and women walking with a child in a fair garden,
— this to symbolise the widower's choice between re-
marriage and retiring to a monastery ; (5) the widower
appearing before Christ, who gives the verdict against
him, since all mortals must yield their bodies to
Death and their souls to God. The cuts in this book
are larger and bolder than the other specimens of
Pfister's work which we have noticed, but they are
rude enough.

Two other illustrated books have been ascribed to
Pfister. The first, in which his type was used, is on
Christ's Passion, and contains nineteen woodcuts of
scenes from the Entry into Jerusalem to the Last
Judgment. The other book is the first edition of
Otto von Passau's Vier nnd zivanzig Aelten, in which
the initials S. P. and P. A., introduced into a border
and one of the woodcut letters, have been interpreted

The Completion of the Printed Book 3 1

as standing for Sebastian Pfister and Albrecht
Pfister. Examples of these cuts form the first illus-
trations in Muther's Der Deutsche Bucherilhistra-
tion, but they do not resemble Pfister's work, and
it is not certain that they should be dated earlier
than 1470.

After the introduction of woodcut illustrations, the
next innovation with which we have to concern our-
selves is the adoption of the title-page. Arnold ther
Hoernen of Cologne appears to have been the first
printer lavish enough to devote a whole page to pre-
fixing a title to a book, and is thus the author of the
title-page. A facsimile (made originally for the
present author's pamphlet on the History of the Title-
page) is here given, from which we see that this
' sermon preachable on the feast of the presentation
of the most blessed Virgin ' was printed in 1470 at
the outset of ther Hoernen's career. The printer, how-
ever, does not seem to have set any store by his
innovation, and the next title-page which has to be
chronicled is the ' Tractatulus compendiosus per
modum dyalogi timidis | ac deuotis viris editus
instruens non plus curam | de puUis et carnibus habere
suillis quam quo modo | verus deus et homo qui in
cells est digne tractetur. \ Ostendens insuper etiam
salubres manuductiones quibus | minus dispositus
abilitetur,' etc. What we may call the business title
of this book is much more sensibly set forth in the
brief colophon : ' Explicit exhortacio de celebratione
misse per modum dyalogi inter pontificem et sacer-

§l)^tttfi^ ab pb^ulutnptebtcabtlt0*1tl kfko p(iif4i
taoom0*&catdfimc mam feinfot vir^imeno^
uittttum magna bilt^ecia,ab CO mmuncm tyftint
multx)^ l^ttc^otu ptefcttim catatop m\itdu9»<£t
it^atco pec rmpKfToni multiplirafu0*rub i}oc titc^

colktbctni atq^ ettam mulnplicaodrnd^ cuie no
patttipen^ba racfo ft plactt*ii>ibm jp^txttt* )iti
fblif tatst^ requttttj

The first printed Title-page. A. ther Hoernen, Cologne, 1470.

The Completion of the Printed Book 2>7i

dotem, Anno Lxxg,' etc. Still, here also, the absence
of an incipit, and of any following text must be taken
as constituting a title-page. Three years later two
Augsburg printers, Bernardus ' pictor ' and Erhardus
Ratdolt, who had started a partnership in Venice with
Petrus Loslein of Langenzenn in Bavaria, produced
the first artistic title-page as yet discovered. This
appears in all the three editions of a Calendar which
they issued in Latin and Italian in 1476, and in
German in 1478. The praises of the Calendar are
sung in twelve lines of verse, beginning in the Latin
edition : —

Aureus hie liber est: non est preciosior ulla
Gemma kalendario quod docet istud opus.
Aureus hie numerus ; lune solisque labores
Monstrantur facile: cunctaque signa poli.

Then follows the date, then the names of the three
printers in red ink. This letterpress is surrounded
by a border in five pieces, the uppermost of which
shows a small blank shield (see p. 21), while on the two
sides skilfully conventionalised foliage is springing
out of two urns. The two gaps between these and
the printers' names are filled up by two small blocks
of tracery. It is noteworthy that this charming de-
sign was employed by printers from Augsburg, the
city in which wood-engraving was first seriously em-
ployed for the decoration of printed books. But
the design itself is distinctly Italian in its spirit,
not German.

c

34 Early Illustrated Books

Like its two predecessors, the title-page of 1476
was a mere anticipation, and was not imitated. The
systematic development of the title-page begins in
the early part of the next decade, when the custom
of printing the short title of the book on a first page,
otherwise left blank, came slowly into use. The two
earliest appearances of these label title-pages in Eng-
land are (i) in 'A passing gode lityll boke necessarye
& behouefull agenst the Pestilens,' by Canutus, Bishop
of Aarhus, printed by Machlinia probably towards
the close of his career [i486?] ; and (2) in one of the
earliest works printed by Wynkyn de Worde, Caxton's
apprentice, after his master's death. Here, in the
centre of the first page, we find a three-line para-
graph reading :

The prouffytable boke for manes soule And right com-
fortable to the body and specially in aduersitee ^
tribulation, which boke is called The Chastysynge of
goddes Chyldern.

Other countries were earlier than England both in
the adoption of the label title-page and in filling the
blank space beneath the title with some attempt at
ornament. In France the ornament usually took the
form of a printer's mark, more rarely of an illustra-
tion ; in Italy and Germany usually of an illustra-
tion, more rarely of a printer's mark. Until the first
quarter of the sixteenth century was drawing to a
close the colophon still held its place at the end of

The Completion of the Printed Book 35

the book as the chief source of information as to
the printer's name, and place and date of publi-
cation. The author's name, also, was often reserved
for the colophon, or hidden away in a preface or
dedicatory letter. Title-pages completed according
to the fashion which, until the antiquarian revival
by Mr. Morris of the old label form, has ever
since held sway, do not become common till about
1520.

Perhaps the chief reason why the convenient custom
of the title-page spread so slowly was that soon after
1470 the Augsburg printers began to imitate in wood-
cuts the elaborate borders with which the illuminators
had been accustomed to decorate the first page of
the text of a manuscript or early printed book.
When they first appear these woodcut borders grow
out of the initial letter with which the text begins,
and extend only over part of the upper and inner
margins. In other instances, however, they com-
pletely surround the first page of text, and this is
invariably the case with the very beautiful borders
which are found, towards the close of the century,
in many books printed in Italy. In these they are
mostly preceded by a ' label ' title-page. The use of
borders to surround every page of text was practi-
cally confined^ to books of devotion, notably the

^ They are found also in some Books of Emblems, and in the various
editions of the Figures from the Metamorphoses, so popular at Lyons
in the middle of the sixteenth century.

36 Early Illustrated Books

Books of Hours, whose wonderful career began in
1487 and lasted for upwards of half a century.
Head-pieces are found in a few books, chiefly Greek,
printed at Venice towards the close of the fifteenth
century. In the absence of any previous investiga-
tions on the subject, it is dangerous to attempt to
say where tailpieces occur, but their birthplace was
probably France.

Pagination and head-lines are said to have been
first used by Arnold ther Hoernen at Cologne in
1470 and 147 1 ; printed signatures by John Koelhoff
at the same city in 1472. The date of Koelhofif's
book, an edition of Nider's Expositio Decalogi, has
been held rather needlessly to be a misprint, though
it is a curious coincidence that we find signatures
stamped by hand in one edition of F. de Platea's De
restitutionibuSf Venice, 1473, and printed close to the
text in the normal way in another edition issued at
Cologne the following year. None of these small
matters have any direct bearing on the decoration of
books, but they are of interest to us as pointing to
the printers' gradual emancipation from his long de-
pendence on the help of the scribe. It is perhaps
worth while, for the same reason, to take as a land-
mark Gunther Zainer's 1473 edition of the De
reginiine principum of Aegidius Columna. This book
is possessed of printed head-lines, chapter headings,
paragraph marks, and large and small initial letters.
From first page to last it is untouched by the hand

The Completion of the Printed Book 2>7

of the rubricator, and shows that Zainer at any
rate had won his independence within five years of
setting up his press. Curiously enough, to this par-
ticular specimen of his work he did not give his
name, though it is duly dated.

BEATISSIMO PATRI PAVLOSE
CVNDO PONTIFICI MAXIMO.
DONIS NICOLAVSGERMANVS

On mc fugit bcatiflfime patcr.Cuc^ fummo
ingcnio cxquititaqj doctrina ptolotncus cof
mogtapbuo pinxiflc in bis aliquid nouari
attcmptatenus fotctuthic noftcr labor in
multDruttprcbcnlioncs incurttm:. Omncs
cnim g banc nofttam picbra que bi3 tabu
lag'quas ad tc mitdmas<ontinctur vidcrit

From Ptolemy's CottPiografhia, Ulm, 1482.

CHAPTER III.

GERMANY — I47O-1 50O.

In the fifteenth century Augsburg was one of the
chief centres in Germany for card-making and wood-
engraving. The engravers were jealous of their
privileges, and when, in 1471, Giinther Zainer, a
native of Reutlingen, who had been printing in their
town for some years (his first book was issued in
March 1468), asked for admission to the privileges
of a burgher, they not only opposed him, but de-
manded that he should be forbidden to print wood-
engravings in his books. The abbot of SS. Ulfric
and Afra, Melchior de Stanheim, who subsequently
set up presses of his own, procured a compromise,
and Giinther was allowed to employ engravings
freely, so long as they were cut by authorised
engravers. Probably this service was performed for
him by a ' Brief-maler ' named Kropfenstein, whom
we find living for some time in the same house with
him, and who, after Gunther's death in 1478, appears
himself as a printer with another ' Brief-maler ' as his
engraver.

At the time of the quarrel other printers of illus-
trated books appear to have been at work at Augs-
burg. It was probably about 1470 that Jodoc

39

40 Early Illustrated Books

Pflanzmann produced the first illustrated German
Bible with a small cut at the head of each book.
The cuts are in outline only, and intended for colour-
ing, a fate which they have seldom escaped. Three
other books, all of which continued for many years
to find favour with illustrators, were also first issued
about this time in German translations, viz. : Guido
delle Colonne's Historia Trojana, the Seven Wise
Masters, and the Lucidarius} As Zainer's use of
engravings had plainly begun before the dispute of
1 47 1, we may also assign to about the year 1470 the
cuts of his Speculutn Humanae Salvationis and his
reprint of the work of Colonne, already mentioned, in
which most of the old illustrations are copied, with
the addition of some new ones, slightly smaller and
of finer workmanship. Zainer's first dated book with
illustrations is a translation of the Legenda Aurea
of Jacobus de Voragine, with a small cut prefacing
each of the two hundred and thirty-four biographies.
This was issued in 147 1, and the same year saw the

^ Perhaps we should add to these Ludwig Hohenwang's undated
German translation of a work on military tactics, by Vegetius, which
Dr. Muther dates circa 1470, and against the weight of evidence assigns
to Ulm, rather than Augsburg. Some of the cuts in this work are
identical in design with those of the Valturius De Re Militari, printed at
Verona in 1472. The relation of the two works may, however, be only
indirect, for we know that the Valturius existed in manuscript at least
nine years before it was printed, and on the other hand Dr. Muther
claims to have discovered drawings closely resembling some of the cuts
in a German MS. of considerably earlier date. It is possible therefore
that one manuscript was copied from another, and that the two printed
books are independent. But I see no reason for dating the Vegetius
as early as 1470, or for scouting the possibility that the cuts were copied
from the Valturius.

Germany — 1 4 70- 1 5 oo 41

publication of an edition of the Spiegel der mensch-
lichen Leben of Rodericus Zamorensis, with unusually
good illustrations, the scenes from daily life calling
forth a freshness and vigour of treatment vfery
different from the stolid cuts representing Scripture
history. In 1472 came two editions of the Belial, or
' processus Luciferi contra Jesum Christum/ in which
thirty-two cuts assist the understanding of the extra-
ordinary text.

To the same year belongs Ingold's Das giildin
Spiel, a wonderful work, in which the seven deadly
sins are illustrated from seven games. As a copy
of this book is available, which has had the good
fortune to escape the colourist, one of its twelve
cuts — that showing card-playing, with which an
Augsburg engraver would be especially familiar — is
here reproduced. The face of the man at the far
end of the table is perhaps the most expressive piece
of drawing in all the series. Zainer also issued, in
1473 and 1477, two editions of a Bible, with large
initial letters, into each of which is introduced a
little picture. At the end of the second of these
editions he adds the fine device (shown on p. 43)
which he shared with his relation, Johann Zainer,
who worked at Ulm. In 1477 he illustrated a
German edition of the moralisation of the game of
Chess by Jacobus de Cessolis, of which Caxton had
helped to print an English version a year or two
before.

During the ten or twelve years of his activity at

Germany — 1 4 70- 1 500

43

Augsburg, which was brought to a close by his de^th
in 1478, Gunther Zainer printed probably at least a
hundred works, of which about twenty, mostly either
religious or, according to the ideas of the time, amus-
ing, have illustrations. Of the works printed during
the second half of his career, the majority have wood-

Device of the Zainers.

cut initials, large or small, and a few also woodcut
borders to the first page. The initials (which some-
times only extend through a part of a book, blanks
being left when the stock failed), if seen by themselves,
are rather clumsy, but harmonise well with the

44 Early Illustrated Books

remarkably heavy gothic type which Zainer chiefly
used during this period of his career. If his engraved
work cannot be praised as highly artistic, it was at
least plentiful and bold, and admirably adapted for
the popular books in which it mostly appeared.

Between Zainer and Johann Bamler, who, during
twenty years from 1472, printed a long list of illus-
trated books at Augsburg, there can hardly have
been much trade rivalry, for in several of these, e.g.
the Belial {i^yi), the Plenariu7n (1474), the Legenda
Sanctorum^ etc., the cuts are wholly or mainly
borrowed from editions previously issued by Zainer.
During the fifteenth century no copyright existed,
and by means of tracings these rude woodcuts could
be so exactly copied, that only an expert can tell
whether we have to deal with a case of plagiarism or
of a friendly loan of blocks. But between burghers
of the same town, we may be sure that friendly rela-
tions were enforced, and that Bamler's borrowings
from Zainer were not unlicensed.

Bamler began his own career as an illustrator with
some frontispieces, as we may call them, which come
after the table of contents, and facing the first page
of text in the Summa Confessorum of Johannes
Friburgensis, the Goldenen Harfeji of Nider, and
others of his early books. In 1474 he issued the
first of his three editions of the Buch von den Siebeji
Todsiinden imd den Sieben Tugenden. The * Sins and
Virtues ' are personified as armed women riding on
various animals, with various symbolical devices on

Germany — 1 4 70- 1 5 oo 45

their shields, banners, and helmets. But the ladies'
faces are all very much alike, and the armorial
symbolism is so recondite, that a considerable
acquaintance with mediaeval 'Bestiaries' would be
required to decipher it. Far better than this conven-
tional work are the cuts in the Buck derNatiir, printed
by Bamler in the next year. This is a fourteenth
century treatise dealing with men and women, with
the sky and its signs, with beasts, trees, vegetables,
stones, and famous wells, and, as in Zainer's Spiegel
der menschlichen Lebeii, the artist drew from nature
far better than from his imagination. In an edition
of Konigshoven Chronik von alien Kdnigen und
Kaisern, printed in 1476, Bamler inserted four full-
page cuts representing Christ in glory, the Emperor
Sigmund dreaming in his bed, St. Veronica holding
before her the cloth miraculously imprinted with the
face of Christ, and the vision of Pope Gregory, when
the crucified Christ appeared to him on the altar.
The execution of this last cut is inferior to that of
the others, but as a woodcut inscription promised a
special indulgence for every paternoster said before
it, it was probably esteemed the most highly.

Of Bamler's later books, his edition (issued in
1482), of the History of the Crusades^ by Rupertus
de Sancto Remigio, is perhaps the most noticeable.
The large cut of the Pope, attended by a young
cardinal, preaching to a crowd of pilgrims, whose
exclamation of * Deus vult ' is represented by a scroll
between them and the preacher, is really a fine piece

46 Early Illustrated Books

of work, though the buildings in the background,
from whose windows listeners are thrusting their
heads, have the usual curious resemblance to bathing-
machines. Some of the smaller cuts also are good,
notably one of a group of mounted pilgrims, which
has a real out-of-doors effect. After 1482, though he
lived another twenty years, Bamler published few or
no new works, being content to reprint his old editions.
Dr. Muther suggests that he may have been his own
wood-engraver, as he was by profession an illumi-
nator, so it is possible that in his later years he may
have felt that his hand had lost its cunning.

Our next Augsburg printer is Anton Sorg, whose
first dated work with woodcuts is the Buck der
Kindheit unseres Herrn (1476). His German Bible
of 1477 is modelled on that of Pflanzmann, but
has some new cuts. In his Buchlein das der heisset
der sele trost, he produced the first series of illustra-
tions to the Ten Commandments, — large full-page
cuts, rudely executed. His Passion nach deni Texte
der vier Evangelistetiy first issued in 1480, ran
through no less than five editions in twelve years.
In 148 1 he produced the first German translation of
the Travels of Mandeville^ illustrated with numerous
cuts of some merit. By far his most famous work
is his edition of Reichenthal's account of the
'Council of Constance,' illustrated with more than
eleven hundred cuts, chiefly of the arms of the
dignitaries there present The arms were necessarily
intended to be coloured (the present system of

Germany — 1 470- 1 500 47

representing the heraldic colours by conventional
arrangements of lines and dots only dates from the
seventeenth century), and this fate has also befallen
the larger illustrations, whose workmanship is, indeed,
so rude, that it could scarcely stand alone. These
larger cuts represent processions of the Pope and his
cardinal, the dubbing of a knight, a tournament, the
burning of Huss for heresy, the scattering of his
ashes (which half fill a cart) over the fields, and
other incidents of the famous council. But the
interest of the book remains chiefly heraldic.

After 1480, printers of illustrated books became
numerous at Augsburg, Peter Berger, Johann
Schobsser,^ Hans Schauer, and Lucas Zeififenmaier
being rather more important than their fellows.
More prolific than these, but not more enterprising
in respect to new designs, was the elder Hans
Schoensperger, who began his long career in 148 1.
His chief claim to distinction is his printing of the
Emperor Maximilian's Theuerdank, to which we
shall refer in the next chapter. Erhard Ratdolt
deserves mention for his twelve years' stay at Venice,

^ A much more important position must be assigned to Schobsser if, as
an examination of the type leads me to believe, he was the printer of
the Gaistliche usskgung des Lebens Jhesu Christi, which Muther attri-
butes to an unknown printer at Ulm, circa 1470. The capitals, which
are very distinctive, are identical with those used in signed books by
Schobsser, and the minuscules are closely similar. The illustrations to
this book are the work of two different engravers — one of whom uses
bold rounded outlines, while the other fills in his details much more
minutely. Both men were good artists for their time, and if printed at
Augsburg, as the type seems to show, the book may claim to be the
finest produced there during the fifteenth century.

48 Early Illustrated Books

where, as we have seen, he issued in 1476 the Calendar,
which is the first book with an ornamental title-page.
In i486 he returned to Augsburg at the invitation of
Bishop Friedrich von HohenzoUern to print service-
books, into which in future he put all his best work.
His types and initial letters he brought with him from
Italy ; for his illustrations, he had recourse to German
artists of no exceptional ability.

The foregoing sketch of the chief illustrated books
published at Augsburg during the fifteenth century (to
a large extent drawn from the monumental work of
Dr. Muther), can hardly escape the charge of dulness.
It has been worth while, however, to plod through
with it, because it may serve very well as an epitome
of the average illustrated work done between 1470
and 1490 throughout Germany. Some of the works
we have mentioned remained to the end Augsburg
books — e.g. the Buck der Kiinst geistlich zu werden, the
Buck der Natur, the Historie aus dett Geschichten der
Rbmer, were repeatedly published there and nowhere
else. Others, e.g. the Historie des Konigs Apolloniiis,
were shared between Augsburg and Ulm, chiefly, no
doubt, through the relationship of the two Zainers.
Colonne's Historia Trojana and the Geschichte des
grossen Alexander enjoyed long careers at Augsburg,
and were then taken up by Martin Schott at Stras-
burg. Eleven editions of the Belial of Jacobus de
Theramo were shared fairly equally between the two
cities. The Bible and ihcLegenda Aurea were of too
widespread an interest to be monopolised by one or

Germany — 1 4 70- 1 5 oo 49

two places, A few books, like the ^sop and the De
Claris Mulieribus of Boccaccio, which start from Ulm,
or the early Fasciculus Temporum, of which more than
half the early editions belonged to Cologne, trace
their source elsewhere than to Augsburg. But it was
at Augsburg that the majority of the popular illus-
trated books of the fifteenth century were first
published, and the editions issued in other towns
were mostly more or less servile imitations of
them.

Next in importance to Augsburg in the early
history of illustrated books in Germany, ranks the
neighbouring city of Ulm, where the names of wood-
engravers are found in the town registers from the
early part of the century, and the printers had thus
plenty of good material to call to their aid. As we
have seen. Dr. Muther attributes to Ulm, and to a
date about 1470, two books, Hohen Wang's Vegetius
and the Geistliche usslegting des Leben Jhesu Christie
which were more probably printed somewhat later
and at Augsburg. The first illustrated book which
we know with certainty to have been printed at Ulm
is the De Claris Mulieribus of Boccaccio, issued by
Johann Zainer, in a Latin edition dated 1473, and in
a German translation, with the same cuts, about the
same time. This Johann Zainer used the same
printer's mark as Giinther Zainer of Augsburg, to
whom no doubt he was related. The De Claris
Mulieribus begins with a fine engraved border ex-
tending over the upper and inner margins of the first

D

50 Early Illustrated Books

page. It is not merely decorative but pictorial, the
subject represented being the Temptation of Adam
and Eve. Eve is handing her husband an apple
from the Forbidden Tree, amid whose branches is
seen the head of the serpent, his body being twisted
into a large initial S, and then tapering away into
the upper section of the border, where it becomes a
branch, among the leaves of which appear emblems
of the seven deadly sins. The numerous woodcuts in
the text are much better than the average Augsburg
work. Our illustration shows Scipio warning Massi-
nissa to put away his newly married wife, and the
hapless Sophonisba drinking the poison, which is the
only marriage gift her husband could send her.

Zainer's most striking success was achieved by his
edition of Steinhowel's version of the Life and Fables
of ^sop, of which no less than eleven editions were
printed in various German towns before the end of the
century, for the most part closely copied from the
Ulm original. In this, there are altogether two
hundred woodcuts, eleven of which belong to the
story of Sigismund at the end of the book. The
frontispiece is a large picture of ^Esop, who, here and
throughout the chapters devoted to his imaginary
* life,' is represented as a knavish clown, a variant of
Eulenspiegel or Marcolphus. Some of the illustra-
tions to the fables are very good, notably those of
the Sower and the Birds, the Huntsman, and King
Stork, here reproduced from Sorg's reprint. The
^sop and the Boccaccio De Claris Mulieribus give

liber vool gcbwicbet.Wrtn fticnatur b^t &'^9 g<?l^ "^^^
X)§ bem CT&ricI) gqoc^cn x>nD gcbo:cn / baraih / b\ ea
xc^ftcr &arbn homc/als die gptiqen tun& 6ic c© vcpab.
rnit>n5 alTo mir grolTcr fo?g bdjat^cn/als ob cs xoi^cta
Culle gcbc:cn x»cr5cn.Tun&cr dirum &^ eg 5U gemaine
nuc5 tieuftUcI) rpc'-cnJ) in crbetm rcf>jvjic;"cn^/x>n &cn
frindcn ju r^glg<bfni g^b^ucbc^clcbcn Mlffii^b.^"^
obctvoaanbjiga w.trc/dciiTnfctligcn /vrrdoibncn/
armcn/*n5imlicb gcdrcngten/gcFagncn/kzankeivVn
a lUn andern norurffngcn mir ^ctaiirn .' vnd bus tun
milriglici) v%hptm gemur/nit vm rum nocl) tt>elthd>
ecrTundCT •om bilff 5ctun.'nit vm gevD\nen;lun&er \>5
g&rikait. Vnb bod) fotDaagcbcn atfo t^sfcbcnb^n
mit r6lct>cr bcFcbaidenbaic / 65 teir mit v^ geben ' nit
felber ia norurfft Fallen / 5ar Z>urcf> voir fremder b^l^
bcgcrcn muftcn*
~ soPHOHlSBk'; in MASMI SS A lEUVSI

From Boccaccio £>c Clar. MuL, Ulm, 1473. (Reduced.)

Oflitcgftmsfabnlatttmjjzobatut contc4!?(3mfttcf
6 C3ut6 ctitm ntaltts mft \)omo^ctia^ bomis nifi l^om

vita^ l?omirtttm ctmo:c6 fatis eft ccmp2et7cn&ct8€'
t«im«t «»fu6 fum bimitee fimilcs fctihea fabuIae^C^*^
cnimbono:umfituenocctjtuUcftag?iUcfecutu8vmat qu
iton l?ahct qucm timtat '^t^mchfte via bom 'Cum optim
fatffmt ct Ithed ct nwn^em (imeccnt ct ftbt inulccm fent twJ
cum opft'ma tJdluntate^conftlto iJ>ano frtbticti^fupcaoze fib
pcticcuntqui tmpzobojummozescompefcetet etpumoet
<£jE l^oc nrniti ce^ccbmitut «^tj outem qui puntebmttut'qu*
ft fitb cozcepMotte bolebmtt-altoe ^ ftbt fectffe qui faft's m
fedileiebatuc'^cb quia gtoualt l?ac I^jc metucbrnit^iw
ptamUtmm? quia tUe p:u5elts ecat«feb quia (rtfueti *vt ful
IcjSe out Ijtb (iuma Uhctrtdte futtcttt^i^mte illie pobue ecat
conttecft m impdftentiam flebat'^'^unc efo|^u8 iUts ^om
mbustalemvitalitfabulam*

If jlt^obnla ptima ie ^^ams et touc*

!>>m ml?tl ottJctst'ltiSimtes In&etc tanas '
< *6ttplttauttc toui nc ftitc agt fojcnt*

SupttEc l^utc tx/to ttfum 6Bbi^mlfa fctunittfi
^^adz piais fubito fe«/it to ahmefoijumj

King Log and King Stork, from Sorg's reprint of the Ulm ^Esp/. (Reduced.)

Germany — 1470-15 oo 53

Johann Zainer a high place among the German
printers of illustrated books. His other work was
unimportant and mostly imitative. His types are
much smaller than those used in the early Augsburg
books, and his initials less heavy and massive. They
are not more than an inch high, and consist of a
simple outline overlaid with jagged work.

In 1482, Leonhard HoU printed at Ulm an edition
of Ptolemy's Cosmographia^ which contains the first
woodcut map and fine initial letters, one of which is
given as a frontispiece to this chapter. In 1483
he issued the first of many editions of the Buck der
Weisheit der alten Menschen von Anbeginn der Welt.
The wisdom of the ancients chiefly takes the form of
fables, which are illustrated with cuts, larger but
much less artistic than those of Zainer's yEsop.
From Conrad Dinkmuth we have the first illustrated
editions of three notable works, the Seelemvarzgarten
or 'Garden of the Soul' (1483), Thomas Sirar's
Schwdbischer Chronik (i486), and the Eiinuchus of
Terence (i486). This last is illustrated with fourteen
remarkable woodcuts, over five inches by seven in
size, and each occupying about three-fourths of a
page. The scene is mostly laid in a street, and there
is some attempt at perspective in the vista of houses.
The figures of the characters are fairly good, but not
above the average Ulm work of the time.

At Lubeck in 1475 Lucas Brandis printed, as
his first book, a notable edition of the Rudiinenta
Noviciorum, an epitome of history, sacred and pro-

pmmm

From the Eunuchus, Ulm, i486. (Reduced.)

Germany — 1 4 70- 1 5 00 55

fane, during the six ages of the worid. The epitome
is epitomised at the beginning of the book by ten
pages of cuts, mostly of circles linked together by
chains, and bearing the name of some historical
character. Into the space left by these circles are
introduced pictures of the world's history from the
Creation and the Flood down to the life of Christ,
which is told in a series of nine cuts on the last page.
The first page of the text is surrounded, except at the
top, by a border in three pieces, into one section of
which are introduced birds, and into another a blank
shield supported by two lions. The inner margin of
the first page of text bears a fine figure of a man
reading a scroll, and the two columns are separated
by a spiral of leaves climbing round a stick. The
cuts in the text are partly repeated from the pre-
liminary pages, partly new, though extreme economy
is shown in their use, one figure of a philosopher
standing for at least twenty different sages. The
large initial letters at the beginning of the various
books have scenes introduced into them, the little
battle-piece in the Q of the ' Quinta aetas ' being the
most remarkable. Altogether this is a very splendid
and noteworthy book, and one which Brandis never
equalled in his later work.

At Nuremberg in 1472, Johann Sensenschmidt
(John the type-cutter) issued a German Bible, intro-
ducing illustrations into the large initial leters. At
Cologne about 1470,^ Ulrich Zell printed a Horologium

^ I give this date on Dr. Muther's authority ; it is probably too early.

56 Early Illustrated Books

Devotionis with thirty-six small cuts of scenes from
the life of Christ. It was at Cologne also that first
one printer and then another published illustrated
editions (ten in all) of the Fasciculus Temporum^
though the cuts in these are mostly restricted to a few
conventional scenes of cities, and representations of
the Nativity and Crucifixion, and of Christ in glory.

About 1480 there appeared a great Bible in two
volumes, in the type and with borders which are
found in books signed by Heinrich Quentel, to whose
press it is therefore only reasonable to assign it.
There are altogether one hundred and twenty-five
cuts, ninety-four in the Old Testament (thirty-three of
which illustrate the life of Moses), and thirty-one in
the New. They are of considerable size, stretching
right across the double-columned page, and are the
work of a skilful, but not very highly inspired, artist.
They have neither the naYvet^ of the early Augsburg
and Ulm workmen, nor the richness of the later
German work. They were, however, immensely
popular at the time. In 1483 Anton Koburger used
them at Nuremberg, omitting, however, the borders
which occur on the first and third pages of the first
volume, and at the beginning of the New Testament,
and rejecting also nineteen of the thirty-one New
Testament illustrations. The cuts were used again
in other editions, and influenced later engravers for
many years. Hans Holbein even used them as the
groundwork for his own designs for the Old Testa-
ment printed by Adam Petri at Basle in 1523.

Germany — 1470-15 oo 57

At Strasburg, illustrated books were first ^ issued
by Knoblochzer in 1477, and after 1480, Martin
Schott and Johann Priiss printed them in considerable
numbers. Both these printers, however, were as a rule
contented to reproduce the woodcuts in the different
Augsburg books, and the original works issued by
them are mostly poor. An exception may be made
in favour of the undated Buch der Heiligen drei
Konige of Johannes Hildesberniensis, printed by
Priiss. This has a good border round the upper and
inner margins of the first page of text, woodcut
initials, and fifty-eight cuts of considerable merit.^

In addition to the places we have mentioned,
illustrated books were issued during this period by
Bernhard Richel at Basle, by Conrad Fyner at
Esslingen, by George Reyser at Wiirzburg, and by
other printers in less important German towns. But
these are of no general interest, and the books which
we have already discussed are more than sufficient
as representatives of the first stage of book-illustration
in Germany. They have all this much in common
that they are planned and carried out under the

^ The Endchrist, Ernst von Bayern and Melusine of an unknown
printer, whose two dated books belong to 1477 and 1478, may possibly
be earlier.

^ Many of Knoblochzer's books also have very pretentious borders,
though the designs are usually coarse. A quarto border used in his
Salomon et Marcolftis with a large initial letter, and a folio one in his
reprint of ^sop perhaps show his best work. These are reproduced,
with many other examples of his types, initials, and illustrations in
Heinrich Knoblochzer in Strassbjirg von Karl Schorbach und Max
Spirgatis. (Strassburg, 1888.)

58 Early Illustrated Books

immediate direction of the printers themselves, each
of whom seems to have had one or more wood-
engravers attached to his office, who drew their own
designs upon the wood and cut them themselves.
There is a maximum of outline-work, a minimum of
shading and no cross-hatching. Every line is as
direct and simple as possible. At times the effect is
inconceivably rude, at times it is delightful in its
child-like originality, and the craftsman's efforts to
give expression to the faces are sometimes almost
ludicrously successful. To the present writer these
simple woodcuts are far more pleasing than all the
glories of the illustrated work of the next century.
They are in keeping with the books they decorate, in
keeping with the massive black types and the stiff
white paper. After 1 500, we may almost say after
1490, we shall find that the printing and illustrating
of books are no longer closely allied trades. An
artist draws a design with pen and ink, a clever
mechanic imitates it as minutely as he can on the
wood, and the design is then carelessly printed in the
midst of type-work, which bears little relation to it.
Paper and ink also are worse, and types smaller and
less carefully handled. Everything was sacrificed to
cheapness, and the result was as dull as cheap work
usually is. By the time that the great artists began
to turn their attention to book-illustration, printing in
Germany was almost a lost art.

CHAPTER IV.

GERMANY, FROM i486.

The second period of book-illustration in Germany
dates from the publication at Mentz in i486 of Bern-
hard von Breydenbach's celebrated account of his
pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Two years previously
Schoefifer had brought out a Herbarius in which one
hundred and fifty plants were illustrated, mostly only
in outline, and in 1485 he followed this up with
another work of the same character, the Gart der
Gesundheyt, which has between three and four hun-
dred cuts of plants and animals, and a fine frontispiece
of botanists in council. This in its turn formed the
basis of Jacob Meidenbach's enlarged Latin edition
of the same work, published under the title of Hortus
Sanitatis, with additional cuts and full-page fronti-
spieces to each part. These three books, however, in
the naYvete and simplicity of their illustrations, belong
essentially to the period which we have reviewed in
our last chapter. On the other hand, the Opus
transmarin<2 peregrinattonis ad sepulchrum dominicum
in Jherusalem opens a new era, as the first work
executed by an artist of distinction, as opposed to
the nameless craftsmen at whose woodcuts we have
so far been looking.

69

6o Early Illustrated Books

When Bernhard von Breydenbach went on his
pilgrimage in 1483 he took with him the painter,
Erhard Reuwick, and while Breydenbach made notes
of their adventures, Reuwick sketched the inhabitants
of Palestine, and drew wonderful maps of the places
they visited. On their return to Mentz in 1484,
Breydenbach began writing out his Latin account of
the pilgrimage, and Reuwick not only completed his
drawings, but took so active a part in passing the
work through the press that, though the types used
in it apparently belonged to Schoeffer, he is spoken of
as its printer. The book appeared in i486, and, as its
magnificence deserved, was issued on vellum as well
as on paper. Its first page was blank, the second is
occupied by a frontispiece, in which the art of wood-
engraving attained at a leap to an unexampled
excellence. In the centre of the composition is the
figure of a woman, personifying the town of Mentz,
standing on a pedestal, below, and on either side of
which are the shields of Breydenbach and his two
noble companions, the Count of Solms and Sir Philip
de Bicken. The upper part of the design is occupied
by foliage amid which little naked boys are happily
scrambling. The dedication to the Archbishop of
Mentz begins with a beautiful, but by no means
legible, R, in which a coat of arms is enclosed in light
and graceful branches. This, and the smaller S which
begins the preface are the only two printed initials
in the volume. All the rest are supplied by hand.

The most noticeable feature in the book are seven

62 Early Illustrated Books

large maps, of Venice, Parenzo in Illyria, Corfu,
Modon, near the bay of Navarino, Crete, Rhodes, and
Jerusalem. These are of varying sizes, from that of
Venice, which is some five feet in length, to those of
Parenzo and Corfu, which only cover a double-page.
They are panoramas rather than maps, and are plainly
drawn from painstaking sketches, with some attempt
at local colour in the people on the quays and the
shipping. Besides these maps there is a careful
drawing, some six inches square, of the Church of the
Holy Sepulchre, headed ' Haec est dispositio et figura
templi dominici sepulchri ab extra,' and cuts of
Saracens (here shown), two Jews, Greeks, both
seculars and monks, Syrians and Indians, with tables
of the alphabets of their respective languages. Spaces
are also left for drawings of Jacobites, Nestorians,
Armenians, and Georgians, which apparently were not
engraved.

After Breydenbach and his fellows had visited
Jerusalem they crossed the desert to the shrine
of St. Katharine on Mt. Sinai, and this part of
their travels is illustrated by a cut of a cavalcade
of Turks in time of peace. There is also a page
devoted to drawings of animals, showing a giraffe,
a crocodile, two Indian goats, a camel led by a
baboon with a long tail and walking-stick, a sala-
mander and a unicorn. Underneath the baboon is
written ' non constat de nomine ' (' name unknown'),
and the presence of the unicorn did not prevent the
travellers from solemnly asserting, — * Haec animalia

Germany, from i486 63

sunt veraciter depicta sicut vidimus in terra sancta ! '
At the end of the text is Reu wick's device, a woman
holding a shield on which is depicted the figure of a
bird. The book is beautifully printed, in a small and
very graceful Gothic letter. It obtained the success
it deserved, for there was a speedy demand for a
German translation (issued in 1488), and at least six
different editions were printed in Germany during the
next ten years, besides other translations.

Alike in its inception and execution Breydenbach's
Pilgrimage stands on a little pinnacle by itself, and
the next important books which we have to notice,
Stephan's Schatzbehalter oder Schrein der wahren
Reichthiimer des Heils und ewiger Seeligkeit and Hart-
mann Schedel's Liber Chronicarum, usually known
as the Nuremberg Chrojiicle, are in every respect
inferior, even the unsurpassed profusion of the wood-
cuts in the latter being almost a sin against good
taste. Both works were printed by Anton Koburger
of Nuremberg, the one in 149 1, the other two years
later, and in both, the illustrations were designed,
partly or entirely, by Michael Wohlgemuth, whose
initial W appears on many of the cuts in the Schatz-
behalter. Of these there are nearly a hundred, each
of which occupies a large folio page, and measures
nearly seven inches by ten. The composition in
many of these pictures is good, and the fine work in
the faces and hair show that we have travelled very
far away from the outline cuts of the last chapter.
On the other hand, there is no lack of simplicity in

64 Early Illustrated Books

some of the scenes from the Old Testament. In his
anxiety, for instance, to do justice to Samson's
exploits, the artist has represented him flourishing
the jawbone of the ass over a crowd of slain Philis-
tines, while with the gates of Gaza on his back he
is casually choking a lion with his foot. In the next
cut he is walking away with a pillar, while the palace
of the Philistines, apparently built without any ground
floor, is seen toppling in the air. In contrast with
these primitive conceptions we find the figure of
Christ often invested with real dignity, and the re-
presentation of God the Father less unworthy than
usual. In the only copy of the book accessible to
me the cuts are all coloured, so that it is impossible
to give a specimen of them, but the figure of Noah
reproduced from the Nuremberg Chronicle gives a
very fair idea of the work of Wohlgemuth, or his
school, at its best.

The Chronicle^ to which we must now turn, is a
mighty volume of rather over three hundred leaves,
with sixty-five or sixty-six lines to each of its great
pages. It begins with the semblance of a title-page
in the inscription in large woodcut letters on its first
page, ' Registrum huius operis libri cronicarum cum
figuris et ymaginibus ab inicio mundi,' though this
really amounts only to a head-line to the long table
of contents which follows. It is noticeable, also, as
showing how slowly printed initials were adopted in
many towns in Germany, that a blank is left at the
beginning of each alphabetical section of this table,

^ocpnarcba

From the Nurctnler^ Chroii'.cle.

£

66 Early Illustrated Books

and a larger blank at the beginning of the prologue,
and that throughout the volume there are no large
initial letters. This is also the case with the Schatz-
behalter, the blanks in the British Museum copy being
filled up with garish illumination. After the ' table '
in the Chronicle there is a frontispiece of God in
Glory, at the foot of which are two blank shields
held by wild men. The progress of the work of
creation is shown by a series of circles, at first blank,
afterwards more and more filled in. In the first five
the hand of God appears in the upper left hand
corner, to signify His creative agency. The two
chief features in the Chronicle itself are its portraits
and its maps. The former are, of course, entirely
imaginary, and the invention of the artist was not
equal to devising a fresh head for every person men-
tioned in the text, a pardonable economy considering
that there are sometimes more than twenty of these
heads scattered over a single page and connected
together by the branches of a quasi-genealogical
tree. The maps, if not so good as those in Breyden-
bach's Pilgrimage, are still good. For Ninive, for
* Athene vel Minerva,' for ' Troy,' and other ancient
places, the requisite imagination was forthcoming ;
while the maps of Venice,^ of Florence, and of

^ Dr. Lippmann is of opinion that the map of Venice was adapted
from Reuwick's ; that of Florence from a large woodcut, printed at
Florence between i486 and 1490, of which the unique original is
at Berlin ; and that of Rome from a similar map, now lost, which
served also as a model for the cut in the edition of the Supplementum
Chronicarumy printed at Venice in 1490. But the evidence he pro-
duces is hardly convincing.

Germany, from i486 67

other cities of Italy, France, and Germany, appear
to give a fair idea of the chief features of the
places represented. Nuremberg, of course, has the
distinction of two whole pages to itself (the other
maps usually stretch across only the lower half of
the book), and full justice is done to its churches of
S. Lawrence, and S. Sebaldus, to the Calvary out-
side the city-walls, and to the hedge of spikes, by
which the drawbridge was protected from assault.
No one, I believe, has ever attempted to count the
number of the illustrations in this great book, but
Dr. Muther is probably right in saying that it has
never been equalled in any single volume before or
since.

We shall have very soon to return again to
Wohlgemuth and Nuremberg, but in the year
which followed the production of the great Chronicle
Sebastian Brant's Narrenschiff attracted the eyes
of the literary world throughout Europe to the
city of Basle, and we also may be permitted to
digress thither. In the year of the Chronicle itself
a Basle printer, Michael Furter, had produced a
richly illustrated work, the Buch des Ritters von dem
Exempeln des Goiterfurcht und Ehrbarkeit, the cuts in
which have ornamental borders on each side of them.
Brant had recourse to Furter a little later, but for
his Narrenschiff he went to Bergmann de Olpe,
from whose press it was published in 1494. The
engraver or engravers (for there seem to have been
at least two different hands at work) of its one

68 Early Illustrated Books

hundred and fourteen cuts are not known, but Brant
is said to have closely supervised the work, and
may possibly have furnished sketches for it himself
Many of the illustrations could hardly be better.
The satire on the book-fool in his library is too
well known to need description ; other excellent
cuts are those of the children gambling and fight-
ing while the fool-father sits blindfold, — of the fool
who tries to serve two masters, depicted as a hunter
setting his dog to run down two hares in different
directions, — of the fool who looks out of window
while his house is on fire, — of the sick fool (here
shown) who kicks off the bed-clothes and breaks
the medicine bottles while the doctor vainly tries to
feel his pulse, — of the fool who allows earthly con-
cerns to weigh down heavenly ones (a miniature city
and a handful of stars are the contents of the scales),
—of the frightened fool who has put to sea in a
storm, and many others. The popularity of the book
was instantaneous and immense. Imitations of the
Basle edition were printed and circulated all over
Germany: in 1497 Bergmann published a Latin
version by Jacob Locher with the same cuts, and
translations speedily appeared in almost every country
in Europe. It is noteworthy that in the Narrenschiff
we have no longer to deal with a great folio but with
a handy quarto, and that, save for its cuts and the
adjacent borders, it has no artistic pretensions.

In the same year (1494) as the Narrenschiff , Berg-
mann printed another of Brant's works, his poems

The Sick Fool.

yo Early Illustrated Books

* In laudem Virginis Mariae ' and of the Saints, with
fourteen cuts, and in 1495 his De origine et conserua-
iione bonormn reguvi et laude civitatis Hierosolymae,
which has only two, but these of considerable size.
In the following year Brant transferred his patronage
to Michael Furter, who printed his Passio Sancti
Meynhardi, with fifteen large cuts, by no means equal
to those of the Narrenschiff. In 1498 the indefatig-
able author employed both his printers, giving to
Bergmann his Varia Carmina and to Furter his
edition of the Revelation to S. Methodius in prison,
which is remarkable not only for its fifty-five illus-
trations, but for Brant's allusion to his own theory,
' imperitis pro lectione pictura est,' to the unlearned
a picture is the best text. After 1498 Brant re-
moved to Strasburg, where his influence was speedily
apparent in the illustrated books published by Johann
Gruninger, who in 1494 had issued as his first illus-
trated book an edition of the Narrenschiff^ and in
1496 published an illustrated and annotated Terence.
He followed these up with other editions of the
Narrenschiff, Brant's Carmina Varia, and a Horace
(1498), with over six hundred cuts, many of which,
however, had appeared in the printer's earlier books.
In 1 50 1 he produced an illustrated Boethius, and in
the next year two notable works. Brant's Heiligen-
lebens and an annotated Virgil, each of them illus-
trated with over two hundred cuts, of which very
few had been used before.

The year 1494 was notable for the publication

Germany, from i486 71

not only of the Narrenschiff, but of a Low Saxon
Bible printed by Stephan Arndes at Lubeck, where
he had been at work since 1488. The cuts to this
book show some advance upon those in previous
German Bibles, but they are not strikingly better
than the work in the Nuremberg Chronicle, to whose
designers we must now return. In 1496 we find
Wohlgemuth designing a frontispiece to an Ode on
S. Sebaldus, published by Conrad Celtes, a Nurem-
berg printer, with whom he had previously entered
into negotiations for illustrating an edition of Ovid,
which was never issued. In 1501 Celtes published
the comedies of Hroswitha, a learned nun of the
tenth century, who had undertaken to show what
charming religious plays might be written on the
lines of Terence, By far the finest of the large cuts
with which the book is illustrated is the second
frontispiece, in which Hroswitha, comedies in hand,
is being presented by her Abbess to the Emperor.
The designs to the plays themselves are dull enough,
a fault which those who are best acquainted with the
good nun's style as a dramatist will readily excuse.
Her one brilliant success, a scene in which a wicked
governor, who has converted his kitchen into a tem-
porary prison, is made to inflict his embraces on the
pots and pans, instead of on the holy maidens im-
mured amidst them, was not selected for illustration.
The woodcuts to the plays of Hroswitha were
designed by Wohlgemuth or his scholars, and this
was also the case with those in the Quatuor libri

72 Early Illustrated Books

amoruntf published by Celtes in 1502, to which
Albrecht Diirer himself contributed three illustra-
tions. For three years, from St. Andrew's Day
i486, Diirer had served an apprenticeship to Wohl-
gemuth, and when he returned to Nuremberg after
his 'wanderjahre' he too began to work as an illus-
trator. His earliest effort in this character is the
series of sixteen wood-engravings, illustrating the
Apocalypse, printed at Nuremberg in 1498. The first
leaf bears a woodcut title Die heimliche Offenbarung
Johannes^ and on the verso of the last cut but one
is the colophon, 'Gedriicket zu Niimbergk durch
Albrecht Durer maler, nach Christi geburt M.CCCC
und darnach im xciij iar.' It has also in one or
more editions some explanatory text, taken from the
Bible, but in spite of these additions it is a portfolio
of engravings rather than a book, and as such does
not come within our province. On the same prin-
ciple we can only mention, without detailed de-
scription, the Epitome in Divae Parthenices Mariae
historiam of 15 1 1, the Passio Domini nostri Jesu^
issued about the same date, and the Passio Christie
or 'Little Passion,' as it is usually called, printed
about 1 5 12. All these have descriptive verses by
the Benedictine Monk Chelidonius (though these do
not appear in all copies), but they belong to the
history of wood-engraving as such, and not to our
humbler subject of book-illustration. Still less need
we concern ourselves with the * Triumphal Car ' and
'Triumphal Arch' of the Emperor Maximilian, de-

Germany , from i486 73

signed by Diirer, and published, the one in 1522, the
other not till after the artist's death. Besides these
works and the single sheet of the Rhinoceros of 15 13,
Diirer designed frontispieces for an edition of his own
poems in 15 10, for a life of S. Jerome by his friend
Lazarus Spengler in 15 14, and for the Reformation
der Stadt Nuremburg of 152 1. In 15 13 also he drew
a set of designs for half-ornamental, half-illustrative
borders to fill in the blank spaces left in the Book of
Prayers printed on vellum for the Emperor Maxi-
milian in 1 5 14. By him also was the woodcut of
Christ on the Cross, which appears first in the
Eichstadt Missal of three years later. For us,
however, Diirer's importance does not lie in these
particular designs, but in the fact that he set an
example of drawing for the wood-cutters, which other
painters were not slow to follow.

In directing the attention of German artists to the
illustration of books, the Emperor Maximilian played
a part more important than Diirer himself. As in
politics, so in art, his designs were on too ambitious
a scale, and of the three great books he pro-
jected, the Theuerdank, the Weisskunig, and the
Freydal, only the first was brought to a successful
issue. This is a long epic poem allegorising the
Emperor's wedding trip to Burgundy, and though
attributed to Melchior Pfintzing was apparently, to
a large extent, composed by Maximilian himself.
The printing was intrusted to the elder Hans Schon-
sperger of Augsburg, but for some unknown reason,

74 Early Illustrated Books

when the book was completed in 15 17, the honour of
its publication was allowed to Nuremberg. A special
fount of type was cut for it by Jost Dienecker of
Antwerp, who indulged in such enormous flourishes,
chiefly to any g ox h which happened to occur in the
last line of text in a page, that many eminent printers
have imagined that the whole book was engraved on
wood. The difficulties of the setting up, however,
have been greatly exaggerated, for the flourishes
came chiefly at the top or foot of the page, and are
often not connected with any letter in the text. In
the present writer's opinion it is an open question
whether the type, which is otherwise a very hand-
some one, is in any way improved by these useless
appendages. They add on an average about an inch
at the top and an inch and a half at the foot to
the column of the text, which is itself ten inches in
height, and contains twenty-four lines to a full page.
The task of illustrating this royal work was in-
trusted to Hans Schaufelein, an artist already in the
Emperor's employment, and from his designs there
were engraved one hundred and eighteen large cuts,
each of them six and a half inches high by five and
a half broad. The cuts, which chiefly illustrate hunt-
ing scenes and knightly conflicts, are not conspicu-
ously better than those produced about the same
time by other German artists, but they have the
great advantage of having been carefully printed on
fine vellum, and this has materially assisted their
reputation.

Germany^ from i486 75

The Weisskunig^ a celebration of Maximilian's life
and travels, and the Freydal, in honour of his knightly
deeds, were part of the same scheme as the Theuer-
dank. The two hundred and thirty-seven designs
for the Weisskunig were mainly the work of Hans
Burgkmair, an Augsburg artist of repute ; its literary
execution was intrusted to the Emperor's secretary,
Max Treitzsaurwein, who completed the greater part
of the text as early as 15 12. But the Emperor's
death in 15 19 found the great work still unfinished,
and it was not until 1775 that it was published as a
fragment, with the original illustrations (larger, and
perhaps finer, than those in the Theuerdank), of which
the blocks had, fortunately, been preserved. The
Freydaly though begun as early as 1502, was left
still less complete ; the designs for it, however, are
in existence at Vienna. The 'Triumph of the
Emperor Maximilian,' another ambitious work, with
one hundred and thirty-five woodcuts designed by
Burgkmair, was first published in 1796.

The death of Maximilian in 15 19 and the less
artistic tastes of Charles V, caused both Burgkmair ^
and Schaufelein to turn for work to the Augsburg
printers, and during the next few years we find them

^ Burgkmair had already done work for the printers, notably for an
edition of Jomandes De Rebus Gothorum, printed in 1516, on the first
page of which King Alewinus and King Athanaricus are shown in con-
versation, the title of the book being given in a shield hung over their
heads. In the same year Daniel Hopfer designed very fine, though florid,
borders for two Augsburg books, the Chronicon Abbatis Urspergensis,
printed by Johann Muller, and the Sassenspigel, printed by Sylvan
Othmar.

76 Early Illustrated Books

illustrating a number of books for the younger
Schoensperger, for Hans Othmar, for Miller, and for
Grimm and Wirsung, all Augsburg firms. The most
important result of this activity was the German
edition of Petrarch's De Remediis utriusque Fortunae,
for which in the years immediately following the
Emperor's death Burgkmair drew no less than two
hundred and fifty-nine designs. Owing to the death
of the printer, Grimm, the book was put on one side,
but was finally brought out by Heinrich Steiner,
Grimm's successor, in 1532. In the interim some
of the cuts had been used for an edition of Cicero
De Senectute, and they were afterwards used again in
a variety of works. Many of them may be ranked
with Burgkmair's best work, nevertheless the Petrarch
is a very disappointing book. To do justice to the
fine designs the most delicate-press work was neces-
sary, and, except when the pressmen were employed
by an Emperor, the delicacy was not forthcoming ;
it may be said, indeed, that it was made impossible
by the poorness and softness of the paper on which
the book is printed. At this period it was only the
skill of individual artists which prevented German
books from being as dull and uninteresting as they
soon afterwards became.

Books of devotion in Germany never attained to
the beauty of the French Horae, but they did not
remain uninfluenced by them. As early as 1492 we
find a Novum B. Mariae Virginis Psalterium printed
at Tzenna, near Wittenberg, with very beautiful.

Germany, from i486 77

though florid, borders. In 15 13 there appeared at
Augsburg a German prayer-book, entitled Via Felici-
tatiSy with thirty cuts, all with rich conventional
borders, probably by Hans Schaufelein, and we have
already seen that in the same year Diirer himself
designed borders for the Emperor's own Gebetbuch.
In 15 15, again, Burgkmair had contributed a series of
designs, many of which had rich architectural borders,
to a Leiden Christi, published by Schoensperger at
Augsburg. In 15 20 the same artist designed another
set of illustrations, with very richly ornamented
borders of flowers and animals, for the Devotissimae
Meditationes de vita beneficiis et passione Jesu Christi,
printed by Grimm. The use of borders soon became
a common feature in German title-pages, especially
in the small quartos in which the Lutherans and
anti-Lutherans carried on their controversies ; but it
cannot be said that they often exhibit much beauty.

The innumerable translations of the Bible, which
were another result of the Lutheran controversy,
also provided plenty of work for the illustrators.
The two Augsburg editions of the New Testament
in 1523 were both illustrated, the younger Schoen-
sperger's by Schaufelein, Silvan Othmar's by Burgk-
mair. Burgkmair also issued a series of twenty-one
illustrations to the Apocalypse, for which Othmar
had not had the patience to wait.

At Wittenberg the most important works issued
were the repeated editions of Luther's translation of
the Bible. Here also Lucas Cranach, who had pre-

,n^

lutiitt*

^ttteraltttfl
tfzt*

Border atuibuted to Lucas Cranach.

Germany, from i486 79

viously (in 1509) designed the cuts for what was
known as the Witienberger Heiligsthumbuch/vsx 1521
produced his Passional Christi und Antichristi, in
which, page by page, the sufferings and humility of
Christ were contrasted with the luxury and arrogance
of the Pope. At Wittenberg, too, the thin quartos,
with woodcut borders to their title-pages, were pecu-
liarly in vogue, the majority of the designs being
poor enough, but some few having considerable
beauty, especially those of Lucas Cranach, of which
an example is here given. Meanwhile, at Strasburg,
Hans Gruninger and Martin Flach and his son con-
tinued to print numerous illustrated works, largely
from designs by Hans Baldung Griin, and a still more
famous publisher had arisen in the person of Johann
Knoblouch, who for some of his books secured the
help of Urs Graf, an artist whose work preserved
some of the old-fashioned simplicity of treatment.
At Nuremberg illustrated books after Koburger's
death proceeded chiefly from the presses of Jobst
Gutknecht and Peypus, for the latter of whom Hans
Springinklee, one of the minor artists employed on
the Weisskunig occasionally drew designs. At Basle
Michael Furter continued to issue illustrated books
for the first fifteen years of the new century, Johann
Amorbach adorned with woodcuts his editions of
ecclesiastical statutes and constitutions, and Adam
Petri issued a whole series of illustrated books, chiefly
of religion and theology. To Basle Urs Graf gave
the most and the best of his work, and there the

8o Early Illustrated Books

young Hans Holbein designed in rapid succession
the cuts for the New Testament of 1522, for an
Apocalypse, two editions of the Pentateuch, and
a Vulgate, besides numerous ornamental borders.
Some of these merely imitate the rather tasteless
designs of Urs Graf, in which the ground-plan is
architectural, and relief is given by a profusion of
naked children, not always in very graceful attitudes.
Holbein's best designs are far lighter and prettier.
The foot of the border is usually occupied by some
historical scene, the death of John the Baptist, Mucins
Scaevola and Porsenna, the death of Cleopatra, the
leap of Curtius, or Hercules and Orpheus. In a
title-page to the Tabula Cebetis he shows the whole
course of man's life — little children crowding through
the gate, which is guarded by their 'genius,' and
the fortune, sorrow, luxury, penitence, virtue, and
happiness which awaits them. The two well-known
borders for the top and bottom of a page, illustrating
peasants chasing a thieving fox and their return
dancing, were designed for Andreas Cratander, for
whom also, as for Valentine Curio, Holbein drew
printers' devices. Ambrosius Holbein also illustrated
a few books, the most noteworthy in the eyes of
Englishmen being the 15 18 edition of More's Utopia,
printed by Froben. His picture of Hercules Gallicus,
dragging along the captives of his eloquence, part of
a border designed for an Aulus Gellius published by
Cratander in 15 19, is worthy of Hans himself While
the German printers degenerated ever more and

Germany, from i486 81

more, those of Basle and Zurich maintained a much
higher standard of press-work, and from 1540 to
1560, when the demand for illustrated books had
somewhat lessened, produced a series of classical
editions in tall folios, well printed and on good
paper, which at least command respect. They
abound with elaborate initial letters, which are, how-
ever, too deliberately pictorial to be in good taste.
In Germany itself by the middle of the sixteenth
century the artistic impulse had died away, or sur-
vived only in books like those of Jost Amman, in
which the text merely explains the illustrations. It
is a pleasure to go back some seventy or eighty
years and turn our attention to the beginning of
book illustration in Italy.

CHAPTER V.

ITALY — I.

THE FIRST ILLUSTRATED BOOKS AND THOSE OF
VENICE.

In 1441 a decree of the Signoria forbade the im-
portation of German playing-cards into Venice. The
decree proves the existence of a native industry able
to enforce its claim for protection, but the earliest
positive date we can connect with any Italian
engraving on metal is eleven years later (the first
dated example of the work of Finiguerra), and the
extant examples of Italian wood-engraving all appear
to be considerably later. Surrounded by pictures
and frescoes, and accustomed to the utmost beauty
in their manuscripts, the Italians did not feel the
need of the cheaper arts, and for the first quarter of a
century after the introduction of printing into their
country, the use of engraved borders, initial letters
and illustrations, was only occasional and sporadic.
I have already noticed Dr. Lippmann's discovery of
a woodcut border in a copy of the Subiaco Lactantius
of 1465, and have expressed my belief that, like the
designs stamped by hand in some early Venetian
books, it must be regarded as an addition peculiar to

82

Italy — The First Illustrated Books 83

this one copy, or, at most, shared by only a few, and
that it was added after the book had left the printer's
hands. If this be so, the edition of the Meditationes
of Cardinal Turrecremata, printed by Ulrich Hahn
at Rome in 1467, retains its time-honoured claim to
be the first work printed in Italy in which wood-
engraving was employed. The cuts are thirty-four
in number, and professed to illustrate the same sub-
jects as the frescoes recently painted by the cardinal's
order in the Church of San Maria di Minerva at
Rome.^ Dr. Lippmann, who has certainly a ten-
dency to overestimate the artistic influence of his
compatriots in Italy, pronounces these cuts to be
' thoroughly Germanic ' in their execution, an opinion
which the Vicomte Delaborde vehemently contests.
There is nothing impossible in the theory that Hahn
may have cut them himself, but the execution is so
rude, that it is impossible to say whether they are
the work of a German influenced by Italian models,
or of an Italian working to please a German master,
nor is the point of the slightest importance. Thirty-
three of the cuts were used again in the editions
printed at Rome in 1473 and 1478, and it is from the
1473 edition that the accompanying illustration of
the Flight into Egypt (one of the best of the series)
is taken, no copy of the editio princeps being easily
available for reproduction.

^ The title of the book, printed in red, beneath the first woodcut,
reads: ' Meditationes Reveredissimi patris diiijohannisde turrecremata
sacrosce Romane eccl'ie cardinalis posite ^ depicte de ipsius madato
I eccl'ie ambitu Marie de Minerva, Rome.'

/ Ofc|Jh>;qutd agi8'Rcm profecf6opcrane,que me profundifli*
ma admiraticne Tufpcndjt' TDerode nmene/ic pueru perdat^ in.
/^ffjptu cu puero i matrc eiue fujis-O res (Trupcnda-nndne pucr iftc
<?r paj:uulu8ille/qui paucoe ante dice natue ednobie'tuiiw impcn
uniucppbctaranctue attYupcrbumerucius/^eucfornapater fii*
funfccuitjpricepapaas'lQimie profccco arbttratus es hkrodie po-
tentiam,utmetiicre8,ncparuulu perdcrctv rui cO potcftaa^ immcn*
fa/maicftas mfinitajT infupcrabiUe fortirudO'O tu deue omnipotef
iclcmcnnfTimepatcr^quf ncccfTitas fuit,atuni3[«mtu8 tuu8 ficfugfc*
Tet'An non poteras cu abiierodi8 furorc^tua pprentia i^^m ftrua*
re,ctai ad mandanli babeAinnmcras lC5ionce aR^elom* Audi fiddia

From the Medttatimes of Turrecremata, Rome, 1473. (Much reduced.)

Italy — The First Illustrated Books 85

In 148 1, the physician-printer, Joannes Philippus
de Lignamine, issued an edition of the Opuscula of
Phih'ppus de Barberiis adorned with twenty-nine cuts
representing twelve prophets, twelve sibyls, St. John
the Baptist, the Holy Family, Christ with the
Emblems of His Passion, the virgin Proba and
the philosopher Plato. Plato, Malachi, and Hosea
are all represented by the same cut, another serves
for both Jeremiah and Zechariah, and two of the
Sibyls are also made to merge their individualities.
With the exception of the figure of Christ, which is
merely painful, the cuts are pleasantly and even
ludicrously rude, the rakish appearance of the
prophets being especially noticeable. Nevertheless,
they are not without vigour, and are, to my thinking,
greatly preferable to the more conventional figures of
the twelve Sibyls and Proba which appeared shortly
afterwards in an undated edition of the same book,
printed by Sixtus Riessinger of Strasburg, during a
short stay at Rome when on his way home from
Naples, or possibly at Naples itself In this edition
the figures are surrounded by architectural borders,
and we have also a border to the first page and six
large initial letters, all in exact imitation of the inter-
lacement work, which is the commonest form of
decoration in Italian manuscripts of the time.
Riessinger's mark, a girl holding a black shield with
a white arrow on it, and a scroll with the letters
S.R.D.A. (Sixtus Riessinger de Argentina), is found
in the ' register ' at the end of the book. To Ries-

86 Early Illustrated Books

singer we also owe a Cluiromantia, with figures of
hands, which I have not seen, while from Lignamine's
press there was issued an edition of the Herbarium of
Apuleius Barbarus (who was, of course, confused with
his famous namesake), which has rude botanical
figures and, at the end of the book, a most man-like
portrait of a man-drake, with a dog duly tugging at
one of his fibrous legs. The list of illustrated books
printed at Rome before 1490 is completed ^ by some
editions, mostly by Silber and Plannck, of the
Mirabilia Romae, a guide-book to the antiquities of
of the city, in which there are a few cuts of pilgrims
gazing at the cloth of S. Veronica, of SS. Peter and
Paul, of Romulus and Remus, and other miscellaneous
subjects. The interest of all these books is purely
antiquarian.

If we turn from Rome to the neighbouring city of
Naples, we shall find evidence of much more artistic
work. The earliest known woodcut produced there —
a representation of the supposed origin of music by
the figures of five blacksmiths working at an anvil —
is, indeed, rude enough. This occurs in an edition of
the Musices Theoria of Francesco Gafori, printed in
1480 by Francesco di Dino, whose work we shall have
to notice again after his return to his native city,
Florence. Much more important than this is an
edition of ^sop published in 1485 by the jurist

^ Maps hardly come under the head of illustrations, but we may note
the appearance in 1478 of the edition of Ptolemy's Cosmographia, by
Arnold Buckinck, with maps engraved by Conrad Sweynheim, the
partner of Pannarty.

Italy — The First Illustrated Books ?>"]

Francesco Tuppo, and almost certainly printed by
Matthias Moravus of Olmiitz, who had then been at
work at Naples for ten years. This contains eighty-
seven large cuts, one of which, representing the death
of iEsop, occupies a full page. The cuts illustrating
the fabulist's life have rather commonplace borders
to them, but when the fables themselves are reached,
these are replaced by much more important ones.
Into an upper compartment are introduced figures of
Hercules wrestling with Antaeus, Hercules riding on
a lion, and a combat between mounted pigmies.
The fables have also a large border surrounding the
first page of text, used again in the Hebrew Bible of
1488. The groundwork of all the borders is black,
but this has not always enabled them to escape the
hand of the colourist. The book is also adorned by
two large and two smaller printed initials. In i486,
Matthias Moravus printed one of the few Italian
Horae, a charming little book, three inches by two,
with sixteen lines of very pretty Gothic type, printed
in red and black, to each of its tiny pages, and four
little woodcuts, which in the only copy I have seen
have been painted over. A daintier prayer-book can
hardly be conceived.

When we turn from the south to the north of Italy,
we find that an Italian printer at Verona had pre-
ceded the German immigrants in issuing an important
work with really fine woodcuts as early as 1472.
This is the De Re Militari of Robertus Valturius,
written some few years previously (see p. 40, where

88 Early Illustrated Books

its relation with the Vegetius, printed by Ludwig
Hohenwang, has already been discussed), and de-
dicated to Sigismund Malatesta. In this fine book,
printed by John of Verona with all the care which
marks the northern Italian work of the time, there
are eighty-two woodcuts representing various military
operations and engines, all drawn in firm and graceful
outline, which could hardly be bettered. The designs
for these cuts have been attributed to the artist
Matteo de' Pasti, whose skill as a painter, sculptor,
and engraver Valturius had himself commended in a
letter written in the name of Malatesta to Mahomet II.
The conjecture rests solely on this commendation, but
seems intrinsically probable. The book has no other
adornment save the woodcuts and its fine type.
Another edition was printed in the same town eleven
years later by Boninus de Boninis.

Besides the Valturius, the only other early Verona
book with illustrations is an edition of ^sop in the
Italian version of Accio Zucco, printed by Giovanni
Avisio in 1479. This has a frontispiece in which the
translator is seen presenting his book to a laurel-
crowned person sitting in a portico, through which
there is a distant view. This is followed by a page
of majuscules containing the title of the book, but
ending with a * foeliciter incipit' On the back of this
is a tomb-like erection, bearing the inscription * Lepi-
dissimi iEsopi Fabellae,' which gives it the rank of the
second ornamental title-page (see p. "i^i for the first).
Facing this is a page surrounded by an ornamental

Italy — The First Illustrated Books 89

border, at the foot of which is the usual shield sup-
ported by the usual naked boys. Within the border
are Latin verses beginning —

Ut iuuet et prosit conatum pagina praesens
Dulcius arrident seria picta iocis :

the lines being spaced out with fragments from the
ornamental borders which surround each of the
pictures in the body of the book. These, on the
whole, are not so good as those in the Naples edition
of 1485, but were helped out, at least in some copies,
by rather pretty colouring. The chief feature in
the book is the care bestowed upon the preliminary
leaves.

In the same year as the Verona ^sop, there
appeared a new illustrated edition of the Meditationes
of Turrecremata, printed 'per iohannem numeister
clericum maguntinum ' in a type resembling that of
the 42-line Bible. Numeister had printed books at
Foligno in 1470 and 1472, and, in the absence of
evidence to the contrary, it is reasonable to suppose
that this work also was printed there, though on the
score of the resemblance of the type to Schoeffer's
it has been assigned to Mentz. In printing the
book, Numeister clearly had a copy of one of Hahn's
editions before him, and the designer of the thirty-
four cuts which Mr. V>\M {Early Printed Books ^ P-7i)>
rather generously pronounces to be * very fine,' was
also influenced by the work of his predecessor. They
are surrounded by a small border in which vine-leaves
are twining round poles on a black ground.

90 Early Illustrated Books

In Florence, before 1490, we have no example of
wood-engraving employed in book-illustration, but
in 1479 Nicolaus Lorenz of Breslau issued there
the first of three books with illustrations engraved on
copper. This is an edition of Bellini's Monte Santo
di Dio with three plates, representing respectively
(i) the Holy Mountain, up which a man is climbing
by the aid of a ladder of virtues ; (2) Christ standing
in a * mandorla ' or almond-shaped halo formed by
the heads of cherubs ; and (3) the torments of Hell.
This was followed in 148 1 by a Dante with the
commentary of Landino, with engravings illustrating
the first eighteen cantos, the work probably of Baccio
Baldini (to whom also the plates in the Monte Santo
havfe been attributed), from the designs of Botticelli.
Spaces were left for engravings at the head of the
other cantos, but the plan was too ambitious, and
they were never filled up. Some copies of the book
have no engravings at all, others only two, those
prefixed to Cantos i and 3, the first of which is most
inartistically introduced on the lower margin of the
page, tempting mutilation by the binder's shears.
The other venture of Nicolaus Lorenz, which has
engraved work, is the Sette Giornate delta Geographia
of Berlinghieri, in which he introduces numerous
maps.

At Milan only two illustrated books are known to
have been issued before 1490, both of which appeared
in 1479. The rarer of these, which exists only in a
single copy, described by Dr. Lippmann, is the

Italy — Venice 9 1

Summula di pacifica Conscientia of Fra Pacifico di
Novara, printed by Philippus de Lavagnia, and
illustrated with three copperplates, one of which
represents the virtues of the Madonna. The other
book is a Breviarium totius juris canonici, printed by
Leonard Pachel and Ulrich Scinzenceller, with a
woodcut portrait of its author, ' Magister Paulus
Florentinus ordinis Sancti Spiritus,' which is repro-
duced by Dr. Lippmann.

The illustrated books printed in Italy which we
have hitherto noticed are of great individual interest,
but they led to the establishment of no school of
book-illustration, and the value of wood-engravings
was as yet so little understood that the cuts in them
often failed to escape the hands of the colourists. At
Venice, on the other hand, where Erhard Ratdolt and
his fellows introduced the use of printed initials and
borders in 1476, we find a continuous progress, to the
record of which we must now turn. The border to the
title-page of the Kalendars of 1476 has already been
noticed ; both the Latin and the Italian editions also
contained printed initials of a rustic shape, resembling
those in some early books in Ulm, but larger and
better. The next year Ratdolt made a great step in
advance in the initials and borders of an Appian, and
an edition of Cepio's Gesta Petri Mocenici. These were
followed by the Cosmographia of Mela in 1478, and
by an edition of Dionysius PeriegeUs. Three distinct
borders are used in these books, all of them with light
and graceful floral patterns in relief on a black ground.

gcunda HdU dl Wcsimi) ncmtnc Btilbon totu»
icato iominc'.fcd in a(p(aa no inagno8.b(c ante a
fole non lungtus obdl ftgno vho: jQm fcmg cofdi
curfos dficicne: modo iioctc pitmaShodo ante ad
JJfolis QC02tu8 indpit apparen^rndnon^ ctiam pci/

petuorfignia.iur.cd com (oleirdiens aatc C03 folcuion aniplins

c(l ^ tertiain partem figni.

WJcrcoriua

From the Hyginus of 1482.

Italy — Venice 93

The large initials are of the same character, and
both these and the borders are unmistakably Italian.
The next year, in an edition of the Fasciculus Tem-
poruin, Ratdolt ventured on pictures of cities. Most
of these are poor enough, and the same cuts are used
for many different places, but the quaint little illustra-
tion of Venice, often reproduced, though almost child-
like in its execution, shows a promise of better things.
Ratdolt also printed an undated Chirotnantia, with
twenty-one figures of heads, reprints of which bearing
his name and that of Mattheus Cerdonis de Win-
dischgretz were issued at Padua in 148 1 and 1484.
About this time, in 1482, came the Poeticon Astro-
nomicon of Hyginus, with numerous woodcuts of the
astronomical powers, those of Mercury (here very
slightly reduced) and Sol being perhaps the best.
To the same year belongs a Pomponius Mela with a
curious map and a few good initials, also a Euclid
with mathematical diagrams and a border and initials
from the Appian of 1477.

After 1482 Ratdolt does not seem to have printed
any more illustrated books, and in i486 he ceased
printing at Venice and returned, as we have seen, to
Augsburg. His brief Italian career entitles him to a
place of some importance among the decorators of
books, for though his illustrations were unimportant,
his borders and initials have never been surpassed,
and are certainly superior to the more florid and pic-
torial work which obtained favour later on.

In 1482 Octavianus Scotus printed three Missals

94 Early Illustrated Books

with a rude cut of the Crucifixion, and these were
imitated by other printers in 1483, 1485, and 1487.

The year i486 was marked by the publication, by
Bernardino de Benaliis, of an edition of the Supple-
mentum Chronicarum of Giovanni Philippo Foresti of
Bergamo, with numerous outline woodcuts of cities,
for the most part purely imaginary and conventional,
the same cuts being used over and over again for
different places. Four years later a new edition was
printed by Bernardino de Novara, in which more
accurate pictures were substituted in the case of some
of the more important towns, notably Florence and
Rome. Dr. Lippmann considers that in the interval
large single views of these cities had been produced,
that of Florence being represented by a print now at
Berlin, and that the new illustrations were copied
from these. It is difficult, however, to believe that
the view of Florence, of which he gives a specimen,
can have been produced as early as 1490, and the
evidence which he adduces to prove this is not con-
vincing. In both issues the first three cuts, represent-
ing the Creation, the Fall, and the sacrifice of Cain
and Abel, are copied from thos in the Cologne Bible.

The year after his edition of the Supplementum,
Bernardino de Benaliis printed an ^sop with sixty-
one woodcuts adapted from those in the Veronese
edition of 1479. Of this edition Dr. Lippmann,^ who

^ By a slip of the pen Dr. Lippman speaks of the ^sop as the first
illustrated book published by B. de Benaliis. On page 70 he duly
assigns to him the Supplementum of i486.

^Mcditatione dc la oflcnfionc del noftro (ignore (efu inco
ronaroedelafcncenria data per Pilato SC delta paffione die
porto da terza infino a fexta.

e Sfendo li
iudeiaffa
mati coe lupi
rapaci defidc"
rado deuoraf
o aoncllo iefu

o
corfeno con

grade furia al
lopalazo dPi
laco cridando
chclamortcd
lefunofe^Io'
ga:5£acdcdo
S^'^ ^1 ^c moleftatopi
^^^^^J— Jlatodcla loro
rabida importunicacc ufcitc de fora faccdofc mcnar dricto Ic
fu da la corte fu il ptorio chc li era aplFo Anna Gaipha li facer-'
doti fcribi e pharifciic tutta laltra turba iudaicra i rata mulritudi
ne chc era picna la piazatcpcnlando Pilaco la gnn fiiria dciu
dcifatiarfeuedcndolefucofideturbatofccere mcnarc Icfug
la cathcna a Kii auanti al palazo in confpc<flo dc tiuti. Et gion

From the Devote Mcditatlone, Venice, 1508 [1489],

96 Early Ilbtstrated Books

has the only known copy under his charge at Berlin,
remarks that ' the style of engraving is, to a large
extent, cramped and angular, and the entire appear-
ance of the work is that of a genuine chapbook.'

In 1488 we arrive at the first of the numerous
illustrated editions of the Trionfi of Petrarch. This
was printed by Bernardino de Novara, and has six
full-page cuts, measuring some ten inches by six, and
illustrating the triumphs of Love, of Chastity, Death,
Fame, and Time, and of the true Divinity over the
false gods. The designs are excellent, but the en-
graver had very imperfect control over his point,
and his treatment of the eyes of the figures introduced
is by itself sufficient to spoil the pictures. Curiously
enough, the ornamental border of white figures on a
black ground is certainly better cut than the pictures
themselves. The book has neither border nor initials,
but is well printed in two types.

The same inferiority of the engraver to the designer
is seen in the illustrations to the 1489 edition of the
Denote Meditatione sopra lapassione del nostra signore,
attributed to S. Bonaventura. The first illustrated
edition of this book, with eleven coarsely executed cuts,
had been printed in 1487 by leronimo de Santis. The
only copy of it now known to exist is in the Biblioteca
Casanatense in Rome, where it was discovered by Dr.
Kristeller. The 1489 edition was printed by Matteo di
Codecha (or Capcasa) of Parma, who republished the
book no less than six times during the next five years,
after which the cuts were used by other printers, — e.g.

OVESTA SIE VNA VTIUSSIMA OPERETTA ACAOA/
VKlO FIDEL CHRJ ^,^::p^=^t==*5:^ STIANO CHIAMATA
FlORDEVia ^^rT^?^^!?^ TV LAVS DEO

DIO

PADRE

From the Fiordi Virtu, Venice, 1493.

98 Early Illustrated Books

by Gregorio di Rusconi, from whose edition in 1 508 our
illustration of the mocking of Christ is taken. It is
interesting to compare this Venetian series with the
Florentine edition published a little later by Antonio
Mischomini, whose engraver, while taking many hints
from the designs of his predecessor, greatly improved
on them. The next year witnessed the first Venetian
edition of another work in which the artists of the two
cities were to be matched together. This is the Fior
di Virtti, whose title-cut of Fra Cherubino da Spoleto
gathering flowers in the convent-garden shows a great
advance on previous Venetian work. Unfortunately
the British Museum copy has been slightly injured,
so that I am obliged to take my reproduction from the
second of two similar editions published by Matteo
Codecha in 1492, 1493. These have each thirty-six
vignettes in the text, illustrating the examples in the
animal world of the virtues which the author desired
to inculcate. As we shall see, in the Florentine
editions the human instances also are illustrated.

We must now turn to the first illustrated edition
of Malermi's Italian version of the Bible, printed in
1490. The first Biblical woodcuts at Venice are a
series of thirty-eight small vignettes which decorate
an edition of the Postilla or sermons, of the com-
mentator Nicolaus de Lyra, printed in 1489. In
the Bible itself, printed the next year by Giovanni
Ragazzo for Lucantonio Giunta, the illustrations arc
on a very lavish scale, numbering in all three hundred
and eighty-three, of which a few are duplicates, while

Italy — Venice 99

about a fourth are adapted in miniature from the cuts
in the Cologne Bible, which formed a model for so
many other editions. Some of the cuts in this and
other Venetian books ^ are signed with a small b, which
by some writers is supposed to stand for the name of
the artist who designed them, but is more probably
to be referred to the workshop at which they were
engraved. The first page of the Bible has a full-sized
illustration of the seven days of Creation within an
architectural border. Other editions containing the
same cuts were issued in 1494, 1498, and 1502.

These three religious works, the Meditatione, the
Postilla and the Malermi Bible thoroughly established
the use of vignettes, or small cuts worked into the
text, as an alternative to full-page illustrations, like
those in the Petrarch, and it was natural that this
method of decoration should soon be applied to the
greatest of Italian works, the Divina Commedia. In
producing an illustrated Dante, Venice had been
anticipated not only by the incomplete Florentine
edition of 148 1, but by a very curious edition
published at Brescia in 1487, with full-page cuts,
surrounded by a black border with white arabesques.
These large cuts, which measure ten inches by six,

^ Among other books in which this b occurs, sometimes in conjunc-
tion with other letters, are the two Dantesoi 1491, the Vite dei Santi Fadri
(in conjunction with i.a. ) the Boccaccio and Masiucio of 1492, the Epistole
ed Eiiangelii of 1495, '^^ Terence of 1497, and the Hypnerotoniachia of
1499. The different theories concerning its meaning will be found set
out in Dr. Lippmann's //■«//«« Wood Engraving in the \^th Century,
and in the preface to the Due de Rivoli's Bibliographie des livres
Venitiens anx figures, to both of which I am under great obligations.

lOO Early Illustrated Books

are very coarsely executed, and have no merit save
what the earlier ones derive from their imitation of
those in the Florentine edition. In the course of the
year 1491 two illustrated Dantes were published at
Venice, the first on March 3rd by Bernardino Benali
and Matteo [Codecha] da Parma, the second on
November i8th by Pietro Cremonese. The earlier
edition has a fine woodcut frontispiece illustrating
the first canto, but the vignettes which succeed it are
so badly cut as to lose all their beauty. In the later
edition the same designs appear to have been followed,
but the vignettes are larger and much better cut, so
that they are at least somewhat less unworthy of their
subject. Both editions have printed initials, but of
the poorest kind, and in both the text is hidden away
amid the laborious commentary of Landino.

After Dante's Divina Coinmedia it is natural to
expect an edition of Boccaccio's Decamerone^ and this
duly followed the next year from the press of
Gregorius de Gregoriis. The first page is occupied
by a woodcut of the ten fine ladies and gentlemen
who tell the stories, seated in the beautiful garden to
which they had retired from the plague which was
raging around them. Beneath this are seventeen
lines of text, with a blank left for an initial H, and
woodcut and text are surrounded by a wonderful
architectural border, at the foot of whose columns little
boys standing on the heads of lions are blowing horns,
while in the lower section of the design the usual
blank shield is approached from either side by cupids

Italy — Venice i o i

riding on rams. The blank for the initial is a great
blot on the page, as any coloured letter would have
destroyed the delicacy of the whole design. In the
body of the work each of the ten books is headed by
a double cut, in one part of which the company of
narrators is standing in front of a gateway, while one
of their number is playing a guitar ; in the other they
are all seated before a fountain, presided over by a
wreath-crowned master of the story-telling. The
vignettes which illustrate the different tales vary very
much in quality, though some, like the little cut of the
Marquis and his friends approaching Griselda as she
brings water from the well, could hardly be bettered.
The Boccaccio of 1492 heralded a long series of
illustrated books from the press of Gregorius de
Gregoriis and his brother John. Most of these were
devotional in their character, e.g. the Zardine de
Oratione, the Monte deW Oratione, the Vita e Miracoli
del Sancto Antonio di Padoa, the Passione di Cristo,
etc. The Novellino of Masuccio Salernitano formed
a pendant to the Boccaccio, and was published in the
same year. To Gregorius we also owe the magni-
ficent border, in white relief on a black ground, to
the Latin Herodotus of 1494, repeated again in the
second volume of the works of S. Jerome published
in 1497-98. Equally famous with any of these is the
same printer's series of editions of the Fasciculo de
Medicina of Johannes Ketham. In the first of these,
printed in I49i,the illustrations are confined to cuts of
various dreadful-looking surgical instruments ; but in

I02 Early Illustrated Books

1493 large pictures were added, each occupying the
whole of a folio page, and representing a dissection, a
consultation of physicians, and the bedside of a man
struck down by the plague. In some of his later
books Gregorius repaired the mistake of the Boccaccio,
and used excellent woodcut initials.

The Herodotus of 1494 has only its magnificent
border by way of illustration, but other classical
authors received much more generous treatment
during this decade. An Italian Livy, with numerous
vignettes, was printed in 1493 by Giovanni di Vercelli,
and a Latin one in 1495 by P. Pincio, Lucantonio
Giunta in each case acting as publisher,^ In 1497
Lazarus de Soardis printed for Simon de Lucre a
Terence with numerous vignettes ; and in the same
year there appeared an illustrated edition, several
times reprinted, of the Metamorphoses of Ovid, the
printer being Giovanni Rossi and the publisher once
more Lucantonio Giunta. The cuts in this work
measure something over three inches by five, and
have little borders on each side of them ; but the fine-
ness of the designs is lost by poor engraving. Some
of them are signed m, others N.

We now approach one of the most famous books
in the annals of Venetian printing, the Hypneroto-
viachia Polipliili printed by Aldus in 1499, at the
expense of a certain Leonardo Crasso of Verona,

^ In the intervening year Giunta had published the Santa Catharina,
printed by Matteo Codecha, some copies of which have the false
date 1483.

Italy — Venice 103

' artium et juris Pontificis consultus,' by whom it was
dedicated to Guidobaldo, Duke of Urbino. The
author of the book was Francesco Colonna, a
Dominican friar, who had been a teacher of rhetoric
at Treviso and Padua, and was now spending his old «
age in the convent of SS. Giovanni e Paolo in
Venice, his native city. Colonna's authorship of the
romance is revealed to us in an acrostic formed by the
initial letters of the successive chapters, which make
up the sentence, * Poliam Frater Franciscus Columna
peramavit : ' Brother Francesco Colonna greatly loved
Polia. Who Polia was is a little uncertain. Dr.
Appell, who wrote the introduction to the facsimiles
of the woodcuts issued by the Science and Art Depart-
ment in 1889, favoured the view that she was a mere
creature of the author's imagination, a symbol of his
real love, ' classical antiquity.' But in the opening
chapter Polia tells her nymphs that her real name
was Lucretia ; and she has been identified with a
Lucretia Lelio, daughter of a jurisconsult at Treviso,
who entered a convent after having been attacked by
the plague which visited Treviso from 1464 to 1466.
This fits in well with the date and place of Polifilo's
dream, which is assigned to Mayday 1467 at Treviso ;
but this weighty matter is not one which very greatly
concerns us.

The lover imagines himself in his dream as passing
through a dark wood till he reaches a little stream,
by which he rests. The valley through which it
runs is filled with fragments of ancient architecture,

I04 Early Illustrated Books

which form the subjects of many illustrations. As he
comes to a great gate he is frightened by a dragon.
Escaping from this, he meets five nymphs, and is
brought to the court of Queen Eleuterylida. Then
• follows a description of the ornaments of her palace
and of four magnificent processions, the triumphs of
Europa, Leda, and Danae, and the festival of Bacchus.
After this we have a triumph of Vertumnus and
Pomona, and a magnificent picture of nymphs and
men sacrificing before a terminal figure of Priapus,
Meanwhile Polifilo has met the fair Polia, and to-
gether they witness some of the ceremonies in the
Temple of Venus, and view its ornaments and those
of the gardens round it. The first book, which is
illustrated with one hundred and fifty-one cuts, now
comes to an end.

Book II. describes how the beautiful Polia, after
an attack of the plague, had taken refuge in a temple
of Diana ; how while there she dreamt a terrifying
dream of the anger of Cupid, so that she was moved
to let her lover embrace her, and was driven from
Diana's temple with thick sticks ; lastly of how Venus
took the lovers under her protection, and at the
prayer of Polifilo caused Cupid to pierce an image
of Polia with his dart, thereby fixing her affections
as firmly on Polifilo as he could wish. This second
book is illustrated with only seventeen cuts, but as
these are not interrupted by any wearisome archi-
tectural designs, their cumulative eff"ect is far more
impressive than those of the first, though many of the

POLIPHILO QYIVI NARR A.CHE GLI PAKVE AN^
COR-A DI DOKMIKE.ET ALTRONDE IN SOMNO
KITROVARSEIN VNA CONVALLE.LAQVALENEL
FINEERASERATADEVNAMIRABILECLAVSVRA
CVM VNA PORTENTOSA PYRAMIDE.DE ADMI^
RATIONE DIGNA.ET VNO EXCELSOOBELISCO DE
SOPRA.LAQYALE CVM DILIGENTIA £T PIACERE
S VBTILMENTE LA CONSIDEROE.

A SPAVENTEVOLE SILVA.ET CONSTI-
pato Nemorceuafo.&gli primialtri lochiper cl dolcc
fomno chefehaucd per lefcfle&proncrnatemebre tlif«»
fuforelidi.mcritrouaidi nouo in unopm ddcftabilc
firoaffai piuchcel pratcedentc.Elqualcnon era demon
tihorridi.&crepidinofc rupe intorniato.ncfalcato 6x
ftmmofi fugi. Ma compofitamente de grate montagniple dinontro-
po altcda. Siluofe di gtouani cjucrcioli, di roburi.fraxini & Carpi-
m .8C di frondofi Efculi,& Ilice.Sc di reneriCoryli,&di Alni,& di.Ti'
Iie,& di Opio . &: dc infniauofi Oleaflri .^difpofiri fecondo lafpcdto dc
gli arboriferi Colli . Et giu al piano erano grate liluulc di altri filuatici

From the HypHerotofitackia, Venice, 1499. (Reduced.)

io6 Early Illustrated Books

pictures in this — notably those of Polifilo in the wood
and by the river, his presentation to Eleuterylida, the
scenes of his first meeting with Polia, and some of
the incidents of the triumphs — are quite equal to
them. Unfortunately, the best pictures in both books
are nearly square, so that it is impossible to reproduce
them in an octavo except greatly reduced.

The woodcuts of the Polifilo have been ascribed to
nearly a dozen artists, but in every case on the very
slenderest ground. Some of the cuts, like some of
those in the Malermi Bible, are marked with a little
b ; but this, as has been said, is almost certainly in-
dicative of the engraver's workshop from which they
proceeded, rather than of the artist who drew the
designs. The edition of 1499 is a handsome folio ;
the text is printed in fine Roman type, with three
or four different varieties of beautiful initial letters.
The title and headings are printed in the delicate
majuscules which belong to the type, and have a
very graceful appearance. A second edition of the
Polifilo was published in 1545, with, for the most part,
the same cuts. This was followed in the next year
by a French translation by Jean Martin, printed
at Paris by Jacques Kerver, and republished three
times during the century. For the French editions
the cuts were freely imitated, the rather short, plump
Italian women reappearing as ladies of even exces-
sive height. In England in 1592 Simon Waterson
printed an imperfect translation with the pretty title,
Hypnerotomachia, or the Strife of Love in a Dreatne,

Italy — Venice 107

with a few cuts copied from the Italian originals.
The book, now extremely rare, was apparently not
well received, for Waterson, abandoning all hope
of a second edition, speedily parted with his wood-
blocks. Four of the cuts are found amid the most
incongruous surroundings in the Strange and wonder-
ful tidings happened to Richard Hasleton, borne at
Braintree in Essex, in his ten yeares trauailes in many
forraine countries, though this egregious work was
printed by A. I. for William Barler in 1595, only
three years after the Strife of Love in a Dreame.

As we have noted, Aldus did not print the Hypnero-
tomachia at his own expense, nor did he issue any
other illustrated books. In his larger works he re-
vived the memory of the stately folios of Jenson,
and in his popular editions sought no other adorn-
ment than the beauty of his italic type. If pictures
were needed to make a book more acceptable to a
rich patron, he did not disdain to have recourse to
the illuminator. Some of his Greek books have most
beautiful initial letters, and in the Aristotle of 1497
he employs good head-pieces, though these fall far
short of the large oriental design, printed in red,
placed by his friendly rival, Zacharia Caliergi, at
the top of the first page of the Conuneniary of
Simplicius on Aristotle of 1499.

The influence of Aldus certainly helped to widen
the gulf which already existed between the finely
printed works intended for scholars and wealthy book-
lovers and the cheaper and more popular ones in

m

aori t3octo:fi aucrontatibua

dd fdliaitata cdgmcn^

damc>eco:amm:

nncrimc(9i#

pzefltoj

From a Missaic Koinanuni, Giunta, 1509. (Reduced.)

Italy — Venice 1 09

which woodcuts formed an addition very attractive
to the humbler book-buyers. Perhaps this in part
accounts for the great deterioration in Venetian illus-
trated books after the close of the fifteenth century.
The delicate vignettes and outline cuts only appear
in reprints, and in new works their place is taken
by heavily-shaded engravings, mostly of very little
charm. The numerous liturgical works published by
Lucantonio Giunta and his successors perhaps show
this work at its best. They are mostly printed in
Gothic type with an abundant use of red ink, and
the heaviness of the illustrations is thus all the better
carried off. But as the century advanced Venetian
printing deteriorated more and more rapidly : partly
from excessive competition ; partly, as Mr. Brown has
shown in his The Venetiafi Printing Press, from too
much interference on the part of the Government ;
partly, we must suppose, simply from the decline of
good taste, though it is noticeable that between 1540
and 1560, when the insides of books had become
merely dull, is a brilliant period in the history of
Venetian binding. Whatever the cause, within a
few years after the close of the fifteenth century the
glories of Venetian printing had disappeared.

From the Epistoh of Pulci, Florence, c. 1495.

CHAPTER VI.

ITALY — II.
FLORENCE AND MILAN — ITALIAN PRINTERS' MARKS.

We must now return from Venice to Florence,
where, after the experiments with engravings on
copper in 1477 and 1481, no illustrated books had
been published until the Laudi of Jacopone da Todi
(the Franciscan author of the Stabat Mater), printed
by Francesco Buonaccorsi in 1490. On the verso of
its eighth leaf this contains a most beautiful outline
woodcut (reproduced by Dr. Lippman), St. Jacopone
kneeling by a little lectern, his book on the ground,
while above him is a vision of the Madonna en-
shrined in a 'mandorla,' supported below by three
cherubs and above by four maturer angels. In the
same year Francesco di Dino (whom we have already
seen at work at Naples ten years earlier) brought out
an edition of the Specchio di Croce of Domenico
Cavalca, with a frontispiece representing the Cruci-
fixion. In 1491 we make the acquaintance of Lorenzo
di Morgiani and Giovanni Thodesco da Maganza, or
Johann Petri of Mentz, from whose press some of

the most important of the Florentine illustrated books

111

112 Early Illustrated Books

were issued. The first result of their activity was a
new edition of Bettini's Monte Santo di Die, in which
the three copperplates of the edition of 1477 were
freely imitated upon wood. In the same year they
printed a little treatise on Arithmetic, written by
Philippo Calandro and dedicated to Giuliano dei
Medici. This, as it is the first, is also the most de-
lightful of all arithmetic books. It has a title-cut of
' Pictagoras Arithmetice Introductor,' and the earlier
pages of the book are surrounded by a characteristic
Renaissance border. Towards the end of the work
there is a series of illustrated problems, only a little
more absurd than those which still occur in children's
school-books. One of these, however, is so good that
we must permit ourselves a little digression to quote
it in a free translation : —

' A squirrel flying from a cat climbed to the top of a tree
2t\ arm's-lengths {braccid) in height. The cat, wanting to
seize the squirrel, began to climb the tree, and each day leaped
up half an arm's length, and each night descended a third of
one. The squirrel, on its part, believing that the cat had gone
away, wanted to get down from the tree, and each day de-
scended a quarter of an arm's length, and each night went
back one-fifth of one : I want to know in how many days the
cat will reach the said squirrel ? '

The answer is 131 ; but the picture must have been
taken on the first or second, for the cat is still very
plump, and so large in proportion to the tree that
if he had but stood on his hind legs he ought to have
reached the top ! Others of the pictures are without
this charming touch of absurdity, perhaps the most

Italy — Florence 113

perfect being a little cut of a traveller on horseback,
as to the expenses of whose journey the teacher was
anxious for some information from his young friends.
These little cuts are all about an inch square, and
drawn in outline. Another edition of the Arithmetic,
in Roman type instead of black letter, but other-
wise very similar, was issued in 15 18 by Bernardo
Zucchecta.

With the year 1492 we come to the first dated
editions of the illustrated Savonarola tracts, which
play no inconsiderable part in the history of book
illustration in Italy. Their existence is in itself the
best refutation of the popular belief that the re-
former's influence was wholly hostile to the interests
of art, though the number of artists who reckoned
themselves, formally or informally, among his fol-
lowers should have sufficed to prevent the belief
growing up. These tracts, save for the cuts with
which they are adorned, are insignificant in appear-
ance, being for the most part badly printed, and with
few and poor initial letters. The woodcuts, seldom
more than two in a tract, are, however, charming,
and have won for them much attention. In 1879
M. Gustave Gruyer published a description of them,
illustrated with more than thirty excellent repro-
ductions, and nearly exhaustive in its contents.
Unfortunately, it is arranged according to the sub-
jects of the cuts, and is bibliographically very
defective.

The first publisher of these tracts seems to have
H

(fieperetta di frate iSiroIamo da ferrara
dclla o:ationc mcntale

From an undated Savonarola tract, Florence, c. 149s.

Italy — Florence 1 1 5

been Antonio Mischomini, who on June 26th, 1492,

issued a

Trac

tato

dello

Amore Di lesu Christo Composto

da frate Hieronymo da Ferrara del

I'ordine

de frati

predica

tori pri

ore di San

Marcho di

FIRENZE

with the title arranged cross-wise, as here shown.
On the back of the title is a picture of the Crucifixion,
with the Blessed Virgin and S. John standing by
the Cross. This was followed on June 30th by the
Tractato della Humiltay with a large title-cut repre-
senting the dead Christ before His Cross, an angel
supporting each arm. Neither of these cuts shows
typical Florentine work, for the blank spaces have
all to be cleared away by the engraver, and there
is an abundance of shading. The first design was
clearly spoilt in the cutting, the second is of great
beauty. The typical Florentine work, in which white
lines are cut out from a black ground, as well as
black lines from a white, appears in the Tractato
oiiero Sermone della oraiione, finished by Mischomini
on October 20th. Here the title-cut shows the scene
at Gethsemane : the three disciples asleep in the fore-
ground, Christ in prayer, and the hands of an angel

1 1 6 Early Illush'ated Books

holding a cup appearing in a corner above. The
picture, as always in distinctively Florentine work,
is surrounded by a little border or frame, in which
a small white pattern is picked out from a black
ground.

The other illustrated Savonarola tracts bearing an
early date, with which I am acquainted, are the De
Simplicitate Christiancs Vitce, printed ' impensis Ser
Petri Pacini,' August 28th, 1496, and the Predica deW
arte del betie Morire^ preached on Nov. 2 of that
year, taken down at the time by Ser Lorenzo Violi,
and doubtless published immediately afterwards.
The De Simplicitate has on its first page a picture of
Savonarola writing in his cell, a sand-glass at his side,
a crucifix in front of his desk, and books and his
monk's gown scattered on a table. The illustrations
to the Arte del bene Morire comprise a hideous out-
line cut of Death, scythe on shoulder, flying over
ground strewn with corpses (this is enclosed in a
large black border used by Mischomini in 1492); and
cuts of Death showing a young man Heaven and
Hell,^ of a sick man with his good and bad angels
watching him and Death standing without the door,
and of a dying man attended by a monk. Death
sitting now at his bed's foot, and the angels watching
as before.

Turning now to the undated tracts, we find that
the Expositione del Pater Noster contains (i) a very

^ There are two variants of this cut, the smaller iDtroducing a little
landscape background.

Italy — Florence 1 1 7

beautiful variant of the representation of the scene on
Gethsemane, the angel appearing on the left instead
of the right,^ (2) a cut of Christ writing at a table,
(3) a small cut of David in prayer, and some still
smaller pictures of prophets and of the Crucifixion.
At the end of the book is an Epistola a una devota
donna Bolognose, which is headed and ended by a cut
of Savonarola preaching in the open air to a congre-
gation of nuns. An undated edition of the Tractato
delta Hiunilta has Images of Pity at the beginning
and end, the former surrounded by a black border.
Yet another edition has an outline cut of Christ hold-
ing His Cross, while blood streams from his hand into
a chalice. An edition of the Tractato dello Amore di
lesu has two outline cuts, one large, one small, show-
ing the Blessed Virgin and St. John standing by the
Cross. A tract on self-examination, addressed to the
Abbess of the Convent of theMurate at Florence, shows
Savonarola, with the marks of age on his face, being
welcomed at the convent. Other tracts have pictures
of a priest elevating the Host, a man praying before
an altar, a man and woman praying, etc. I am un-
lucky enough to know several of the most beautiful
only from M. Gruyer's facsimiles. Among these is
the superb cut to the Dyalogo delta Verita prophetica,
in which Savonarola is preaching to seven questioners
arranged in a half-circle under a tree, a view of

^ There is yet a third variant, which may be recognised by the angel
appearing on the right, but showing his whole body, not the hands
only, as in the 1492 cut.

Savonarola and the Nuns.

Italy — Florence 1 1 9

Florence occupying the background. Cuts in other
books show his encounters with a devil and with an
astrologer, and represent him preaching to an intent
congregation. With these tracts we must join the
defence of Savonarola by his follower Domenico
Benivieni, who appears in the title-cut in earnest
disputation with a group of Florentines, while later
on in the book there is a full-page illustration of the
reformer's vision of the regeneration of the world and
the Church, in which the stream of Christ's blood as
He hangs on the Cross is being literally used for the
washing away of sins. This book was published by
Francesco Buonaccorsi in 1496.

Many of the Savonarola cuts were used again in
an edition of the Epistole e Evangelii, printed in
1495 by Lorenzo Morgiani and Johann Petri at the
instance of the Ser Piero Pacini da Pescia, who
provided the funds for the De Shnplicitate of 1496,
and for the next fourteen or fifteen years seems to
have been an active promoter of illustrated books.
The Epistole e Evangelii is one of the rarest of
books, and I only know it in its third edition,^ printed
in 15 1 5 by lo, Stephano da Pavia at the instance
of Bernardo Pacini, son of Ser Piero. In this 1515
edition there are no less than one hundred and forty-
four cuts, of which, however, sixty-four are repeats.
The title-page in both editions shows Christ with a
book and sword, and St, Peter with a book and keys,
standing in a circle enclosed in an arabesque border

* The second was issued in 1498.

1 20 Early Illustrated Books

of white floral ornaments and dolphins on a black
ground. At the corners of the border are figures of
the four Evangelists. The cuts form a treasure-house
of Florentine art, and were frequently drawn upon
by the printers of the later Rappresentationi^ at which
we shall soon have to look.

We must return now to Antonio Mischomini, who
published many other illustrated books besides the
Savonarola tracts. In 1492 he printed an edition of
Cristoforo Landino's Formulare di lettere e di
orationi uolgari^ with a large title-cut of a very young
teacher addressing a class, and at the end of the
book his mark (a cross-surmounted M within two
squares and a circle), surrounded by the arabesque
border which we have already noticed in the Arte del
bene Morire of 1496. The next year he printed the
Libro di Giuocho delli Scacchi of Jacobus de Cessolis,
with a large title-cut (repeated at the end of the
book) representing courtiers playing in the presence
of a king, and thirteen smaller cuts personifying the
various pieces. These comprise a king and queen, a
judge, a knight, a ' rook,' or vicar of the king to visit
in his stead all parts of the realm, and the eight
' popolari ' or pawns, a labourer, smith, wool-merchant,
money-changer, physician, tavern-keeper (here shown),
city-guard, and a runner to be at the rook's service.
Chess-players may be interested to know that the
pieces actually in use in 1493, as shown on the board
in the title-cut, had already lost this excessive in-
dividuality, and resemble those of our own day.

CDdtauemierc ct albergaton

Cap. VI

Lfexco fdiacho dinanz ialalfino m€co prd

fcquefta forma. Chefuun hpomo cbeha

gjr^l ucua lamano dm'ita (lefa amodo di pcrfo

ca cheiflUJcaire.NelIam2nibanca haueua uno paoeee
STul paneun btcchieredi uina.EcalU dcola haueua lo
chiaui.QueftcoofcrapTefetaljtiucmicri ctgh alberga
tori cc guardatori dcllccofc.Goftoro falluoghano di
nazi allalfino c»me dinazi algiudice ipoche f pefleiiol
tc lebrigbecclccurbarioi chc nafcono era loro fh^no ai
tractareplalfino gtudicc dcRc/cc'acquictarlc co lebiUl
dcdella giufbria. LofiFirio di coflwro fie/ di procqrare

From the Ghiocho delli Scacchi, Florence, 1407. (Reduced.)

122 Early Illustrated Books

In 1494 Mischomi'ni printed the commentary on the
Ten Commandments by Frate Marco dal Monte
Sancta Maria, which has a title-cut of the monk
preaching, and three full-page allegorical illustrations.
The first of these represents 'la figura della vita
eterna ' by a picture of the glories of heaven,^ and the
earthly devotions by which they are to be attained ;
the second, which is in three divisions, the traversing
of the Desert of Sin ; and the third. Mount Sinai, up
which Moses is seen climbing. In the same year,
1494, Mischomini also published a catechism known
as the LticidarWy to which he prefixed a title-cut
showing Damocles at his feast, the sword hanging
over his head, and in another compartment some
little rabbits running happily in a wood. Damocles
and the rabbits have nothing whatever to do with the
Catechism, and the occurrence of the cut proves that
before this date Mischomini must have printed an
edition of the Fior di Virtu, to which it rightfully
belongs. We have already looked at the Venetian
editions of this book, and shall not be surprised to
find that the Florentine printers had the good sense
to copy their charming title-cut, though they did not
improve it by their addition of an incongruous border
of pilasters, a vernicle, and an Image of Pity. The
first Florentine edition of this book, with which I am
acquainted, has a fitfully rhyming colophon, adapted

^ In contrast to the prevailing anthrojwmorphism of the time, the
P'irst Person of the Trinity is represented by a ' loco tondo et vacuo,' a
blank circle, with a halo of angels round it. On either side of this circle
stand Christ and the Blessed \'^irgin.

tanco fcrmo nelfuopropofito/chclui uengha a
cadere nel uiciodelUdurezza:chefec6dochecii
ce fancto Andronico / Durezza e/anon uoler mu
tire el|)ponimcnro per una cofa. Excmplo.

fjg"^;g[ T PVofTi appropriare &:a(romig!iarc
Ira ^^S lauirrure della Codancia ad uno uccel
n&j^i' locheba nomcPhenice:e!qualeuiue
recenrodndidannu&comeluifiuedeinuecchia
f • fichelanaruraglimachi/lui ncogliccerceiegne
odoMf«rre&fbenfecche;&fannc un nidio/5^er»
tr^ui dreto/ 6^ uolgelafua faccia iierfo lafpera del
fole:3^taco fbatre Icalie/cbeilfuoco facccde la
quel fiio nidio plo ca'ore del folera: e/raco collaa
tcqucilo uecello / che p t]uel fuoco ii5l"irnuoiie;

From the Fior di Virtu, Florence, 1498.

124 Early Illustrated Books

from that of the Venetian edition of 1493, showing
that it was "printed at Florence in 1498, and ought,
at any rate, to be read on feast-days. To entice
readers to persevere in this task, there are thirty-five
illustrations, some of which, like the one in the
Lucidario, are divided into two parts, so as to secure
a contrast or comparison between an animal and a
man — as, for example, between a humble sheep and a
proud general riding in triumph, or, as shown in our
illustration, between the constancy of the phoenix,
who permits herself to be burnt to ashes rather than
quit her nest, and that of an Emperor Constantine
who (by a gross plagiarism upon Solon) quitted his
country for ever after making his counsellors swear
to observe his laws unaftered until his return. The
book was printed yet a third time, probably about
J5i5> by Gian Stephano da Pavia, at the request of
Bernardo Pacini. The printer of the 1498 edition is
not known ; it cannot have been Mischomini, who
seems to have brought his brilliant career to a close
about 1495. The foregoing notice of his illustrated
books is by no means exhaustive. Passing mention
has been made in the chapter on Venice of one other
important one, the undated Meditatione, attributed to
S. Bonaventura, with cuts of peculiar interest, from
the opportunity they afford of comparing the different
styles in vogue in the two cities.

Three other Florentine books issued during the
fifteenth century remain to be mentioned, none of
which I have seen. The place of the first of these.

Italy — Florence 125

an undated edition of Domenico Capranica's ^r/^ <//
bene Morire (not to be confounded with Savonarola's),
is supplied very well by an edition of 15 13, which
contains twelve large cuts and twenty-two small
ones, answering apparently to the thirty-four cuts
assigned by Mr. Richard Fisher, in the Catalogue of
his collection, to the first edition. The larger cuts
are interesting, because they are based on those found
in the old block books of the Ars Moriendi. The
smaller ones seem brought together rather at hap-
hazard, and lead one to think that Mr. Fisher's pro-
posed date oi circa 1490 is probably some five years
too early. The other two books, an j^sop, printed in
1495 by Francesco Buonaccorsi for Piero Pacini, and
the Morgante Maggiore (a long poem on the adven-
tures of Orlando) of Ludovico Pulci, printed in 1500,
both exist only in single copies in foreign libraries.
The former could hardly fail to be interesting ; the
illustrations to the latter, according to Dr. Lippmann,
are numerous but not very good, and with this in-
formation we must console ourselves.

Of illustrated books printed at Florence after 1500,
the most important is an edition of the Quatriregio del
decorso della vita humana of Federico Frezzi, printed,
this also, ' ad petitione di Ser Piero Pacini di Pescia,'
in 1508. Like the author of the Hypnerotomachia,
Frezzi was a Dominican, and was consecrated Bishop
of Foligno, his native place, in 1403. He attended
the Council of Constance, and died there in 1416.
He was a man of great learning and a book-collector,

1 26 Early Illustrated Books

but rather a dull poet. His Quatriregio is an imita-
tion of Dante's Divina Commedia, and is divided into
four books treating successively of the kingdoms * of
the god Cupid,' ' of Satan,' ' of the Vices,' and ' of the
goddess Minerva and of Virtue.' It was first printed
in 148 1, and went through three other editions before
it was honoured with illustrations in 1508. The im-
portance of this illustrated edition has perhaps been
overrated. Taken individually, the best of the cuts
are not superior to those in earlier Florentine books
of less pretensions, while the cumulative effect of the
series of one hundred and twenty-six (several of
which, it should be said, are duplicates) is seriously
diminished, partly by the monotonous recurrence of
the same figure in every cut, partly by the coarseness
and angularity with which most of the blocks have
been engraved. It must be mentioned that the cut
on the first page of the poem is signed with the
initials L. V., which were at one time interpreted as
standing for Luca Egidio di Venturi, i.e. Luca Signo-
relli, whose recognised signature, however, was L. C.
(Luca di Cortona).

Two other great series of Florentine illustrated
books still remain to be considered. The first of
these is the Rappresentationi, sacred and secular,
which enjoyed a life extending over two centuries,
and must be reckoned as the most artistic of chap-
books. In 1852 M. Colomb de Batines published at
Florence a bibliography of these 'Antiche Rappre-
sentazioni Italiane,' to which I am indebted for the

([* La raprcfcntatione £ fan GouanniSC Paulo •

128 Early Illustrated Books

following details concerning their chief authors. The
plays are almost uniformly written in ottava rinia, and
poorly printed in double columns. A large number
of them, at least a score, were written and printed
during the fifteenth century, but these earliest editions
are, as a rule, not illustrated. Maffeo Belcari (1410-
1484) apparently was the first author who obtained
the honours of print. His play oi Abraham appeared
in 1485, after which it was reprinted some twenty
times, the latest known edition belonging to the
eighteenth century. Belcari also wrote on the
Annunciation, on S. John the Baptist visited b}'
Christ in the Desert, and on S. Panuntius. Lorenzo
de' Medici himself wrote a play of S. John and S.
Paul, Bernardo Pulci (d. 1501) produced one on
the legend of Barlaam and Josaphat, while his wife
Antonia was quite a prolific dramatist, claiming as
her own plays on S. Domitilla, S. Guglielma, the
Patriarch Joseph, S. Francis, and the Prodigal Son.
A Passion play by Giuliano Dati, printed in 1501, was
one of the earliest to obtain illustration. During
the fifteenth century anonymous plays were written
on the Nativity, on the life of Queen Hester, on the
Angel Raphael, on the conversion of three robbers
by S. Francis, and on S. Eustachio, S. Antony,
and S. Antonia. Plays on the Last Judgment, on
S. Agatha, S. Agnes, S. Catharine, S. Cecilia, S.
Christina, etc., also appeared at an early date.
An angel, as a rule, acts as Prologue, and the
action of the drama is divided between numerous

Italy — Florence 129

characters. Most of the plays were, doubtless, in-
tended to be acted on the feast-day of the Saint whose
life they celebrate, and in a church bearing the Saint's
name, but the multiplicity of the editions shows that
they also won the favour of a reading public.

A small proportion of these little books are un-
dated, and from the comparative excellence of their
press-work may be assigned to the beginning of the
sixteenth century. The first printer who is known
to have made a specialty of the Rappresentationi is
Francesco Benvenuto, who began printing them in
1 5 16, and enjoyed a career of thirty years. M.
Colomb de Batines mentions several of his editions,
but they are very scarce, and I have only myself
seen a Raphael of 15 16 with a title-cut of Tobit and
the Angel enclosed in a border, partly the same as
that of the Fior di Virtu of 1498, a Barlaam and
Josafaty also of 15 16, with six illustrations (including
our friend Damocles and the Rabbit, whose fate
seems to have been to be lugged in inappropriately),
and a Miracolo di Tre Peregrini che andauano a
sancto lacopo di Galitia, with a solitary cut of the Saint
rescuing one of the pilgrims who is being unjustly
hanged. The great majority of the extant Rappre-
sentationi v^&re printed between 1550 and 1580, mostly
anonymously, though Giovanni Baleni and a printer
*Alle Scale di Badia' were responsible for a great
many of them. Of course, in many cases the cuts
were sadly the worse for wear, but they held on
wonderfully, and even in the seventeenth century

I

130 Early Illustrated Books

editions a tolerable impression is sometimes met with.
Many of them, also, were recut, sometimes skilfully,
so that it is not uncommon to find a better example
in a later edition than in an earlier. The illustra-
tions here shown are from an undated edition of
Lorenzo de' Medici's Rappresentationi di San Giovanni
e Paulo (p. 127), the careful printing of which is an
argument for its belonging to the beginning of the
sixteenth century, and a picture of the martyrdom of
S. Dorothea from an edition of her Rappresentatio7ie,
printed in 1555.

With these religious Rappresentationi M. Colomb
de Batines joins a few secular poems, whose title
to be considered dramatic is not very clear. Of
those which he mentions, the earliest is the Favola
d' Orfeo, by Angelo Politiano, which forms part
of La Giostra di Giuliano di Medici, printed with-
out name or date, probably about 1495, with ten
excellent cuts, that of Aristeo pursuing the flying
Eurydice being, perhaps, the best. La Giostra di
Lorenzo di Medici, celebrated by Luigi Pulci, has
only a single cut, but that a fine one, — a meeting of
knights in an amphitheatre. Among other secular
chapbooks which enjoyed a long popularity was a
series of 'contrast!,'^ the contrast of Carnival and
Lent, of Men and Women, of the Living and the
Dead, of the Blonde and the Brunette, and of Riches

^ El Contrasto di Camesciale e la Quaresima ; EI Contrasto degli
Huomini e delle Donne ; El Contrasto del Vivo e del Morto; El Con-
trasto della Bianca e della Brunetta ; La Contenzione della Poverta
contra la Richezza, etc.

Martyrdom of S. Dorothea.

132 Early Illustrated Books

and Poverty. I give here the first of the two cuts of
the Contrasto di Carnesciale e la Quaresima, undated,
but probably early. With these little poems we must
join the metrical Novella and Istorie, to which atten-
tion has lately been called by the discovery in the
University Library at Erlangen of a little collection
of twenty-one tracts, all undated, and without any
indication of their printers, but which may safely be
assigned to the early part of the sixteenth century
Among them are the Novella di Gualtieri e Griselda,
the Novella di due Preti et un Cherico, the Novella
delta Figliuola del Mercatante, etc. Dr. Varnhagen
has printed an account of these Erlangen tracts, with
reproduction of their cuts, one or two of which
frequently occur in the Rappresentationi.

The charm of these little Florentine books is so
great, and of late years has won such steadily in-
creasing recognition, that I do not think an apology
is needed for the length at which they have here been
treated. None the less, we must remember that they
were essentially popular books, and that the wealthy
book-lovers of the time probably regarded them very
slightly. Mischomini himself did not turn his atten-
tion to them till he had been printing nearly a dozen
years, and even after 1492 his more expensive books,
the great Plotinus, for instance, issued in that year,
kept strictly to the traditions of twenty years earlier,
and were wholly destitute of ornament, even of
printed initials. The two classes of books — those
on good paper and in a large handsome type, and

iCEIcontrafto di CarneTcUle Be Uquittttma. t

t'i>r-r^-g-^ ,3-iT5:;^iL!i-3rr-r^-3ni

-■ P7g-;g-gixis:xij:.LCJ:E3Z3UQ

HL tcnipo che uoU^xnoepcnmti
cutce Iccofe fapeuano parlare
^ queflo fu conccduto da ifatl
chaueuono au(^orita pocerlo fare
pcrchc dogni uirtu enn docati
difar iagratia fiuolfcro dcgnare
A: fecondu chc parlano gU ebrei
duro lagracia gtomi quaranca fd

Duo grf porcntie ncl mSdo regnaua
& luno lifcra dato alceaiporale
& nella gola lui fcmpre Itudiaua
0r<]iKftoerachiauiaco elcamouale
dicofc ghiotte mal fifaciaua
^lafeconda allofpirituale
cha difciplinc f< dlgiuni fifcri data
Cc era bquatcTiuia diianuta

Tcncua Camouale cortc bandft*
laniattina A: lafcra arrofto fir Icflb
fcmpre facccdo plu fplcndida uita
cniagiori ghionl glifVauano apreQ'ui'
■era lagola moico ben fomita

' dicofc ghiotte in qiiantita 6c fpcflo
fcgiicraalniodo nlcua ghiottomia
per contcntar fua uogUa lauolia

V,

Scmprc Icmcnfc crano apparatc
digniotti tutte quite ftauano piene
faccendo fpeflo digram ragunatc
con niagn i dcfinari 6c ricclie cenc
&• trionipluiia clucrno con ladate
CO fcgatcgll ftarnc tordi Sc fchiene
Arfcptc pozi piciii diconfccll
niidccic aiarzapam*3f niorrdlcfti

134 Early Illustrated Books

those on poor paper with small type carelessly
printed, but with delightful woodcuts — were issued
side by side, but the beauties of the two were never
combined, and the Florentine printer would doubt-
lessly have been greatly surprised if they had been
told that it was the chapbooks which were to win
the day. Even in the little italic editions issued by
the Giuntas, in imitation of Aldus, which appealed
to an intermediate class of purchasers, woodcuts
occur but rarely, and the only instance I can call
to mind is a Dante, printed by Philippo Giunta in
1 509, which, besides some plans of the Inferno, etc.,
has a single cut illustrating the first canto.

We have devoted so much space to Venice and
Florence that the illustrated books of other towns
must be noticed with rather unfair brevity. Brescia
may be taken as an example of a town at which the
native artist did his best. We have already remarked
the publication there of a Dante in 1487. The
same year witnessed the appearance of an ^sop,
rudely imitated from the Verona edition, and in
149 1 Baptista da Forfengo printed another book in
which we have been interested, a Fior di Virtu, with
a title-cut of a student, head on hand, reading at a
desk. On a ledge on the wall are two flower-pots,
the flowers in which reach up to a very decorative
ceiling. This is quite a nice example of Brescian
art, but the productions of the town have not been
studied, and further research might show that they
deserve more serious praise. At Ferrara artists of the

Italy — Milan 135

schools of Venice and Florence appear to have com-
bined in the production of some very notable books.
To two of these, both published by Lorenzo di Rossi
in 1497, attention has been drawn by the Vicomte
Delaborde in his La Gravure en Italic avant Marc
Antoine. The first is an edition of the Epistles of
S. Jerome, with numerous vignettes and three fronti-
spieces, the third of which, somewhat in the style of
the Venetian Boccaccio, bears the date 1493, divided
between its two columns. This frontispiece appears
also in the other work, the De pluribus claris
selectisque nmlieribus of Philippus Bergomensis, the
illustrations in the text of which show Florentine
influence in their black backgrounds. This book has
a title-page printed in large Gothic letters cut in
wood, similar to that of the Nuremberg Chronicle.

No illustrated books appear to have been issued
at Milan during the eighties, but in 1492 Philippo
Mantegazza printed the Tluorica Musice of Gafori
with some coarse cuts, and this was followed in
1494 by the Trionfi of Petrarch, printed by Antonio
Zaroto with the usual six full-page illustrations. As
befits the reputation of Milan as a musical centre,
the works of Gafori were often printed there. In
1496 Guillaume Le Signerre of Rouen printed there
the first edition of the Practica Musice, with a curious
title-page representing the relations of the Muses and
the heavenly bodies, and fine ornamental borders to
two pages of text. At the base of one of these are
little scenes of choir-boys practising and a music-

136 Early Illustrated Books

mistress giving a lesson. The style of the borders
is distinctly Venetian. In another work of Gafori's
printed at Milan, the De Harmonia Instrumentorum%
of 1 5 18 (reprinted two years later at Turin), the cuts
exhibit the heavy Milanese shading, one of them
representing a lesson on the organ and the other
a performer playing.

In 1496 Le Signerre printed a devotional work, the
Specchio di Anima^ \f\\h seventy-eight full-sized cuts
to its eighty-eight pages. Most of the cuts relate to
the passion of Christ, and they are described by Dr.
Lippmann as 'vigorously executed in coarse thick
outlines, with scarcely any shading.' Some of these
cuts reappear three years later in the same printer's
Tesauro Spirituale^ of which the unique copy is in
the Berlin Print-Room. In 1498 Le Signerre printed
an ^sop, the cuts in which are surrounded by small
black borders relieved in white. The illustrations
themselves are poor. At the end of the book is the
printer's mark, a crowned stork in a shield within a
circle, on either side of which stand a fox and a
monkey. In this same year Le Signerre transferred
his press to Saluzzo, where in 1499 he issued the
Tesauro Spirituale^ and four years later an edition
of the De Veritate Contricionis of Vivaldus, with a
fine frontispiece representing S. Jerome in the desert.
The border shows typical Milanese ornament, and
recalls the illumination to the Sforziade, mentioned
in our first chapter. In 1507 a still finer work, ac-
cording to Dr. Lippmann, an edition of the Opus

Italy — Italian Printers' Marks 137

Regale, also by Vivaldus, was printed at Saluzzo by
Jacobus de Circis. This contains a portrait of the
Marquis of Saluzzo, Louis II., whose taste has won
for the town its little niche in the history of printing.
Italian printers' devices have as yet received little
attention compared to that bestowed upon French

f — ,— -

1

/b^

B^

Mark of Bazalerius de Bazaleriis.

ones ; they are, however, very decorative and interest-
ing, and it is good to know that Dr. Paul Kristeller
has found time amid his study of more important
woodcuts to reproduce by photography nearly a
complete collection of those in use before 1525, to
the number of between three and four hundred.

138

Early Illustrated Books

From the proofs of his forthcoming book on the
subject of these devices Dr. Kristeller very kindly
allowed me to select seven of the representative
examples, which are here figured. In the great
majority of devices the ground is black, with a simple
design, mostly including a circle and a cross, out-

Mark of Stephanus GuilliretL

lined in white. The mark of Bazalerius de Bazaleriis
of Bologna and Reggio, taken from a copy of the
Epistolae of Philelphus, printed by him in 1489, shows
this class of design in almost its simplest form. In
that of Stephanus Guillireti, who printed at Rome

Italy — Italian Printers Marks 1 39

from 1506 to 1524, we have the addition of a shield
(the arms on which, unluckily, have not been iden-
tified) and floral sprays. These floral sprays become
the chief feature in the design of Franciscus de
Mazalis ofReggio, who printed from 1493 to 1504;
though the initials, circle, and cross of the simpler
devices are all retained. An even more beautiful

MHt^i^]

^^^^^^^^^^■^■J

w.

m

Wmsm

Mark of Francis de Mazalis.

example of this class of mark was used by Egmont
and Barrevelt, the printers of the Sarum Missal, who
added to its attractiveness by the use of red ink,
instead of black. Red ink also adds immensely to
the effect of the well-known mark of Nikolaos Blastos,
which occurs in a copy of the Commentary of Simpli-
cius upon Aristotle, printed by Zacharia Caliergi at
Venice in 1499. The delicate tracery of this design

I40

Early Illustrated Books

is unsurpassed by any work of the time. The mark
of Nicolaus Gorgonzola, who printed at Milan from
1504 to 1533, in its floral ornaments, is very similar
in style to those of Mazalis and Egmont, but, as in
the mark of Blastos, the cross and circle have dis-

appeared, and the name is set out in full, instead of
by its initials.

Purely ornamental designs, of the styles illustrated
in these five examples, form the majority among

Italy — Italian Printers Marks 141

Italian devices, but more pictorial ones were by no
means unknown. One of the best of these was that
used by 'Simon de Gabiis dictus Bevilaqua,' who
printed at Venice from 1485 to about 15 12. Another
good device is that of Ser Piero di Pacini of Pescia,
the publisher of so many of the Florentine illustrated

gBiEEfim

books. This consists of a crowned dolphin on a
black ground, with sometimes a smaller device of a
bird, placed on each side of it.

As examples of later styles, though not very beauti-
ful in themselves, we add here the rather clumsy wood-
cut of S. Nicholas adopted by Niccolo d Aristotele da
Ferrara, called il Zoppino,' who printed at Venice

142

Early Illustrated Books

from 1508 to about 1536, and the very florid device
of Hieronymus Francisci Baldassaris, a printer at
Perugia from about 1526 to 1550. The arms there
shown are those of the city of Perugia, while the
F and the cross above it reproduce the mark used

'*e^^"«^'#^

Mark of Niccolo Zoppino.

by the printer's father, Francesco, the founder of
the firm. The Aldine anchor and the fleur-de-lys
of Lucantonio Giunta and his successors are too
well known to need reproduction or comment,
though both stand rather apart from the ordinary
run of Italian marks.

arbzeDrsbaratllesnow
mlkmmt impnme et

CHAPTER VII.

FRANCE.

The earliest productions of the French press will
not bear comparison with those of either the German
or the Italian : they have neither the massive dignity
of the one, nor the artistic grace of the other. The
worthy professors at the Sorbonne, who called to
their aid the Swiss or German printers, Crantz
Gering and Friburger, bestowed, as we have seen in
our first chapter, considerable trouble on the decora-
tion by hand of special copies for presentation to
influential friends or patrons, but in other respects,
their books were wholly destitute of ornament.
When, after little more than two years, they gave
up their press, the three printers started again on
their own account with a gothic type of the most
wretched description, nor did Gering, who afterwards
worked both by himself and in combination with
other printers, produce a really handsome book until
about 1480. The semi-gothic types of another firm
of German printers in Paris, Peter Caesaris and
Stoll, are much more attractive, but the average
French work during the seventies was not good.

The first attempt at decoration appears to have
been made, not at the capital, but at Lyons, where, in

K

1 46 Early Illustrated Books

August 1478, an anonymous printer, probably Martin
Husz, completed a double-column edition of Le
Miroir de la n^demption humainey translated from the
Latin by Julien Macho, with cuts copied from those
in a German edition of the Speculum, printed at
Basle in 1476. In 1478, also, Barth^lemy Buyer
printed an edition of the romance of Baudoin, Comte
de Flandre with no cuts, but with rude printed
initials. In an edition of Les Quatre Filz Aymon,
unsigned and undated, but printed at Lyons about
1480, the first page bears four grotesque woodcuts
representing the reception of the youths by Charle-
magne, the buffet which the Emperor's son gave one
of them over a game of chess, the fatal blow with
the golden chess-board by which the buffet was
returned, and then the four youths fighting amid a
crowd. On the next page a larger picture shows their
expulsion from Charlemagne's court. Throughout the
book are curious woodcut initials, interwoven with
grotesque faces. In 1483 Mathieu Husz and Pierre
Hongre issued a L^gende dor^e, with large pictures of
Christ in Glory on the Last Day, and of the Cruci-
fixion, and numerous very rough cuts at the head of
the different chapters. In the same year, Husz
published, in conjunction with Jean Schabeller, an
illustrated translation of Boccaccio's De Casibus
illustrium Virorum (* Du dechier des nobles hommes
et femmes '). Meanwhile, at Albi, in Languedoc, of
all places in the world, Neumeister had reprinted his
edition of the Meditationes of Turrecremata (see

France 147

p. 89) in 1 48 1. In 1484 we hear of illustrated books
in three other towns. At Rennes, Pierre Bellescullee
and Josses printed the Coutumes de Bretagne^ with a
woodcut of the arms of Burgundy, used again the next
year in the same printers' Floret en francoys, a book
noticeable for having a woodcut title printed in white
on a black ground. At Vienne, Pierre Schenck
printed another edition, in double-columns, of Z'^^^^r
en court, with small cuts at the chapter headings. At
Chambery, Antoine Neyret finished, on July 6th, an
edition of the Exposition des Evangiles en roviant of
Maurice de Sully, and in the following November the
romance of Baudoin cointe de Flandre. The Bishops'
sermons have, on the first page, a large initial I and
a very rough cut of the disciples loosing the ass and
her colt for Christ's use. With their other illustra-
tions I am not acquainted. The romance of Count
Baldwin has a full-page cut of the count riding on a
gaily-decked charger, and thirteen smaller illustra-
tions of his adventures, of which, however, several are
repeated. The execution of them all is as rude as can
well be conceived. Two years later, Neyret printed
the first edition of a very famous book, Le Livre dii
Roi Modus et de la Rcine Ratio, ' lequel fait mencion
commant on doit deviser de toutes manieres de
chasses.' The cuts in this are numerous, and their
representations of the various hunting scenes are
more than sufficiently grotesque.

The list of books we have named could certainly
be extended, especially as regards those printed at

148 Ea7'ly Illustrated Books

Lyons, but it is sufficiently full to enable us to draw
some useful conclusions from it The illustrations
are, almost without exception, poor in design and
badly cut, and are mostly accompanied by inferior
types and press-work. Some of them are imitated
from the books of foreign printers, and they contain
no evidence whatever of the growth of any French
school of illustrators. On the other hand, they
testify to the spread of a demand for illustrated books,
at least in the provinces, which local printers were
doing their best to satisfy. At Paris the demand,
apparently, had not yet arisen. In the first dated
book which bears the name of Jean Du Pr^, a Missale
nd usiim ecclesiae Parisiensis, printed by him in con-
junction with Desir^ Huym in 148 1, there are said to
be two woodcuts illustrating the Canon. With the
exception of the devices of a few printers, such as
Guyot Marchant and Berthold Rembolt, these are
the only woodcuts in books printed at Paris before
1485, of which I have found record. Probably there
are others, but I do not think there can be many,
and we may reasonably conclude that the lead in
book-illustration was taken by the provinces, and that
the Paris printers waited some fifteen years before
daring to enter into competition with the beautiful
manuscripts which were still being produced in
great numbers, and in the most sumptuous style of
decoration.

It is at this conjuncture that Antoine Verard enters
on the scene. Although some of the innumerable

France 1 49

works which bear his name are said to have been
printed ^par Antoine V^rard/ it is clear that the
expression must not be taken too literally, and that
he was a ' libraire,' i.e. a bookseller or publisher,
rather than a printer. His first dated book 1 is an
edition, e'nriched with a single woodcut, of Laurent
du Premier Fait's French version of the Decamerone,
and the colophon tells us that it was printed for
Antoine Verard, 'libraire, demeurant sur le Pont
Notre Dame, a I'image de Saint Jean I'Evangeliste,'
on November 22, 1485. The types used in the book
have been identified as belonging to Jean Du Pre, and
the association of the two men seems to have led to
important results. The next year we find Du Pre
printing an edition of S. Jerome's Vie des anciens
saintz Peres, with a delightful frontispiece of the saint
preaching from a lectern in the open air, numerous
smaller cuts, and initial letters with interwoven faces.
During i486 also, he assisted Pierre Gerard (who
earlier in the year had printed by himself an edition
of Boutillier's La Sonnne Rurale with a single cut), in
producing at Abbeville the first really magnificent
French illustrated book, S. Augustine's Cite de Dieu,
in which paper and print and woodcuts of artistic

^ Hain assigns to Verard z¥ XQnch Josephtcs, dated December 7, 1480,
Bonnor's VArbre de Batailles, 1481, and the Liber Parabolaruni of
Alanus, March 20, 1484, o.s. But he had not seen any of these books,
nor, indeed, more than three out of his list of Verard's works. I,
therefore, follow the statement of M. Thierry-Poux. It may be noted
that Verard undoubtedly printed editions of all the three books named,
but at much later dates.

1 50 Early Ilhisirated Books

value all harmonise.^ Two years later he joined
with another provincial printer, Jean le Bourgeois, in
producing a still more splendid book, the romance of
Lancelot dii Lac, the first volume of which was finished
by Le Bourgeois at Rouen on November 24th, and the
second by Du Pr^ at Paris on September i6th. In
1488 also, Du Pr^ produced his first ' Book of Hours,'
but the French Horae form so important an episode in
the history of the decoration of books, that we must
reserve their treatment for a separate chapter, in
which, besides those of Du Pr^ and Verard, who led
the way with an edition in 1487, we shall have to
speak of the long series inaugurated by Philippe
Pigouchet and Simon Vostre in the next year.

At starting, Verard's resources were probably small,
and for a year or two he produced little beyond his
Horae. In 1487, however, he published a French
Livy, with four small cuts, representing a battle, a
siege, a king and his court, and some riders, whose
hats have a very ecclesiastical shape, entering a town.
The next year produced a work entitled LArt de
Chevalerie selon V/g-ece, really an edition of the Falts
d'arme et de chevalerie of Christine de Pisa. This
has a single large cut representing a king and his
court. 'Y\\^ Livre de Politiqucs d'Aristote, published

^ The only other Abbeville illustrated book is the 1487 Triomphe des
Neuf Preux, with conventional portraits of most of the heroes (their
legs wide apart), and a bullet-headed Du Guesclin, which looks almost
as if it might be based on some authentic tradition. In a 1508 reprint
l)y Michel le Noir at Paris, while some of the old cuts were retained
this Du Guesclin was replaced by a much more showy figure.

France 1 5 1

in 1489, has a large frontispiece of the translator,
Nicholas Oresme, presenting his book to Charles viiL,
in which the characteristic style of V^rard's artist is
fully developed. In 1490, an edition of Lucaiit,
Snetone, et Saluste,\v\C\Q}[i I have not seen, was printed
for V^rard by Pierre Le Rouge. To 1491 probably
belongs his French Seneca, and in this year he must
have obtained the aid of the king or of some very
rich patron, for his activity from 1492 to the end of
the century is quite amazing. It is from about this
same year, also, that we may date the production of
these magnificent special copies on vellum, enriched
with elaborate, if not very artistic, miniatures, to
which we have already alluded in our first chapter.

The chief book of 1492 was undoubtedly the series
of treatises making up the Art de bien vivre et de
bien mourir, of which a detailed description will be
given later on. These treatises were printed for
V^rard by Cousteau and Menard, the first part being
finished on July i8th, the last on December 19th.
Next to them in importance is a Josephus de la bataiile
judaique, one of V^rard's large folios, with columns
of printed text, not reckoning any margin, nearly
twelve inches long. The frontispiece is a fine cut of
a triumphal entry of a king who should be French,
since he wears the lilies. The design, however, must
have been made for this book, for a label in the
middle of the picture bears the name 'Josephus,'
while in the Gestes Romaines and Lajtcelot, in both of
which the cut reappears, the label is left blank. The

152 Early Illustrated Books

' Entry ' is also used again, three times in the JosepJms
itself, at the beginning of the fourth, fifth, and seventh
books. An entry of a different kind, that of a king
and his staff into a captured town, is depicted in the
cut (here reproduced) which heads the prologue.
This is faced by the first page of text headed by a
cut of an author presenting his book to an ecclesiastic.
Both pages are surrounded by fine borders of flowers,
women, and shield. The head-cut to the second
book shows a monk handing a book to a king, that
used for the third and sixth (repeated again in the
Lancelot of 1494), shows a king on his throne sur-
rounded by his courtiers, a sword of justice is in
his hand, and a suppliant kneels before him. Small
cuts, fitting into the columns, head the different
chapters in each book, but are of no great merit.
Occasionally a border about an inch wide runs up
the side of one of the columns of text, usually on the
outer margin, but sometimes on the inner. Altogether
the book is a very notable one.

In 1493, V^rard's activity was still on the increase,
and we have at least eight illustrated books of his
bearing the date of this year. In the romance of Z^
Jouvencel and Bonnor's Arbre des Batailles, both in
4to, the cuts, all of them small, are nearly identical,
and are repeated again and again in each book.
Much more important than these are the editions of
the Chronicques de France (printed for V^rard by
Jehan Maurand), and a translation of the Metamor-
phoses of Ovid, issued under the very taking title of

fep»mtn;ffiflptftff|I.9cfamif.Tcorrifiot)5(;no6fc6qucfitft
(ctfttcaaribtySttnumB/iomcf^aatutitte.^fcommiue

¥iova\6T2xd's fose/ikus, 1492. (Much reiuced.)

1 54 Early Ilhistrated Books

La Bible des Poetes. This is another of Verard's
great folios, with profuse illustrations, large and
small, and in its vellum edition is a very gaudy and
magnificent book. In 1494 V^rard published his
Lancelot ; and in 1495, a L^getide Dor^e and S.
Jerome's Vie des Peres en frangois. This last book
was finished on October 15, but its appearance was
preceded by that of the first volume of the publisher's
most ambitious undertaking, an edition of the Miroir
Historial of Vincent de Beauvais. This enormous
chronicle is in thirty-two books, which V^rard divided
between five great folio volumes, averaging about
three hundred and twenty leaves, printed in long
double columns. The whole work thus contains
about the same amount of matter as some fifty
volumes of the present series (which, however, is
mercifully limited to six), yet it was faultlessly
printed on the finest vellum, and with innumerable
woodcuts, subsequently coloured, in considerably less
than a year. The first volume was finished on Sep-
tember 29, 1495, and the colophon which announces the
completion of the last, 'i I'honneur et louenge de nostre
seigneur iesucrist et de sa glorieuse et sacrde mere
et de la court celeste de paradis,' bears date May 7th,
1496. In the face of such activity and enterprise, I
feel ashamed of having girded at the good man foi"
having used some of the Ovid cuts as a basis to his
illuminations in this gigantic work.

After 1496 to the end of the century, Verard's
dated books are very few. The only one I have met

France 1 5 5

with myself is a Merlin of 1498. It is possible that
he produced less (the Miroir may not have proved
a financial success), but it is quite as likely that he
merely discontinued his wholesome practice of dating
his books, and that the Boetkitis, the Roman de la
RosBy the Gestes Romaines, the romances of Tristram
and Gyron, and other undated works, whose colophons
show that they were printed while the Pont Notre
Dame was still standing, i.e. before October 25th,
1499, belong to these years. After 1500 Verard's
enterprise certainly seems less; He continued to
issue editions of poets and romances, but they are
much less sumptuous than of yore, and in place of
his great folios we have a series of small octavos,
mostly of works of devotion, with no other ornament
than the strange twists of the initial L, which adorns
their title-pages. The example here given is from
an undated and unsigned edition of the Livre du
Faulcon, but the letter itself frequently occurs in
Verard's undoubted books. The first hint for this
grotesque form of ornament may have been found
in the small initials of Du Pre's i486 edition of
S. Jerome's Vie des anciens saintz P^res, and variants
of the L were used by other publishers besides
V^rard, e.g. by Jacques Maillet at Lyons, and Pierre
Le Rouge and Michel Le Noir at Paris. The most
noticeable examples of the L, besides the one here
given, are the man-at-arms L of the 1488 edition of
the Mer des Histoires (P. Lerouge), the monkey-and-
bagpipes L, here shown, from Maillet's 1494 edition

limehnfmlcoa

Initial L used by Veraid.

Initial L used by Maillet.

158 Early Illustrated Books

of the Recueil des Histoires Trqyennes, a St. George-
and-the-Dragon L in a Lyons reprint of the Mer des
Histoires, and the January-and-May L which, I
believe, was first used by V^rard for a 1492 edition
of the MatJuolus, or 'quinze joies du mariage,' but
which turns up alternately at Lyons and at Paris in
the most puzzling manner.

It seems probable that the attention which V^rard
paid to his vellum editions, in which the woodcuts
were only useful as guides to the illustrator, made him
less careful than he would otherwise have been to secure
the best possible work in his ordinary books. Cer-
tainly I think his most interesting cuts are to be
found not in his later books but in the collection of
six treatises which he had printed by Gillet Cous-
teau and Jehan Menard in 1492, and republished,
somewhat less sumptuously the next year, under the
collective title UArt de bien vivre et de bien mourir,
the reprint coming from the press of Pierre Le Rouge.
The cuts in this collection have a special interest
for us, because some of them were afterwards used
in English books, and we may therefore be allowed
to examine them at some length.

In the 1492 edition the first title-page Le liure
intitule lart de bien mourir heralds only the first
work, an adaptation of the old Ars Moriendi show-
ing the struggle between good and bad angels for
the possession of the dying soul. The devils tempt
the sufferer to hasten his end (' interficias teipsum '
one of them is saying, the words being printed on a

France 159

label), they remind him of his sins (' periuratus es '),
tempt him to worldly thoughts (' intende thesauro '),
persuade his nurses to over-commiseration (' Ecce
quantam penam patitur '), or flatter him with unde-
served praise (' coronam meriusti '). To each of
these assaults his good angels have a ' bonne in-
spiracion ' by way of answer, and the devils have to
confess ' spes nobis nulla ' and to see the little figure
of the soul received into heaven. The second treatise
is called at the beginning Legtiyllon de crainte divine
pour Men mourir, but on the title-page placed on
the back of the last leaf ' les paines denfer et les
paines de purgatoire.' Its illustrations consist of large
cuts in which devils are inflicting excruciating and
revolting tortures on their victims. Its colophon gives
the printers' names and the date July 18, 1492. The
next three parts of the book are Le Traiti de Vavene-
ment de VAntechrist, Les Quinze Signes, or Fifteen
Tokens of Judgment, and Les Joies du Paradis. The
printing of these was finished on October 28. Only
the middle treatise is much illustrated, but here the
artist had full play for his powers in representing
the fish swimming on the hills, the seas falling into
the abyss, the sea-monsters covering the earth, the
flames of the sea, the trees wet with blood, the
crumbling of cities, the stones fighting among them-
selves, and the other signs of the Last Day. Perhaps
the best of this set of cuts is that representing the
* esbahissement ' or astonishment of the men and
women who had hidden themselves in holes in the

i6o Early Illustrated Books

earth, when at last they ventured forth. But in the
last treatise, the Art de bien vivre, quaintness and
horror are replaced by really beautiful work. The
cuts here are intended to illustrate the Ave Maria,
Lord's Prayer, Creed, Ten Commandments, and Seven
Sacraments. Those in the last series are the largest
in the book, each of them occupying a full page.
The creed has a series of smaller cuts of inferior
work. But the picture which precedes this, repre-
senting the twelve apostles, and the pictures of
the Angelic Salutation, of the Pope invoking the
Blessed Virgin (here shown), and of Christ teaching
the Apostles, show the finest work, outside the Horae,
in any French books during the fifteenth century.
These blocks, or close imitations of them, with those
of the ' pains of hell,' were used again the next year
by Guyot Marchant in his Compost et Kalendrier des
Bergiers in which, as we have seen (p. i6), Verard
painted out Marchant's device in the copy on vellum
which he illuminated for Charles Vlii. They appear
also in two English books printed at Paris, in 1 503,
The Tray tie of god lyuyng and good deyngy and The
Kalendayr of Shyppars, and in all the English
editions of the latter work from Pynson's in 1506
onward. They are fairly well reproduced in Dr.
Sommer's reprint already mentioned (p. 16 note).

Verard employed so many of the Paris printers on
his different books, that it is by no means easy to
disentangle their separate careers. Thus a border
and a cut from the Abbeville Cite' de Dicu, printed

pHte etj patadie Uvx^ com>

C^nfixitia fatntoitionan
geftqaemipc^e fOHf^ fee

^- — »-• ecge niawe eij ^ifant
^ ue grarta pff na blie Ucvi/ St '
nc^Kta fa f inutietiBviB.^t fat
fr ffi;i]6rf6 en (cut Sifitafwtj
Sifi 6cneSictU6fmctue S?ttie
tui. ^Itofltemcte faicfe e^Ufe
y a oSioufte t^ii^. ^Ma mam
oux p:o uoSie pctd:fSite ometj.
Ccfi abirc to\it eufcBk.^c tc fa
fur tiiant p(amc ^e grace nof>

tu fei^neut eftattet!\e top / ttt
eeBmmreeentte touted autu^
fifties (if e fruits tot? %ititif
fueff?0mot^.^mcfc matie
mete S ^ica p:ic pout noue pe^
c^ute ameniZexte} itnya^i'
mc qui fceuft fatuet (a qfoziea
fe mete he Sieu Se fa(at pfo^ ep
cttUt/pttt6bou(pnepiue a^<'
gte<iS(e a eUe ^^ecefie piefen >
te fa(utation/(a^((e dieu (e pe >
teabicfeectcompofee (i^e^r
neeet?uopeeauxfidme^pat(^
^e^aSziei quant aux froie pzr
mietee parties, ^t pat ma ba'^
mefaincteed^aScti et faincfe
egfifc quant auf: auttte ptxee.

From Verard's Art de iien vlvrc. (Reduced.)

1 62 Early Illustrated Books

by Jean Du Pr6, subsequently passed into his pos-
session, and on the other hand, as we have seen,
some of the cuts of the Art de bien vivre et de bien
mourir appear again in Guyot Marchant's Compost
des Bergiers. Pierre Lerouge, one of V^rard's printers,
produced at least one fine book quite independently
of him. This is the first illustrated edition of La
Mer des Hystoires, the French version of the Rudi-
menta Novicioruvi (see p. 53), the general plan of
which it follows, though not slavishly. Pierre Lerouge
printed his edition for a publisher named Vincent
Commin. It is in two tall folios, with the man-at-
arms L to decorate its title-pages, and splendid
initials P, I, and S, the first having within it a figure
of a scribe at work, the S being twisted into the form
of a scaly snake, and the body of the I containing
a figure of Christ. The cuts and borders of the book
are not very remarkable. In 1498 V^rard published
a new edition of it, having obtained the use of the
old blocks. A Lyons reprint was issued about 1 500,
and other editions during the sixteenth century.
Two other printers who cannot be said to have learnt
anything from Vdrard are Jean Bonhomme, who as
early as i486 printed an illustrated edition of a very
popular book, Le livre des profits champitres of
Pierre de Crescens, and Germain Bineant, who in
1490 printed a PatJulin le grant et le petit which is
said to have woodcuts. These two books I only
know from the descriptions of M. Thierry-Poux. To
Guyot Marchant, whom we have already mentioned,

France 1 63

we owe a very important series of editions, of the
Danse Macabre or ' danse des Morts,' the first of
which, a book of twenty pages with seventeen cuts,
was printed in September 1485, a few weeks before
the appearance of the earh'est book with which we
can join V^rard's name. It was reprinted by Mar-
chant in the following June (an undated edition
having perhaps intervened) under the title of Miroer
salutaire pour toutes gens, and in 149 1 Marchant
followed it up by a Danse Macabre des Femmes in
which the right of the ladies to the attention of these
ghastly skeletons was duly vindicated. An edition
printed at Lyons, February 18, 1499 (no printer's
name), the unique copy of which is owned by Mr.
Huth, is especially interesting as containing cuts of
the shops of a printer and a bookseller, at both of
which Death is at work, eight years earlier than the
device of Badius Ascensius, which is usually quoted
as the earliest representation of a printing press.
The reduced reproduction here given is taken from
a very accurate copy in Noel Humphrey's Masterpieces
of Early Printing, as it is not fair play to the owner
of a unique book to ask for permission to reproduce
the same page more than once from the original.

Another edition of the Danse was printed by
Nicole de la Barre at Paris in 1500, and others of
the same character in the early years of the next cen-
tury. We shall have to recur to the book again both
with reference to the Horae and for the later Lyons
edition, the cuts in which are attributed to Holbein.

C<i'^i*fefe(t3t.tiajoohmentta^aabutntaeJtut Cfi«Mai tenet mptriUKaffliaieuSat
<V»9>>f troo pmntt (I moiuo&cuiictie bomuutfuc. 'S^ti) buoGue ^ pnaapi^ (inrniae (>iSdm«

C!Piu"^>u6''06tlr;>/t)6i)M^/^ffo«iuuoiifi6^nifipus'ni(iff^n<fiUncpiiao'M-M.

<lCc mo Jf
C^fnn Ninfci wig tourtnon
Tmpnmtiits fu8 ffgurtrtimt
X>cn(> tof? pout wncfufioi)
(^uru ^u« fduft utta\ntinent
^mrtw Ijng fauft 8ii8i0f£rtioie
PKff»',t c<^« lt>ou« f duft faiffct
UmiCn nr fouff nudtmcnt
SCDUuragroocongnoifHbuurtfi.

fiSe« imp:unfuR!
C^^de ou otuone noiM retoare
Puie due fu mo:t noua <fpu
ifnipnmt lUMns toiM £c8 coura
't>t la fuimrt t^^ofogu
£oi^ ■bdrrt, .1 portm*.
Put lire art pCufinito font grow cCoa
lirfmtctn tilling
£re Voitfous bee goie font buioe

Ctftmort
d i§>ae auan/ boco ots a)t2n
<X)oif?tc (t6toutmaf<6e^aaant
l^ue mr ctoarbr) be 6v!t) pna
£iuffr> 1M>> (nurti mauttavmt
9D<in fia tiougf no ft/a qudfftCui
(Prttr? ifp loo/frf pmfa
£x)mmtnt "ooue tmkn nwriisKi
Comriumfnf nrfi poo fuict

fi£tMiatH
t^<X)t fond if m<mfgt( mo7>««^^
7( crop 41U oupmottnwp.'rffic
etmtunaamniemeauaiua
ftcfje paaOutt ^fhtfft
OUn fiurce iifM<t <fae u (aifft
Ct md ttounquc Momute
iNiiit If pCTo toutt (vriJt
<Lt(eii tUu 4111 mi; ptxitt 9Vk>
S

From a Lyons Dance 0/ Death. (Much reduced.)

France 165

The only other Paris printer whom we have space
here to mention is Jean Trepperel, whose career
began in 1492, in which year, according to Hain, he
issued a Histoire de Pierre de Provence et de la belle
Magnelonne, probably illustrated. In 1493 he pub-
lished an edition of the Chroniques de France, with
four cuts, one of the founding of a town, another of
an assault, and two battle-scenes. They are good of
their kind, especially that which serves for all the
founders of cities from ^Eneas and Romulus to S.
Louis, but their repetition becomes a little weari-
some. In an undated issue of Jehan Quentin's
Orologe de Devotion the cuts are all different, but fall
into two series, one badly drawn and infamously
engraved, the other showing really fine work, and
having all the appearance of having been originally
designed for a Book of Hours.

The only other fifteenth century book of Trepperel's
with which I am acquainted is a charming quarto
edition of the romance of Paris et Vienne, a copy
of which was kindly shown me by Mr. William
Morris. It is undated, but was printed while the
Pont Notre Dame was still standing. The title-
cut shows signs of breakage, and may possibly have
been designed for the earlier edition by Denis
Meslier mentioned by Brunet as having a single cut.
The rest of the large cuts in the book have all the
appearance of having been specially designed for the
new edition, and are equal to the best work in the
Horae. Meanwhile at Lyons the rude cuts of the

1 66 Early IlUistrated Books

books which heralded illustrated work in France had
been replaced by far more artistic productions. In
1488 Michelet Topie de Pymont and Jacques Herem-
berck produced a French edition of Breydenbach's
Peregrinatio (see p. 60) with reprints of some of the
old cuts, the books of Jacques Maillet imitated fairly
well the less sumptuous of V^rard's, and Jean
Trechsel struck out a new line in his illustrated
Terence of 1493. At Rouen the Missal and Breviary
printed by Martin Morin were adorned with a curious
initial M and B in the same style as some of the
more frequent Ls, and Pierre Regnault did work
which V^rard found worthy of his vellum. Paris,
however, having once gained the predominance in
illustrated work, had as yet no difficulty in maintain-
ing her position.

It remains for us to notice briefly the printers'
devices in early French books. These are so numerous
that it is possible to divide them into rough classes.
The largest of these is formed by the marks which
have as their central ornament a tree with a shield
or label hung on the trunk, with supporters varied
according to the owner's fancy, and which are not
always easy to assign to their right place in the
animal creation. Durand Gerlier preferred rams,
Michel Tholoze wild men, Denys Janot a creature
which looks like a kangaroo, Hemon Le Fevre
dancing bears duly muzzled and chained, Simon
Vostre leopards, Thielmann Kerver unicorns, Felix
Baligault rabbits, Robert Gourmont winged stags.

France 167

Jehan Guyart of Bordeaux dolphins. Most of these
devices have a dotted background, and they are often
found printed in red ink, which adds greatly to their
decorative effect. Another class, to which V^rard's
well-known device belongs, showed in their upper part
the French lilies crowned and supported by angels.
Jean Le Forestier combined this with the tree of
knowledge, choosing lions as its supporters, but add-
ing also the sacred Iamb (for his name 'Jean'), and
similar variations were adopted by other printers.
In another large class the French printers, especially
those of Lyons, followed the simple cross and circle so
common in Italy. This was mostly printed in white
on a black ground, as by Pierre Levet, Matthieu Vivian
of Orleans, and Le Tailleur. Less often, as in the
marks of Berthold Rembolt and Georges Wolf, the
ground is white and the design black. Guillaume
Balsarin, who, as was very common, had two devices,
had one of each kind. Outside these classes the
special designs are too many to be enumerated. The
successive Le Noirs punned on their names in at least
six different devices of black heads, and Deny de
Harsy with less obvious appropriateness selected two
black men with white waistbands to uphold his shields.
Guyot Marchant's shoemakers, with the bar of music
to complete his pious motto sola fides sufficit form
one of the earliest and best known of French marks.
Pierre Regnault showed excellent taste in his flower-
surrounded P, in which the letters of his surname
may also be deciphered. The scholar-printer Badius

Mark of Ar.toine Caillaut.

France 1 69

Ascensius chose a useful, if not very pretty, design of
printers at work, the two variants of which first
appear respectively in 1507 and 1521. All these
devices and countless others will be found roughly
figured in Silvestre's Marques Typographiques ^ many
of them appear also in Brunet's Manuel du Libraire,
and those of the chief fifteenth century printers have
been reproduced with absolute fidelity in M. Thierry-
Yoxr^s, Monuments de rimprimerie frangaise. Only
the mark of Du Pr^ and one of those used by Caillaut
are therefore given here, the first (facing p. 145) in
honour of a pioneer in French illustration, the second,
as perhaps the most beautiful of any which the pre-
sent writer has seen.

The first Greek book printed in France appeared
in 1 507, and the awakening of classical feeling was
accompanied, as in other countries, by the putting
away of the last remnants of mediaeval art and litera-
ture as childish things. The old romances continued
to be published, chiefly by the Lenoirs, but in a
smaller and cheaper form, and for the most part with
old cuts. Verard diminished his output, and the
publishers of the Horae turned in despair to German
designs in place of the now despised native work.
Soon only some little octavos remained to show that
there was still an unclassical public to be catered for.
These were chiefly printed by Galliot du Pr6, with
titles in red and black, and sometimes with little
architectural borders in imitation of the more ambi-

1 70 Early Illustrated Books

tious German ones. When they disappear we say
farewell to the richness and colour which distinguishes
the best French books of the end of the fifteenth cen-
tury. Instead of the black letter and quaint cuts we
have graceful but cold Roman types, or pretty but
thin italics, with good initial letters, sometimes with
good head- and tail-pieces, but with no pictures, and
with only a neat allegoric device on the title-page
instead of the rich designs used by the earlier printers.

Geoffrey Tory of Bourges was the first important
printer of the new school. His earliest connection
with publishing was as the editor of various classical
works, but he returned from a visit to Italy full of
artistic theories as to book-making, which he pro-
ceeded to carry out, partly in alliance with Simon
Colines, for whom he designed a new device repre-
senting Time with his scythe. Tory's own device of
the * pot cass^e,' a broken vase pierced by a toret or
auger, is said to refer to his desolation on the death
of his only daughter. Devices of other printers have
been ascribed to him on the ground of the appearance
in them of the little cross of Lorraine, which is found
in some of Tory's undoubted works. It is doubtful,
however, if the cross was his individual signature or
only that of his studio.

After the Horae, which we shall notice in our next
chapter, Tory's most famous book was his own Champ-
fleury, ' auquel est contenu I'art et science de la vraie
proportion des lettres antiques,' printed in 1529. This
is a fantastic work, interesting for the prelude, in

France 1 7 1

which he speaks of his connection with the famous
Grolier, and for the few illustrations scattered about
the text. The best of these are the vignettes of
' Hercules Gallicus,' leading in chains the captives of
his eloquence, and of the Triumphs of Apollo and
the Muses. The specimen alphabets at the end of
the book also deserve notice. They show that Tory
was better than his theories, for his attempt to prove,
by far-fetched analogies and false derivations, that
there is an ideal shape for every letter is as bad in
art as it is false in history.

Tory was succeeded in his office of royal printer by
Robert Estienne, and during the rest of the century
the classical editions of this family of great printers
form the chief glories of the French press. Their
books, both large and small, are admirably printed,
and in excellent taste, though with no other orna-
ments than their printer's device, and good initials
and head-pieces. But it must be owned that from
the reign of Francis I. onwards, the decoration of the
text of most French books is far less interesting than
the superb bindings on which the kings and their
favourites began to lavish so much expense.

Only two more Paris books need here be men-
tioned, both of them printed in 1546, and both
with cuts imitated from the Italian — Jean Martin's
translation of the Hypyierotoinachia Poliphili and the
Amour de Ctipido et de PsicJie translated from
Apuleius. The first of these was published by
Jacques Kerver, the second by Jeanne de Marnef.

172 Early Illustrated Books

Of original Paris work of any eminence we have no
record after the death of Tory.

Meanwhile at Lyons a new school of book-illustra-
tion was springing up. From the beginning of the
century the Lyons printers had imitated, or pirated,
the delicate italic books printed by Aldus. The
luckless Etienne Dolet added something to the classi-
cal reputation of the town, and by the middle of the
century the printers there were turning out numerous
pocket editions of the classics, which they sold to
their customers in ' trade bindings ' of calf stamped
with gold, and often painted over with many-coloured
interlacements. The fashion for small books was set,
and when illustrations were fitted to them the result
was singularly dainty.

Before considering the editions of Jean de Tournes
and his rivals we must stop to notice the appearance
at Lyons in 1538 of the belated first edition of Hol-
bein's Dance of Death, the woodcuts for which, the
work of H. L., whose identity with Hans Lutzel-
burger has been sufficiently established, are known
to have been in existence as early as 1527, and were
probably executed two or three years before that
date. Several sets of proofs from the woodcuts are
in existence, with lettering said to be in the types of
Froben of Basle, who may have abandoned the idea
of publishing them because of the vigour of their
satire of the nobles and well-to-do. The Trechsels,
the printers of the French edition, are known to have

France 173

had dealings with a Basle woodcutter with initials
H. L., who died before June 1526, and may have pur-
chased the blocks directly from him, or at a later date
from Froben. In 1538 they issued forty-one wood-
cuts with a dedication by Jean de Vauzelles, and a
French quatrain to each cut either by him or by
Gilles Corozet, giving to the book the title Les Simu-
lachres et historiees faces de la viort. Its success was
as great as it deserved, and ten additional cuts were
added in subsequent editions. Modern reprints have
been numerous, and within the last few months the
excellent copies made by Bonner and Byfield for the
Douce edition of 1833 have been re-issued with an
admirable preface by Mr. Austin Dobson.

In the same year as the Dance of Death the Trech-
sels issued another series of upwards of a hundred
cuts after designs by Holbein, the Historiarum
Veteris Testamenti Icones, with explanatory verses by
Gilles Corozet. These, though scarcely less beautiful,
and at the time almost as successful as those in the
Dance of Death, are not quite so well known, and I
therefore select one of them, taken from the reprint
of the following year, as an illustration.

The success of these two books invited imitation,
and during the next twenty years many dainty illus-
trated books were issued by Franciscus Gryphius,
Mac^ Bonhomme, Guillaume Roville, and Jean de
Tournes. In 1540 Gryphius printed a Latin Testa-
ment, with thirty-four lines of dainty Roman type to

ABSALOM aftu&prudentiaIoab,8^mu'
lien's Thecuiddis reiiocatur. I oab mefle fiic/
cenfa, incrodudus Abfalom k patrc ofcula/
tiir.

II. R E G V M X I I I I.

"P.trja prudence mefcmmcfoB tant
K^uec I oab, que Daiiidje rapaife
l^ers*^y^bfalom, qtn uicm etifnijiiiSlaitt
Shumdicry ^fonpo'c le Lufe,

From the Hist. Vet. Test. Icones, 1539.

France 175

a page, which only measures 3I in. X 2, and in which
are set charming cuts. Bonhomme's chief success was
an edition, printed in 1556, of the first three books of
the Metamorphoses translated into French verse by
Clement Marot and Barthdemy Aneau. This has
borders to every page, and numerous vignettes mea-
suring only 1 1 in X 2. In the following year this
was capped by Jean de Tournes with another version
of the Metamorphoses, with borders and vignettes
attributed to Bernhard Salomon, usually called ' le
petit Bernard,' and the success of the book caused it
to be re-issued in Dutch and Italian. The borders
are wonderfully varied, some of them containing
little grotesque figures worthy of our own Doyle,
others dainty lacework, and others less pleasing
architectural essays. This, like most of the best
books of its kind, was printed throughout in italics,
and the attempt about this time of Robert Granjon,
another Lyons printer, to supersede the italic by a
type modelled on the French cursive hand, the ' carac-
teres de civilite,' was only partially successful. In
1563, and possibly in other years, Jean de Tournes
published an almanack and engagement-book, a
Calendrier historial, with tiny vignettes representing
the occupations appropriate to the seasons, and
alternate pages for the entry of notes by any pur-
chasers barbarous enough to deface so charming a
book with their hasty handwriting. When the brief
blaze of pretty books at Lyons died out, French
printing fast sinks into dulness, and the attempt of a

176 Early Illustrated Books

Frenchman at Antwerp to revive its glories was only
partially successful, though he has left behind him a
great name. Jean Plantin was born at Tours in 1 5 14,
and after trying to earn a living first at Paris and
then at Caen, set up a bookseller's shop at Antwerp
in 1549, and six years later printed his first book, the
Institution dune fille de noble maison. He was soon
in a position to give commissions to good artists,
Luc de Heere, Pierre Huys, Godefroid Ballain, and
others, and issued the Devises H&oiques of Claude
Paradin (1562), and the Emblems of Sambucus (1564),
of Hadrianus Junius (1565), and Alciati (1566), with
illustrations from their designs. His Horae, printed
in 1566 and 1575, with florid borders, and his Psalter
of 1 571, attempted to revive a class of book then
going out of fashion. Besides the great Antwerp
Polyglott, whose printing occupied him from 1 568 to
1573, and nearly brought him to ruin, Plantin printed
some other Bibles, one in Flemish in 1566, and a
'Bible royale' in 1570, being noticeable for their
ambitious decoration. He published also some great
folio missals, more imposing than elegant. He had
numerous sets of large initials, one specially designed
for music-books being really graceful, and a long
array of variations on the device of the hand and
compass which he adopted as his mark. The title-
pages of his larger books are surrounded with heavy
architectural borders, some of which were engraved
on copper. At his death, in 1589, he had attained
labore et constantia^ as his motto phrased it, to a fore-

France 177

most position among the printers of his day, but his
florid illustrated books have very little real beauty,
and mark the beginning of a century and a half of
bad taste from which only the microscopic editions
of the Elzevirs are wholly free.

M

CHAPTER VIII.

THE FRENCH BOOKS OF HOURS.

Books of Hours have already been mentioned in
two volumes in the series, so that there is fortunately
no need here to explain at length their early history.

Each of the Hours, we are told, had its mystical
reference to some event in the lives of the Blessed
Virgin and our Lord. Lauds referred to the visit of
Mary to Elizabeth, Prime to the Nativity, Tierce to
the Angels' Message to the Shepherds, Sext to the
Adoration by the Magi, Nones to the Circumcision.
Vespers to the Flight into Egypt, Compline to the
Assumption of the Virgin. The subsidiary Hours of
the Passion naturally suggested the Crucifixion, and
those of the Holy Spirit the Day of Pentecost. We
have here the subjects for nine pictures, which were
almost invariably heralded by one of the Annuncia-
tion, and might easily be increased by a representation
of the Adoration by the Shepherds, of the Murder of
the Innocents, and the Death of the Virgin. More-
over, the contents of Books of Hours were gradually
enlarged till they deserved the title, which has been

178

The French Books of Hours 1 79

given them, of the Lay-Folk's Prayer-Book. A
typical Book of Hours would contain —

(i.) A Kalendar (one picture),
(ii.) Passages from the Gospels on the Passion of

Christ. (One to three pictures.)
(iii.) Private Prayers.

(iv.) The Hours themselves — Horae intemeratae

beatae Mariae Virginis — with the subsidiary

Hours of the Passion and of the Holy

Ghost. (Nine to thirteen pictures.)

(v.) The Seven Penitential Psalms. (One or two

pictures.)
(vi.) The Litany of the Saints.

(vii.) The Vigils of the Dead. (One to four pictures.)
(viii.) Seven Psalms on Christ's Passion.

The Kalendar usually contained poetical directions
for the preservation of health, and was therefore pre-
luded by a rather ghastly anatomical picture of a
man. The passages from the Gospel, which began
with the first chapter of St. John, were illustrated by
a picture of the evangelist's martyrdom, and the
Passion by one of the Kiss of Judas, or of the Cruci-
fixion. To the Penitential Psalms were sometimes
prefixed pictures of Bathsheba bathing on her house-
top, and of the death of Uriah, or, more rarely, of an
angel appearing to David with weapons in his hand,
signifying the three punishments between which he
must choose for his sin in numbering the people.
The Litany of the Saints offered too wide a field for

1 80 Early Illustrated Books

full-sized plates to be assigned it, but was often
illustrated by smaller ones set in the text. To the
Vigils of the Dead the commonest illustrations at
first were those of ' Les Trois Vifs et Les Trois
Morts/ three gay cavaliers meeting their own grin-
ning corpses, ' Dives and Lazarus ' was first joined
with these and afterwards superseded them. We
also find pictures of the Day of Judgment, the
Entombment, and in one instance of a funeral. Two
illustrations in honour of the Eucharist are also of
common occurrence — one of angels upholding a cha-
lice,^ the other of the Vision of St. Gregory, when he
saw the crucified Christ appearing on the altar. If
we add to these a picture of the Tree of Jesse, and
another of the Church in heaven and on earth, we
shall have exhausted the list of subjects which appear
with any frequency, though pictures of the Creation
and Fall, of David and Goliath, of the Descent from
the Cross, and perhaps one or two others may occa-
sionally be found. It should be mentioned that the
illustrations to the Psalms on the Passion are usually
repeated from others previously used, but putting
these on one side, it will be found that we have
accounted for the subjects of some five-and-twenty
pictures, and this is in excess of the number found in
any one book, which varies from six to twenty-two.

^ I join this with the other illustration as having a Eucharislic signi-
ficance, but in one of Verard's editions the full explanation is given :
' Cest la mesure de la playe du coste de notre seigneur iesucrist qui fut
apportee de Constantinople au noble empereur Saint Charlemaine afin
que nulz ennemys ne luy peussent nuire en bataille.'

The French Books of Hours 1 8 1

In some of the earlier Home, as we shall see,
the printers contented themselves with these large
illustrations, and in others surrounded the text with
purely decorative borders of flowers and birds. But
in a typical edition the borders consist of a number
of small blocks or plates, the figures in which rein-
forced the teaching of the main illustrations. In an
edition printed by Jean Du Pre in February 1488-9,
five pages are devoted to an explanation of these
vignettes, and it will not be a waste of space to quote
a few lines :

IFCest le repertoire des histoires & figures de la bible tant du
vieilz testament <\ue du nouveau <:^«tenues dedens les vig-
nettes de ces presentes heures imprimees en cuyure. En
chascune desqz/HIes vignettes so«t contenues deux figu^fes
du vieilz testament signifia«s une vraye histoire du nouveau.
Cowme il appert par les chapitres cottez et alleguez au
propos tant en latin que frawcoys en chascune desdiVj figures
et histoire. ^Et premierement en la pagee ensuyuante
listoire de lannu«ciation est pr^figuree la nativite nostra
dame, comwe il appert par les deux figures de iesse et
balaan. prouve par le livre de isaye, vi chapitre et des
nombres xxiiii. chap. IFItem en lautre pagee ensuyua«te
^ar Rebecca et Sara est entewdu co;;/me nostre dame fut
espousee a ioseph. Ai«si qa'on lit en genese xxiiii. c. &
tho. vi.

Thus we see that, as first planned, the border
vignettes formed a continuous series illustrating
historically the teaching of the Horae by reference to
Old Testament types, with chapter and verse for
their significance. It will be noticed also that it is
distinctly stated that the vignettes in this edition
were ' imprimees en cuyvre ' — printed on copper. Two

1 8 2 Early Illustrated Books

months later, in an edition published by Antoine
V^rard (April 5th, 1489), this same table was repro-
duced with very slight alterations. The words ' en
cuyvre ' were then omitted, but ' imprim^es ' was left
in, awkwardly enough. There can be no doubt that
the omission was deliberate, and we have thus two
statements which reinforce the opinion of the best
experts, that both wood and copper were employed
in engraving different editions of these designs. We
may note, incidentally, that while in the colophon of
V^rard's edition the true character of the book is
shown by its being entitled * ces presentes heures,' on
the title-page it is called ' Les Figures de la Bible,'
a striking testimony to the value at first attached
to the vignettes.

These Old Testament types do not appear to have
retained their popularity long, and were soon super-
seded by a less continuous form of illustration. The
Calendar offered an excuse for introducing one series
of vignettes of the sports and occupations of each
month, another of the signs of the zodiac, and a third
giving pictures of the saints in connection with the
days on which they were commemorated. The
Gospels of the Passion were illustrated by vignettes
on the same subject ; the Hours themselves by a
long series on the lives of Christ and of the Blessed
Virgin. The Dance of Death was brought in to
illustrate the Vigils of the Dead, and relief was given
by some charming scenes of hunting and rural life,
which formed the border to the Private Prayers and

The French Books of Hours 183

the Litany of the Saints. In addition to these, we
have representations of the Prophets and Sibyls,
of the Cardinal Virtues, and the Lives of the Saints,
and an admixture of purely decorative or grotesque
designs. Between the vignettes spaces were often
left, which were filled in, sometimes with illustrative
texts, sometimes with a continuous prayer or ex-
hortation, either in French or Latin. Thus in the
preliminary leaves of some of the Horae the text
read :

Tout bon loyal et vaillant catholique qui commencer aucune
euvre ymagine doit invoquer en toute sa pratique premiere-
ment la puissance divine par ce beau nom iesus qui illumine
tout cueur humain & tout entendement. Cest en tout fait
ung beau commencement :

and when we turn to the Gospels of the Passion
we find a prayer beginning ' Protecteur des bons
catholiques, donne nous croire tellement les paroles
euangeliques,' etc. In V^rard's earlier editions the
book would have to be twisted round to read the
words on the lower border, but in Pigouchet's this
defect was remedied, so that we are left free to
imagine that the prayer was meant for devotional
use, and not merely as a decoration.

The chief firms employed in the production of
these beautiful prayer-books during the fifteenth
century were (i.) Jean Du Pr^ ; (ii.) Antoine Verard ;
(iii.) Philippe Pigouchet, working chiefly for Simon
Vostre, a publisher, but also for De Marnef, and
Laurens Philippe, and occasionally on his own account.
The proportion of dated and undated editions is about

1 84 Early Illustrated Books

equal, and with careful study it ought to be possible
to trace the career of each of the important firms,
noting when each new illustration or vignette makes its
first appearance. Unfortunately great confusion has
been introduced into the bibliography of Horae by the
presence in them of calendars, mostly for twenty
years, giving the dates of the moveable feasts. All
that these calendars show is that the edition in which
they occur must have been printed before, probably
at least five or six years before, the last year for
which they are reckoned. The fact that, e.g., the
editions printed by Pigouchet in August and Sep-
tember 1498 have the 1488 to 1508 calendar is by
itself sufficient to prove that they cannot do more
than this. Unluckily a connection has often been
assumed between the first year of the calendar and
the year of publication — e.g. undated Horae with the
calendar for 1488- 1508 are frequently ascribed on
that ground only to 1488, or with perverse ingenuity
to 1487, as if a calendar of the moveable feasts were
like an annual almanack, and must necessarily be
printed in readiness for the new year. Great con-
fusion has thus been caused, so that it is impossible
to trust any conjectural date for an Horae unless we
know the grounds on which it is based.

The earliest dated French Horae was finished by
Antoine V^rard on July 7th, 1487, but V^rard's later
editions bring him into connection with other pub-
lishers, and it will be convenient to consider first three
editions by Jean Du Pr^, all of which are of great

The French Books of Hours 185

interest. The one which we must rank as the earHest
is that printed on February 4th, 1488-9, from whose
table of the vignettes we have already quoted. This
is the only one of the three which was known to
Brunet, whose list of Horae in the fifth volume of his
Manuel du Libraire, long as it is, is very incomplete.
Its text, including the borders, measures 5f in. by 3f,
and in addition to Du Pre's mark and the anatomical
man is illustrated by nineteen engravings. Nine of
these are the usual illustrations to the Hours them-
selves, and the subsidiary Hours of the Passion and
of the Holy Ghost. The Penitential Psalms are illus-
trated by David and Bathsheba and the Death of
Uriah, and the Vigils of the Dead by a figure of
Death. In addition to these we have the Fall of
Lucifer, Descent from the Cross, with emblems of the
four evangelists, a figure of the Trinity, the Virgin and
Child in glory, S. Christopher, S. Mary Magdalen,
and the Vision of S. Gregory, with small pictures
from the life of Christ and figures of the Saints.
The borders carry out the plan of the table of
vignettes, containing three scenes from the Bible and
three heads, with explanatory text, on each page
throughout the greater part of the book. Towards
the end these are replaced by figures of saints and
angels. The artist's designs have been rather spoilt
by the engraver, whose strokes are frequently much
too black.

The second of Du Pr^'s editions is a very interest-
ing book, for the illustrations are printed in three

1 86 Early Illustrated Books

colours — blue, red, and green. It is dated 1490, but
without the mention of any month. It has some un-
usual illustrations — e.g. the three Maries with the body
of Christ, David and Goliath, Lazarus in Abraham's
bosom and Dives in torment, and S. Christopher.
Many of the pages are without vignettes, and where
these occur they are not joined neatly together to form
a continuous border, but set, rather at haphazard,
about the margin. Pictures and vignettes are printed
sometimes in the same, sometimes in different colours.
The page of text measures 5 J in. by 4, or without
borders, 4 by 2|.

The last edition known to me by Du Pre is un-
dated, and has a Latin title-page, Hore ad usum
Romanum. Jo. de Prato. The text with borders
measures 4I in. by 3|. Its borders are similar to
those of the large folios of the period, having a floral
groundwork, into which birds, figures of men and
women, angels and grotesques are introduced. To
make up for the lack of vignettes there are seven
small illustrations of the Passion set in the text. For
the larger illustrations, which appear to be woodcuts,
Du Pr^ again varied his subjects, introducing for
the only time in these three editions Les Trots Vifs et
Les Trois Moris, reduced reproductions of which are
here given.

According to Brunet's list, V^rard published his
first Horae on July 7th, 1487, a volume without fron-
tispiece or borders, but with eight large plates, and
twenty small. This was followed the next year by

1 88 Early Illustrated Books

the first edition of his Grandes Heures, with thirteen
woodcuts and a frontispiece. I have not been fortu-
nate enough to see a copy of either of these editions,
but three undated Horae in the British Museum,
printed by V^rard, seem to belong to the same type
as the Grandes Heures. In addition to a poorly cut
Vision of Heaven, the Anatomical Man, and the
Chalice, they contain, in varying order, fourteen large
woodcuts — (i.) The Fall of Lucifer ; (ii.) the history
of Adam and Eve ; (iii.) a double picture, the upper
half showing the strife between Mercy, Justice, Peace,
and Reason in the presence of God, and the lower
half the Annunciation, which followed the Triumph
of Mercy ; (iv.) the Marriage of Joseph and Mary ;
(v.) the Invention of the Cross ; (vi.) the Gift of the
Spirit ; (vii.) a double picture of the Nativity and the
Adoration by the Shepherds ; (viii.) the Adoration by
the Magi ; (ix.) a double picture of the Annunciation
to the Shepherds and of peasants dancing round a
tree : (x.) the Circumcision ; (xi.) the Killing of the
Innocents ; (xii.) the Crowning of the Virgin ; (xiii.)
David entering a castle, with the words 'Tibi soli
peccavi,' — against Thee only have I sinned, — issuing
from his mouth ; (xiv.) a funeral service, the hearse
standing before the altar. The cut of the Message to
the Shepherds here shown will give a fair idea of the
characteristics of this series, as well as of the borders
by which they were accompanied.^ A full list of the

^ The defects in this reproduction appear also in the original, from
which it is reduced.

\ "'ft'

From a Horae of Antoine Verard.

1 90 Early Illustrated Books

larger subjects has been given because some of them
often occur in later editions joined with other pictures
of the school of Pigouchet, and it is useful to be able
to fix their origin at a glance,^ Six of them form
the only large illustrations in the little Horae, entitled
Les Figures de la Bible, printed for V^rard, April 5th,
1489, in which, as we have already noted, the words
' on copper ' appear to have been deliberately omitted
from the table of the vignettes. There can be no
doubt that they are woodcuts, and the existence of
composite editions seems to show that the printers
were able to print from wood blocks and copper
plates simultaneously on the same page. The size
of the Grandes Heures is 8 in. by 5, that of Les
Figures de la Bible 6 in. by 4. Brunet enumer-
ates altogether thirty editions of Horae printed by
Verard, the last of which, bearing a date, belongs
to the year 15 10. So far as I am acquainted with
them, these later editions have few distinguishing
characteristics, but are mostly made up with illus-
trations designed for other firms.

We come now to the most celebrated of all the
series of Horae, those printed by Pigouchet, chiefly for
Simon Vostre. Brunet in his list rightly discredits
the existence of an edition by this printer dated as
early as January 5th, i486. He accepts, however,
and briefly describes as if he had himself seen, one

1 E.g. In an addition printed by Jean Poitevin, May 15, 1498,
the illustrations for Tierce, Sext, Nones, Vespers, and Compline are
from Verard ; the others, including the printer's device, were borrowed
from Pigouchet.

The French Books of Hours 191

of September i6th, 1488, so that I must refrain from
the tempting hypothesis that this also has been sum-
moned into being only by the misreading of a date,
the edition of the same day ten years later being too
well known for Brunet to have mistaken it. Brunet
also mentions editions printed April 8th, 1488-9 {sic),
and January 20th and March ist, 1491-92. My own
acquaintance with this printer's works begins with a
Horae, not mentioned by Brunet, dated May 8th, 1492.
This, though printed on vellum, shows few signs of
the excellence to which Pigouchet afterwards attained.
The borders are floral and the figures in the illus-
trations, of which there are eighteen,^ are coarsely
drawn and too large for the page of text, which
measures 4J in. by 3. The subjects illustrated are
all normal ones, and the edition is in no way re-
markable. The same may be said of the. much larger
Horae, measuring 6 in. by 4, printed by Pigouchet,
August 27, 1493, and arranged on much the same
plan.

In another set of editions in which Pigouchet was
concerned, apparently between 1493 and 1495, the
borders are made up of vignettes of very varying
size, which may be recognised by many of them being
marked with Gothic letters, mostly large minuscules.
Sometimes one, sometimes two, vignettes thus lettered
occur on a page, and we may presume that the letter-
ing, which is certainly a disfigurement, was intended

^ I exclude the Device and the Anatomical Man, and the small
figures.

192 Early Illustrated Books

to facilitate the arrangement of the borders. In these
Horae, also, the designs are comparatively coarse and
poor. Some of the large illustrations are divided
into an upper compartment, containing the main
subject, and two lower compartments, containing its
* types.'

Certainly by 1496, and possibly in earlier edi-
tions which I have not seen, Pigouchet had arrived
at his typical style, of which a good specimen-page
is given in our illustration from the edition of August
22, 1498. His original idea appears to have been for
editions with a page of text measuring 5^ in. by 3 J,
such as he issued on April 17, 1496, and January 18,
1496-7. But, at least as early as November 4, 1497,
he added another inch both to the height and breadth
of his page by the insertion of the little figures, which
will be noticed at the left of the lower corner and on
the right at the top. The extra inch was valuable,
for it enabled him to surround his large illustrations
with vignettes, but the borders themselves are not
improved by them, for they mar the rich effect of the
best work in which the backgrounds are of black
with pricks of white.

These same dotted backgrounds, which we have
already noticed as present in some of the finest of
the printers' marks, appear also in three plates, which
are found in the 1498 editions, and thenceforward,
but, as far as I can ascertain, not earlier. These three
plates illustrate (i.) the Tree of Jesse (here shown) ;
(ii.) the Church Militant and Triumphant ; (iii.) the

(Jifejei quoittatt) e^mutnet ttommue: ioocc oia
tioie mee, g|uta mcfinautf cute faati} mk^h
etit)biedtt6 mci% muoco6o. Igf trcunbebccimf
me bofojee moxti$t(i peti'ciifa tnfcmt murnctiit ji

Dives and Lazarus, from Pigouchet's Horae. (Reduced.)

N

The Tree of Jesse, from Pigouchet's Horae.

The French Books of Hours 195

Adoration of the Shepherds. All three plates are of
great beauty, and the last is noticeable for the names
— ' Mahault,' ' Aloris,' * Alison,' * Gobin le Gay,' and
* le beau Roger ' — which are assigned to the shepherds
and their wives, and which are the same as those by
which they are known in the French mystery-plays.
The artists who used these dotted backgrounds
evidently viewed the Horae rather from the mystery-
play standpoint. They cared little for the ' types '
which V^rard and Du Pr6 so carefully explained in
their early editions, but delighted in the Dance of
Death and in scenes of hunting and rural life, or
failing these in grotesques. They placed their talents
at the disposal of religion, but they bargained to be
allowed to introduce a good deal of humour as well.

The best French Horae were all published within
about ten years. During this decade, which just
overlaps the fifteenth century, the only serious rival
of Pigouchet was Thielmann Kerver, who began
printing in 1497, and by dint of close imitation ap-
proached very near indeed to Pigouchet's success.
With the lessening of Pigouchet's activity about
1505, there came an after-flood of bad taste, which
swept everything before it. Even Simon Vostre, who
ought to have learnt from his old partner the differ-
ence between beauty and ugliness, was carried away.
He continued printing Horae till about 1520, but he
displaced the beautiful French designs by reproduc-
tions of German work utterly unsuited to the French
types and ornaments. Thus, if we open a Horae for

1 96 Early Illustrated Books

the use of Amiens, published by him in 1 5 1 3, we find
the old picture of S. John placidly undergoing his
martyrdom replaced by a realistic German design,
in which one ruffian is pouring oil over the saint from
a scuppet, and another blowing the flames with a
pair of bellows. There is plenty of vigour and clever-
ness in the picture, but it is quite out of keeping
with the Horae, and when after turning over some
dozen of similarly conceived designs we come at
last to the old plates of the Death of Uriah and
the Church Militant and Triumphant, it is impossible
not to feel that the French artists had the better
taste.

Along with the substitution of German designs
for French in the larger illustrations there went an
equally disastrous substitution of florid Renaissance
borders of pillars and cherubs for Pigouchet's charm-
ing vignettes and hunting scenes. Thielman Kerver,
who had begun with better things, soon made his
surrender to the new fashion, and his firm continued
to print Horae, for which it is difficult to find a good
word until about 1556. His activity was more than
equalled by Gilles Hardouyn, who with his successors
was responsible for some seventy editions during
the first half of the sixteenth century. Guillaume
Eustace, Guillaume Godard, and Frangois Regnault
were less formidable competitors, and besides these
some thirty or forty editions are attributable to
other printers.

On January i6th (or to use the affected style of

The French Books of Hours 197

the colophon itself, 'xvii. Kal. Febr.), 1525, Geoffroy
Tory, the scholar, artist, and printer, in conjunction
with his friend Simon Colines, brought out a Horae,
which is certainly not open to the charge of bad
taste. The printed page measures 6^ in. by 3I, the
type used is a delicate Roman letter with a slight
employment of red ink, but no hand work, the borders
are in the most delicate style of the Renaissance.
The illustrations number twelve, of which one, that
of the Annunciation, occupies two pages. There are
no unusual subjects, except that in the picture of the
Crucifixion Tory displays his classical pedantry by
surrounding the central picture with four vignettes
illustrating Virgil's * Sic vos non vobis ' quatrain, on
the sheep, the bees, the birds, and the oxen, whose
life enriches others but not themselves. In the pic-
ture of the Adoration by the Magi, here given, Tory
obtains an unusually rich effect by the figure of
the negro. He repeats this, on a smaller scale, in
the black raven, croaking Cras^ Cras, in the picture
of the Triumph of Death. The tone of the other
illustrations is rather thin, and the length of the faces
and slight angularity in the figures (effects which
Tory, the most affected of artists, no doubt deliber-
ately sought for) cause them just to fall short of
beauty. Compared, however, with the contemporary
editions of other printers, Tory's Horae seem possessed
of every beauty. We know of five editions before
his death or retirement in 1533, and of some seven
others before the close of the half-century. After

AdfextamVafus.

Eus in adiutorium mcu intcnde.
.Domincadadiuuondu mefe
ha. Gloria patri, & filio,& /pi

ritui fanfto. Sicutcrat inprind

Xio>& nunc^ femper^ & in fecu
men.Aildma. Hymnus*

F.iij.

From Tory's Horae 1525. (Reduced.)

MS'

I

The French Books of Hotirs 199

1550 the publication o{ Horae in France almost en-
tirely ceased, but some pretty editions were issued at
Antwerp by the French printer Christopher Plantin
in 1565 and 1575, and perhaps in other years. The
decree of Pope Pius V. making the use of the Office
no longer obligatory on the clergy seems to have
been preceded by a great falling off of the popularity
of the Hours among the laity, in whom the book-
sellers had found their chief customers, and after 1568
a very few editions sufficed to supply the demand of
those who were still wedded to their use.

CHAPTER IX.

HOLLAND.

This chapter and the next are to deal respectively
with the early history of book-illustration in Holland
and in Spain, and in each case, though for opposite
reasons, I propose to economise the space left at my
disposal. Hardly any work has yet been done in
cataloguing early Spanish books or their woodcuts,
and in speaking of those which I have seen myself I
can only contribute a few notes for the use of future
investigators. In Dutch books, on the other hand,
the work done by Mr. W. M. Conway in his The
Woodcutters of the Netherlands (Cambridge, 1884) is
so exhaustive that it is difficult to write on the sub-
ject without borrowing unfairly from a monograph
which every one interested in book-illustration ought
to read for himself

Mr. Conway has divided his book into three parts,
the first giving the history of the woodcutters, the
second a catalogue of the cuts, and the third a list of
the books containing them. Putting on one side the
blocks imported or directly copied from France and
Germany, he attributes the illustrations in fifteenth-
century Dutch books to some five-and-twenty different
200

Holland 20 1

workmen and their apprentices. His first group is
formed of —

(i.) A Louvain woodcutter who worked for John
and Conrad de Westphalia, for whom he cut two
capital little vignette portraits of themselves, and for
Veldener, for whom he executed the nine illustrations
in an edition of the Fasciculus Temporum^ published
on December 29, 1475.

(ii) A Utrecht woodcutter, whose most important
works are a set of cuts to illustrate the Boeck des
gulden throens, published by a mysterious printer,
Gl., in 1480, some additional cuts for a new edition
by Veldener of the Fasciculus Teniporuin, and a set
of thirty-nine cuts, chiefly on the life of Christ, for the
same printer's Epistolen ende ewangelien of 1481.

(iii.) A Bruges woodcutter, possibly the printer him-
self, who illustrated Colard Mansion's French edition
of the Metamorphoses of Ovid (1484) ; and

(iv.) A Gouda woodcutter, by whose aid Gerard
Leeu started on his career as a printer of illustrated
books with the Dialogus Creaturarum (of which he
printed six editions between June 3, 1480, and August
31, 1482), and the Gesten van Romen^ Vier Uterste, and
Historia Septem Sapientum.

Of these books, whose illustrations are grouped
together by Mr. Conway as all executed in pure line
work, the most interesting to us are the Metamorphoses
and the Dialogus. The former is handsomely printed
in red and black in Mansion's large type, and has
seventeen single-column cuts of gods and goddesses

202 Early Illustrated Books

and as many double-column ones illustrating the
Metamorphoses themselves. The larger cuts are the
more successful, and are certainly superior to the
average French work of the day, to which they bear
a considerable resemblance. Uncouth as they are,
they were thought good enough by Antoine V^rard
to serve as models for his own edition of 1493. The
Metamorphoses^ Mansion's first illustrated book, was
also the last work issued from his press ; and part of
the edition was not published till after his disappear-
ance from Bruges. The hundred and twenty-one cuts
in Leeu's Dialogus Creaturarum are the work of a far
more inspired, if very child-like, artist With a mini-
mum of strokes the creatures about whom the text
tells its wonderful stories are drawn so as to be easily
recognisable, and we have no reason to suppose that
the humour which pervades them was otherwise than
intentional.

We come now to the best period of Dutch illustra-
tion, which centres round the presses of Leeu at
Gouda and Antwerp, and of Jacob Bellaert at Haar-
lem, whose business was probably only a branch of
Leeu's. During his stay at Gouda, Leeu commis-
sioned an important set of sixty-eight blocks, thirty-
two of which were used in the Lijden ons Heeren of
1482, and the whole set in a Devote Ghetiden, which
Mr. Conway conjectures to have been published just
after the printer's removal to Antwerp in the summer
of 1484. Fifty-two of them were used again, in con-
junction with other cuts, in the Boeck vanden leven

Holland 203

Christi of Ludolphus in 1487, and the history of many
of them can be traced in other books to as late as
15 10. Thus they were evidently popular, though
neither their design nor their cutting calls for much
praise. Another set of seven cuts, to each of which
is joined a sidepiece showing a teacher and a scholar,
appears in Leeu's last Gouda book, the Van den Seven
Sacramenten of June 19, 1484, and evinces a much
greater mastery over his tools on the part of the
engraver. The little sidepiece, which was added to
bring the breadth of the cuts up to that of Leeu's
folio page (5 J in.), is particularly good.

After Leeu's removal to Antwerp his activity as a
printer of illustrated books suffered a temporary
check, and our interest is transferred to the office of
Jacob Bellaert at Haarlem, who, after borrowing
some of Leeu's cuts for a Lijden ons Heeren, issued
in December 1483, in the following February had
printed under the name of Der Sonderen troest a
Dutch version of the Belial of Jacobus de Theramo.
This has altogether thirty-two cuts, the first of which
occupies a full page, and represents in its different
parts the fall of Lucifer and of Adam and Eve, the
Flood, the Passage of the Red Sea, and the Baptism
of Christ. Six half-page cuts represent incidents of the
Harrowing of Hell, the Ascension, and the Day of
Pentecost. The other illustrations at a hasty glance
seem to be of the same size (5 in. by 3f), but are
soon discovered to be separable into different blocks,
usually three in number. Eight blocks of 2| in. each.

204 Early Illustrated Books

and seventeen of half this width are thus arranged in
a series of dramatic combinations. Thus we are first
shown the different persons who answer the citation
of Solomon, whose judgment hall is the central block
in thirteen illustrations ; then the controversy in
heaven before Christ as the judge ; then scenes in a
Royal Council Chamber, etc. Our illustration is
taken from the opening of Solomon's Court, with
Belial appearing to plead on one side, and Christ
answering the summons of the messenger, Azahel, on
the other.

In October of the same year, 1484, Bellaert printed
an edition of the Boeck des gulden throens, in which
four cuts, representing the soul, depicted as a woman
with flowing hair, being instructed by an elder, serve
as illustrations to all the twenty-four discourses. In
1485 we have first of all two romances, the Historie
vanden women ridder Jason and the Vergaderinge der
Historien van Troyen, both translated from Raoul le
Fevre, and illustrated with half- folio cuts, which I
have not seen. At the end of the year came a trans-
lation of Glanville's De Proprietatibus Rerum, with
eleven folio cuts, of which the most interesting are
the first, which shows the Almighty seated in glory
within a circle thrown up by a black background, and
the sixth, which contains twelve little medallions,
representing the pleasures and occupations of the
different months. During i486 Bellaert printed three
illustrated books, an Epistelen ende Euangelien, Pierre
Michault's Doctrinael des tyts, an allegory, in which

netricti(iaIonumofDoenDelpnconmdti$ecronemttH^

iniaet; tDdnao^tcDoicgdialft betake nae rpiuSoffict^ . OTat^^
woetalietimcooirlil ' wmr-q-w.mtncet^ginc.cutolianeslJefibemflrtt*
^aalei^itJairgegfautewSijaUTjettcfbeDzocIjcnoantljeuail^itwraelna
tan? tierfaecHe oai9nib6uetijmreiti»fcriptoftcm30aetcetegtfiiw^
UjeDcoecbepStact^eaomfangfoSOi^. mt>e|)2ob.()tumidc0tca <S4
vdaltn^tJCseecDebdpaip^omimbemeenoplmarimiettfntaUS^
trftlioatDeberfttatomof^nmnfljicteeilmafi^tflajel^ mUcltQteof
ijrte.55 m c nc altrim De bctf ti . Ii. w". ^alfcc ml metanliaa iSanOo2cti

From Z'er;' Sondercn Troest, Haarlem, 1483. (Reduced.)

2o6 Early Illustrated Books

Virtue exhibits to the author the schools of Vice,
and a Dutch version of Deguileville's Pdirinage de
la vie humaine. The ten cuts in the second of these
three books are described by Mr. Conway as care-
fully drawn, the more numerous illustrations in the
others showing hasty work, probably produced by
an inferior artist.

After i486 Bellaert disappears, and most of his
cuts and types are found in the possession of Gerard
Leeu, who, since his removal to Antwerp, had lacked
the help of a good engraver. He apparently secured
the services of Bellaert's artist, and now printed French
and Dutch editions of the romance of Paris and
Vienne (May 1487), an edition of Reynard the Fox,
of which only a fragment remains, the already-men-
tioned edition of Ludolphus^ for which he used cuts
both new and old, a Kintscheyt Jhesti (1488), Dutch
and Latin versions of the story of the Seven Wise
Men of Rome, who saved the young prince from the
wiles of his step-mother, and numerous religious
works. At the time of his death, in 1493, he was
engaged on an edition of the Cronycles of England,
which has on its title-page a fine quarto cut showing
the shield of England supported by angels.

In 1485 Leeu had borrowed blocks from Anton
Sorg, of Augsburg, for an edition of ^sop, and in
1 49 1, in his Duytsche Ghetiden, he employed a set of
woodcuts imitated from those in use in the French
Horae. Mr. Conway assigns these directly to a
French wood-cutter, but the work, both in the cuts

Holland v 207

and the borders, appears to me suflficiently distinctive
to be set down rather as an imitation than as pro-
duced by a foreign artist. Its success was immediate,
and the designs appear in half a dozen books printed
by Leeu during the next two years, and in nine
others issued by Lieseveldt, their purchaser, between
1493 and the end of the century.

We must now look very briefly at some of the
illustrated books printed in other Dutch towns. At
Zwolle, from 1484 onwards, Peter van Os issued a
large number of devotional works, the cuts in many of
which were copied from sets made for Leeu. This,
however, is not the case with a folio cut of the Virgin
manifesting herself to S. Bernard, which is given as
a frontispiece to three editions of the Saints Sermons
(1484, etc.), and is of great beauty. At Delft, Jacob
van der Meer also copied Leeu's books ; in 1483 he
produced an original set of illustrations to the ever-
popular Scaeckspul of Jacobus de Cessolis, and three
years later, a Passionael, with upwards of ninety cuts,
which were used again and again in more than a
score of similar works or editions. He was succeeded
by Christian Snellaert, who, in 149 1, endeavoured to
imitate Leeu's French cuts in an edition of the
Kerstenen Spieghel. John de Westphalia continued
to work at Louvain until 1496, but his illustrated
books were few and unimportant. At Gouda, Gotfrid
van Os, after borrowing blocks from Leeu, when the
latter had departed for Antwerp, issued a few books
with woodcuts, notably the romance of Godfrey of

2o8 Early Illustrated Books

Boulogne {Historic hertoghe Godeuaerts van Boloen),
and Le Chevalier Delibiri by Olivier de Lamarche,
to the cut in which last Mr. Conway gives high
praise.

At Deventer, Jacobus de Breda and Richard
Paffroet, from i486 onwards, printed a large number
of books with single cuts, none of any great im-
portance. In the last decade of the century, Hugo
Janszoen commissioned several sets of religious cuts
which excite Mr. Conway's wrath by their crudeness,
while the illustrated books issued at Antwerp by
Godfrey Bach, who had married the widow of an
earlier printer, Mathias van der Goes, do not seem to
have been much better. This decline of good work
Mr. Conway attributes chiefly to the influence of
the French woodcuts introduced by Leeu. 'The
characteristic quality,' he says, ' of the French cuts is
the large mass of delicately cut shade lines which
they contain. The workmen of the low countries
finding these foreign cuts rapidly becoming popular,
endeavoured to imitate them, but without bestowing
upon their work that care by which alone any
semblance of French delicacy could be attained.
From the year 1490 onwards, Dutch and Flemish
cuts always contain large masses of clumsily cut
shade. The outlines are rude ; the old childishness
is gone ; thus the last decade of the fifteenth century
is a decade of decline.'

When we pass from the illustrations to the other
decorations in early Dutch books, we find that large

Holland 209

borders of foliage, boldly but rather coarsely treated,
were used by Veldener in his Fasciculus Temporum
of 1480, and in Gerard Leeu's edition of the Dyalogus
Creatiirarum the following year. Veldener's is ac-
companied by a fine initial O, in which the design of
the border is carried on. Leeu's page contains a
rather heavy S, and the woodcut of the faces of
the sun and moon.

In 1 49 1, as we have seen, Leeu printed a Psalter
of the Blessed Virgin, by S. Bernard, in imitation of
the French Horae. This has very graceful little floral
borders, in small patterns, on grounds alternately
black and white. After Leeu's death, they passed
into the possession of Adrian van Lieseveldt, who
used them for a Duytsche Ghetyden in 1495.

The most noteworthy initial letters are the five
alphabets, printed in red, used by John of West-
phalia. In the smallest the letters are a third of
an inch square, in the largest about an inch and a
quarter. This and the next size are picked out
with white scroll-work, somewhat in the same way
as Schoeffer's. Peter van Os at Zwolle used a large
N, four inches square, with intertwining foliage. He
had also a fount of rustic capitals, almost unde-
cipherable. Leeu, besides his large S, had several
good alphabets of initials. A very beautiful D, re-
produced by Holtrop from the Vier Uterste (Quatuor
novissima) of 1488, is much the most graceful letter
in any Dutch book. No other initials of the same
style have been found. Eckert van Hombergh also

o

Mark of Jacob Bellaert.

Holland 211

had some good initials, in which the ground is com-
pletely covered with a light floral design. Gotfried
van Os at Gouda, M. Van Goes at Antwerp, Jacob
Jacobsoen at Delft, and Lud. de Ravescoet at Louvain,
were the chief other possessors of initials, the use of
which continued for a long time to be very partial.

Several of the devices of the Dutch printers are
very splendid. The borders which surrounded the
unicorn of H. Eckert van Hombergh and the eagle of
Jacob Bellaert give them special magnificence. The
Castle at Antwerp was used as a device by Gerard
Leeu, and subsequently by Thierry Martens, and a
printer at Gouda placed a similar erection on an
elephant, perhaps as a pun between howdah and
Gouda. Peter van Os at Zvvolle had a large device
of an angel holding a shield ; M. van Goes at Ant-
werp a still larger one of a ragged man flourishing
a club, while his shield displays a white lion on a
black ground. Another Antwerp printer, G. Back,
used several varieties of bird-cages as his marks, in
one of which the Antwerp castle is introduced on
a shield hanging from the cage. Several printers —
e.g. Colard Mansion at Bruges, Jacob Jacobsoen at
Delft, and Gerard Leeu at Gouda, contented them-
selves with small devices of a pair of shields braced
together. Leeu, however, while at Gouda, used also
a large device of a helmeted shield supported by
two lions.

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From the romance of Tirant lo Blanch, Valentia, 1490. (Much reduced.)

CHAPTER X.

SPAIN.

In the present state of our knowledge of Spanish
books all that is possible to do here is to remark on
a few peculiarities of decoration which distinguish
them from the early books of other countries, and
then to describe, with some detail, the little handful
of illustrated books which have come under the
writer's own notice.

The book-hand in use in Spain's manuscripts during
the fifteenth century was unusually massive and hand-
some, and the same characteristics naturally reappear
in the majority of the types used by the early printers
in Spain. A considerable proportion of these were
Germans, whose tradition of good press- work was
very fairly maintained by their immediate successors,
so that throughout a great part of the sixteenth
century Spanish books retain much of the primitive
dignity which we are wont to associate only with
' incunabula.' From a very early period, also, they
are distinguished by the excellence of their initial
letters, which are almost as plentiful as they are good ;
the great majority of books printed after 1485, which
I have seen, being fully provided with them. The

2 1 4 Early Illustrated Books

prevailing form of initial exhibits very delicate white
tracery on a black ground. In a few instances, as in
a Seneca printed by Meinardo Ungut and Stanislao
Polono, at Seville, in 1491, some of the initials are in
red, and have a very decorative effect. A fine capital
L and A appear in a work of Jean de Mena, issued by
these printers in 1499, ^"^ a good M in their Claros
Varones of Pulgar in the following year. A Consolat,
printed, it is said, by Pedro Posa at Barcelona in
1494, is very remarkable for its profusion of fine
initials. Engraved borders are not of common occur-
rence in Spanish books, though I shall have to notice
two striking instances of their use in books printed at
Zamora and Valencia. Borders are found, also, on
the title-pages of various laws printed at Barcelona
during the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, but these
are of no great beauty, and some of the pieces of which
they are composed are poor copies from the French
Horae.

As a rule, Spanish title-pages are handsome and
imposing. ^During the last few years of the fifteenth
century and the beginning of its successors, the titles
of books were often printed in large woodcut letters.
A Spanish Livy, printed at Salamanca in 1497, a
Vocabulary of Antonio Lebrixa, printed by Krom-
berger at Seville in 1506, and a Mar de Istorias
printed at Valladolid in 15 12, supply examples of
this practice. In an Obra a llaors del benauentiirat
lo senyor sant Cristofol, printed at Valencia in 1498,
the woodcut title is in white on a black ground,

Spain 2 1 5

which is also relieved by a medallion of the saint
fording the stream. Pictures were also used in con-
nection with the more ordinary woodcut titles in
black — e.g. in Juan de Lucena's Tratado de la vita beata,
printed by Juan de Burgos in 1502, we have a cut of
a king, bearing his sword of justice and surrounded
by his counsellors ; and in a Libro de Consolat tractant
dels fets maritims of the same year, printed by Johan
Luschner at Barcelona, beneath the woodcut title
there is a large figure of a ship, up whose masts sailors
are climbing, apparently in quest of a very prominent
moon.

Woodcut pictures of the hero decorate the title-
pages of the romances of Spain as of other countries,
and these pictorial title-pages are found also, though
less frequently, in works of devotion and in plays.
Such pictures are less common in Spain than else-
where, because of the great popularity there of the
heraldic title-page, in which the arms of the country,
or of the hero or patron of the work, form a singularly
successful method of ornament. These heraldic title-
pages are found in a few books, printed before 1 500,
and were in common use throughout the sixteenth
century.

The earliest Spanish illustrated book with which I
am acquainted is the Libro delos Trabajos de Hercules
of the Marquis Enrique de Villena, printed by
Antonio de Centenera at Zamora, on January 15th,
1483 [1484]. This has eleven woodcuts, illustrating
the hero's exploits, and so rudely executed that they

2 1 6 Early Illustrated Books

are plainly the work of a native artist. Far more
interesting than these 'prentice cuts are the illustra-
tive initials, apparently engraved on soft metal, in a
Copilacion de leyes, promulgated in 1485, and supposed
to have been printed by Centenera in the same year.
These initials are nine in number, and must have
been designed and executed by clever artists, whose
work is so fine that the printer in most instances has
failed to do justice to it. On the first page of text
an initial P contains within it figures of a king and
queen, Ferdinand and Isabella. This page has at its
foot a border containing a hunting scene, with a
blank shield in its centre. The rest of the page is
surrounded by a text, printed decoratively, so as to
form an open-work border. The first section of the
laws, treating of *la Santa Fe,' has an initial E,
showing God the Father upholding the crucified
Christ. The second section sets forth the duty of
the king to hear causes two days a week, and begins
with an L, here reproduced, in which the king is
unpleasantly close pressed by the litigants.

Two knights spurring from the different sides
of an S head the laws of chivalry ; a Canonist and
his scholars in an A preside over Matrimony ;
money-changers in a D over Commerce, while a
luckless wretch being hanged in the midst of a T
warns evil-doers of what they may expect under the
criminal law. The pages containing these initials are
enriched also by a border in two pieces, the lower
part of which shows a shield, with a device of trees,

Spain

217

supported by kneeling youths. The perpendicular
piece running up the outer margin, bears a floral
design. All the letters, while directly illustrating the
subjects of the chapters which they begin, are at the
same time essentially decorative, and they are cer-
tainly ^the best pictorial initials I have ever seen,
though it must be reckoned against them that they
were unduly difficult to print with the text.

Initial L from a Copilacion de Leyes, Zamora, c. 1485.

The page which heads this chapter, unfortunately
only one-third of its original size, from the famous
romance of Tirant lo Blanch, gives us another
example of this peculiar style of engraving. It is
taken from the edition printed at Valentia in 1490,
and may fairly be reckoned as one of the most
decorative pages in any fifteenth-century book. The

2 1 8 Early Illustrated Books

rest of the volume has no other ornament than some
good initials.

The first Spanish book with woodcuts of any
artistic merit with which I am acquainted is an
edition of Diego de San Pedro's Career dAmor^
printed at Barcelona in 1493. This has sixteen
different cuts, some of which are several times
repeated. The title-cut, showing love's prison, is
here reproduced, and gives a very good idea of a
characteristic Spanish woodcut. The other illustra-
tions show the lover in various attitudes before his
lady, a meeting in a street, the author at work on his
book, etc. Another edition of the Career dAmor,
with the same woodcuts, was printed at Burgos in
1496 by Fadrique Aleman.

Most of the other Spanish incunabula with wood-
cuts, which I have seen, were printed at Seville by
Meinardo Ungut and Stanislao Polono. The first
of these, Gorricio's Conteviplaeiones sobre el Rosario
de nuestra senora, issued in 1495, has some good
initials, two large cuts nearly the full size of the quarto
page, and fifteen smaller ones, with graceful borders
mostly on a black ground. The small cuts illustrate
the life of Christ and of the B. Virgin, and are, to
some extent, modelled on the pictures in the French
Horae, In the same year, the same printers published
Ayala's Chroniea del Rey don Pedro, with a title-cut
of a young king, seated on his throne, and also the
Lilio de Medicina of B. de Gordonio with a title-cut
of lilies. In 1496, a firm of four printers, ' Paulo de

Title-page of Diego de San Pedro's Career (f Amor, Barcelona, 1493.

2 20 Early Illustrated Books

Colonia, Juan Pegnicer de Nuremberg, Magno y
Thomas,' published an edition of Juan de Mena's
Labirinto or Las CCC (so called from the number of
stanzas in which it is written) with a title-cut of the
author (?) kneeling before a king. Three years later,
still at Seville, Pedro Brun printed in quarto the
romance of the Emperor Vespasian^ with fourteen
full-page cuts of sea voyages, sieges, the death of
Pilate, etc. Against these books printed at Seville,
during the last decade of the century, I have only
notes of one or two books issued at Salamanca,
Valencia, and Barcelona, with unimportant title-cuts,
and a reprint at Burgos of the Trabajos de Hercules
(1499) with poor illustrations fitted into the columns
of a folio page. But it is quite possible that my
knowledge is as one-sided as it is limited, and I must,
therefore, refrain from building up any theory that
Seville, rather than any other town, was the chief
home of illustrated books in Spain. After 1500 the
Spanish books which I have met have no important
illustrations beyond the cuts which appear on some
of their title-pages. But here, also, I should be sorry
to make my small experience the basis of a general
statement.

The devices of the Spanish printers were greatly
influenced by those of their compeers of Italy and
France. The simple circle and cross, in white on a
black ground, with the printer's initials in the semi-
circles, is fairly common, while Diego de Gumiel and
Arnaldo Guillermo Brocar varied it, according to the

Spain 2 21

best Italian fashion, with very beautiful floral tracery.
The tree of knowledge and pendant shields, beloved
of the French printers, appear in the marks of Meinardo
Ungut and Stanislao Polono, and of Juan de Rosem-
bach. Arnaldo Guillermo had another and very
elaborate mark, showing a man kneeling before the
emblems of the Passion, and two angels supporting a
shield with a device of a porcupine. One of the
quaintest of all printers' marks was used by a later
printer of the name Juan Brocar, whose motto
* legitime certanti' is illustrated by a mail-clad soldier
grasping a lady's hair while he himself is being seized
by the devil !

ifC^ fcfe of t^ c9»nwtc fmati

^%taj BeggtmetQ t^ 6»fir

• \ I '2tn5 of ^te forna am 3 neuct l§c mto
^^^Ite^C tRi<3eob?3ft»ue8ir«<^««J»
Tine? sod; tboof fb QQue mo ffym )
^EJQnr oc 3 tboe tbonf tb 6e n^( fit ff$ f «{a|;
Of cfi9(9^i^ an^ of ot^rt goo&7 omp
Otolb mag 3 Rjctc an ^fc % oij mpij 5r&f
Tlnd IbOm mg ootbui tboe 69(9 fsffQ ^ nOr
Itolb it t« tban ana? of a Cr^gij ^c
tiJ^o fo it ^fitS) fore fftaC Ce trtb«
Tln5 of mp ftbpnS ? C&nf ie m^ c^
Mo fiuft ouaut^c U ie 6> mutdrpte
^fyit fTpdsng fcicnoE 9af^ maOi mtfotan
S:4t( 3 Odtt? no goob? tbOm t^ euet 3 fHer
Tlnd ^ 3 omcnOtMiQ? (b fow t^ctS^,
®f 3oC^ t^ot 3 a>wtbc6? <crn»f8

From the Cantcrhtry Talts, znd edition. (Reduced.)

CHAPTER XI.

ENGLAND.

(By E. Gordon Duff.)

The art of the wood-engraver may almost be said
to have had no existence in England before the intro-
duction of printing, for there are not probably more
than half-a-dozen cuts now known, if indeed so many,
that are of an earlier date. The few that exist are
devotional prints of the type known as the ' Image of
Pity,' in which a half-length figure of Christ on the
cross stands surrounded with the emblems of the
Passion.

It may be taken, I think, for granted that at the
time Caxton set up his press at Westminster, that is, in
the year 1477, there was no wood-engraver competent
to undertake the work of illustrating his books. We
see, for instance, that in the first edition of the Canter-
bury Tales there are no woodcuts, while they appear
in the second edition ; and it is not likely that Caxton
would have left a book so eminently suited for illus-
tration without some such adornment had the neces-
sary craftsmen been available. As it was, it was not
till 1480 that woodcuts first appeared in an English

224 Early Illustrated Books

printed book, the Mirror of the World. In this
there are two series of cuts. One, consisting of
diagrams, is found in most of the MSS. of the book ;
the other, which represents masters teaching their
scholars or at work alone, was a new departure of
Caxton's. It is quite probable that they were in-
tended for general use in books, indeed we find some
used in the Cato, but they do not appear to have been
employed elsewhere. The diagrams are meagre and
difficult to understand, so much so that the printer
has printed several in their wrong places. The neces-
sary letterpress occurring within them is not printed
(Caxton had not then a small enough type), but is
written in by hand, and it is worth noticing that this
is done in all copies in the same hand, and so must
have been done in Caxton's office, — some are fond
enough to suppose by Caxton himself.

In the next year appeared the second edition of
the Game of Chesse, with a number of woodcuts. The
first edition printed at Bruges by Caxton and Mansion
had no illustrations. The cuts are coarsely designed
and roughly cut, but serve their purpose ; indeed they
are evidently intended as illustrations rather than
ornaments. Some controversy has at different times
arisen as to whether these cuts were executed in Eng-
land or abroad, but Mr. Linton has very justly decided
in favour of England. The work, he says, is so poor
that any one who could hold a knife could cut them,
therefore there was no necessity to send abroad.

About 1484 we have two important illustrated

England 225

books, the Canterbury Tales and the yEsoJ) ; the
former with 28 illustrations, the latter with 186.

The cuts of the Ca7iterhiry Tales depict for the
most part the various individuals of the Pilgrimage,
and there is also a bird's-eye view of all the pilgrims
seated at an immense round table at supper, which
was used afterwards by Wynkyn de Worde for the
* Assembly of Gods.' The cuts in the ^sop, with the
exception of the full-page frontispiece (known only in
the copy in the Windsor Library), are smaller and are
the work of two, if not three, engravers. One cut seems
to have been hurriedly executed in a different manner
from the rest, perhaps to take the place of one injured
at the last moment. It is not worked in the usual
manner with the outlines in black — i.e. raised lines on
the wood-block, but a certain amount of the effect
has been produced by a white line on a black ground
— i.e. by the cut-away lines of the wood-block.

The Golden Legend, which was the next illustrated
book to appear, contains the most ambitious wood-
cuts which Caxton used. Those in the earlier part
are the full width of a large folio page, and show,
especially in their backgrounds, a certain amount of
technical skill. The later part of the book contains
a number of small cuts of saints very coarsely exe-
cuted, and the same cut is used over and over again
for different saints.

In 1487 Caxton first used his large woodcut device,
which is probably, though the contrary is often
asserted, of English workmanship. It is entirely

P

226 Early Illustrated Books

un-Frencli in style and execution, and was probably-
cut to print on the Missal printed by Maynyal for
Caxton, in order that the publisher might be brought
prominently into notice.

About this time (1487-88) two more illustrated
books were issued, — the Royal Book and the Speculum
Vite Christi. The series cut for the Speculum are of
very good workmanship, though the designs are poor,
but all of them were not used in the book. One or
two appear later in books printed by W. de Worde,
manifestly from the same series. The Royal Book
contains only seven cuts, six of which are from the
Speculum. Some of the cuts occur also in the Doc-
trinal of Sapience and the Book of Divers Ghostly
Matters.

It is impossible not to think when examining
Caxton's books that the use of woodcuts was rather
forced upon him by the necessities of his business,
than deliberately preferred by himself He seems to
have wished to popularise the more generally known
books, and only to have used woodcuts when the book
absolutely needed them. He did not, as some later
printers did, simply use woodcuts to attract the
unwarj' purchaser.

What cuts Caxton possessed at the end of his
career it is hard to determine. The set of large
Horae cuts which W. de Worde used must have been
Caxton's, for we find one of them, the Crucifixion,
used in the Fifteen O'es, which was itself intended as
a supplement to a Horae, now unknown. In the same

England 227

way there must have been a number of cuts for use
in the 8vo Home, but as that is known only from
a small fragment, we cannot identify them. From
similarity of style and identity of measurement we
can pick out a few from Wynkyn de Worde's later
editions, but many must be passed over.

On turning to examine the presses at work at the
same time as Caxton's, one cannot but be struck by
the scarcity of illustrations. Lettou and Machlinia,
though they produced over thirty books, had no
ornaments that we know of beyond a border which
was used in their edition of the Horae ad usum
Saruin, and passed into the hands of Pynson. They
seem to have been without everything except type,
not having even initial letters.

The St. Alban's press was a step in advance. A
few cuts were used in the Chronicles, and the Book
of St. Alban's contains coats of arms, produced by a
combination of wood-cutting and printing in colour.

The Oxford press was the most ambitious, and was
in possession of two sets of cuts, in neither case in-
tended for the books in which they were used. One
set was prepared for a Golden Legend, but no such
book is known to have been issued at the Oxford
press. One of these cuts appears as a frontispiece to
Lyndewode's Constitutions. It represents Jacobus de
Voragine writing the Golden Legend, so that it did
equally well for Lyndewode writing his law-book.
Others of the series are used in the Liber Festialis of
i486, but as that was a small folio and the cuts were

228 Early Illustrated Books

large, the ends were cut off, and they are all printed
in a mutilated condition. The other cuts used in the
Festial are small, and form part of a set for a Horae,
but no Horae is known to have been printed at the
Oxford press. It would be natural to suppose in this
case that these cuts had been procured from some
other printer who had used them in the production
of the books for which they were intended ; but the
most careful search has failed to find them in any
other book. Besides these cuts the Oxford press
owned a very beautiful border, which was used in
the commentary on the De Animd of Aristotle by
Alexander de Hales and the commentary on the
Lamentations of Jeremiah by John Lattebury, printed
in 148 1 and 1482. The printers owned nothing else
for the adornment of their books but a rudely cut
capital G, which we find used many times in the
Festial.

The poverty of ornamental letters and borders is
very noticeable in all the English presses of the
fifteenth century. Caxton possessed one ambitious
letter, a capital A, which was used first in the Order
of Chivalry, and a series of eight borders, each made
up of four pieces, and found for the first time in the
Fifteen Oes. They are of little merit, and compare
very unfavourably with French work of the period.
The best set of borders used in England belonged to
Notary and his partners when they started in London
about 1496. They are in the usual style, with dotted
backgrounds, and may very likely have been brought

England 229

from France. Pynson's borders, which he used in a
Horae about 1495, are much more English in style,
but are not good enough to make the page really
attractive ; in fact almost the only fine specimens of
English printing with borders are to be found in the
Morton Missal, which he printed in 1500. In this
book also there are fine initial letters, often printed
in red. It is hard to understand why, as a rule, Eng-
lish initial letters were so very bad ; it certainly was
not from the want of excellent models, for those in the
Sarum missals, printed at Venice by Hertzog in 1494,
and sold in England by Frederic Egmont, contain
most beautifully designed initials, as good as can be
found in any early printed book.

Wynkyn de Worde, when he succeeded in 149 1 to
Caxton's business, found himself in possession of a
large number of cuts, a considerably larger number
than ever appeared in the books of Caxton's that
now remain to us. The first illustrated book he
issued was a new edition of the Golden Legend, in
which the old cuts were utilised. This was printed
in 1493. In 1494 a new edition of the Speculum Vite
Christi was issued, of which only one copy is known,
that in the library at Holkham. It probably contains
only the series of cuts used by Caxton in his edition,
for the few leaves to be found in other libraries have
no new illustrations. About the same time (1494)
De Worde issued several editions of the Horae ad
usum Sarum, one in octavo (known from a few leaves
discovered in the binding of a book in the library of

230 Early Illustrated Books

Corpus Christi College, Oxford) and the rest in quarto.
In the quarto editions we find the large series of
pictures, among which are the three rioters and three
skeletons, the tree of Jesse, and the Crucifixion, which
occurs in Caxton's Fifteen O'es. It is extremely pro-
bable that all the cuts in these editions had belonged
to Caxton. The two cuts in the fragment of the
octavo edition, however, are of quite a different class,
evidently newly cut, and much superior in style and
simplicity to Caxton's. It is much to be regretted
that no complete copy of the book exists, for the neat
small cuts and bold red and black printing form a
very tasteful page.

A curious specimen of engraving is to be found in
the Scala Perfeciionis, by Walter Hylton, also printed
in 1494. It represents the Virgin and child seated
under an architectural canopy, and below this are the
words of the antiphon beginning, ' Sit duke nomen
dfii.' These words are not printed from type, but
cut on the block, and the engraver seems to have
treated them simply as part of the decoration, for
many of the words are by themselves quite unread-
able and bear only a superficial resemblance to the
inscription from which they were copied.

An edition of Glanville's De proprietatibus reruin
issued about this time has a number of cuts, not of
very great interest ; and the Book of St. Albans of
1496 has an extra chapter on fishing, illustrated with
a picture of an angler at work, with a tub, in the
German fashion, to put his fish into. It has also a

England

231

curiously modern diagram of the sizes of hooks.
In 1498 De Worde issued an illustrated edition of
Malory's Morte d' Arthur. The cuts are very am-
bitious, but badly executed, and the hand of the
engraver who cut them may be traced in several
books. In 1499 an edition of Mandeville was issued,

From the Falle qfPrincis, Pyr.son, 1494.

ornamented with a number of small cuts, and about
this time several small books were issued having cuts
on the title-page,

Richard Pynson's first illustrated book was an
edition of the Canterbury Tales, printed some time

232 Early Illustrated Books

before 1493. At the head of each tale is a rudely
executed cut of the pilgrim who narrates it. These
cuts were made for this edition, and were in some
cases altered while the book was going through the
press to serve for different characters : the Squire
and the Manciple, the Sergeant and Doctor of Physic,
are from the same blocks with slight alterations.
Lydgate's Falle of Princis, issued in 1494, contains
some of the very best woodcuts of the period : the
one here shown, that at the head of Book v., depicting
Marcus Manlius thrown into the Tiber, could hardly
be surpassed. About 1497 an edition of the Speculmn
Vite Christi was issued, with a number of neatly
executed small cuts, and in 1500 Pynson printed the
beautiful Sarum Missal, known as the Morton Missal.
Special borders and ornaments, introducing a rebus
on the name of Morton, were engraved for this, and
a full-page cut of the prelate's coat of arms appears
at the commencement of the book.

After the year 1500 almost every book issued by
W. de Worde, who was pre-eminently the popular
publisher, had an illustration on the title-page. This
was not always cut for the book, nor indeed always very
applicable to the letterpress, and the cuts can almost
all be arranged into series made for more important
books. There were, however, a few stock cuts : a
schoolmaster with a gigantic birch for grammars, a
learned man seated at a desk for works of more ad-
vanced scholarship, and lively pictures of hell for
theological treatises. The title-page was formed on

England 233

a fixed plan. At the top, printed inside a wood-
cut ribbon, was placed the title, below this the cut.

Pynson, who was the Royal printer, and a publisher
of learned works, disdained such attempts to catch the
more vulgar buyers. His title-pages rarely have cuts,
and these are only used on such few popular books
as he issued. Both he and De Worde had a set of
narrow upright cuts of men and women with blank
labels over their heads, who could be used for any
purpose, and have their names printed in type in the
label above.

Foreign competition was also at this time making
its influence felt on English book-illustration. W. de
Worde had led the way by purchasing from Godfried
van Os, about 1492, some type initial letters, and at
least one woodcut. Pynson, early in the sixteenth
century, obtained some cuts from V^rard, which he
used in his edition of the Kalendar of Shepherdes,
1 506, and Julian Notary, who began printing about
1496, seems to have made use of a miscellaneous
collection of cuts obtained from various quarters.
He had, amongst other curious things, part of a set
of metal cuts executed in the matnere criblie, which
have not been traced to any other book, but appear
to have passed at a considerably later date into the
hands of Wyer, who only commenced to print in
1528. When W. de Worde left Westminster in 1500
to settle in Fleet Street, he parted with some of his
old woodcuts to Notary, — woodcuts which had been
used in the Horae of 1494, and had originally belonged

234 Early Illustrated Books

to Caxton. All these miscellaneous cuts appear in
his Golden Legend of 1 503, and the large cut of the
* Assembly of Saints ' on the title-page seems also to
have been borrowed. It was used by Hopyl at Paris
in 1505 for his edition of the Golden Legend in Dutch,
and passed afterwards with Hopyl's business to his
son-in-law Prevost, who used it in a theological work
of John Major's.

Some time before 15 10 an extremely curious book,
entitled probably the Passion of our Lorde Jesu, was
printed, probably by W. de Worde. The book is
now known only from stray leaves in bindings, but
from references to it in older bibliographies it is
probable that a perfect copy exists, though its where-
abouts is unknown. It contains a number of large
cuts of a very German appearance and quite unlike
any others of the period. Some are used also in the
York Manual printed by De Worde in 1 509.

About this time too a number of popular books in
English, some adorned with rude woodcuts, were
issued by John of Doesborch, a printer in Antwerp.
Among them may be mentioned The wonderful shape
and nature of man, beasts, serpents, etc., the Fifteen
Tokens, the Story of the Parson of Kaleyibrowe, and
the Life of Virgilius. A still earlier Antwerp cut,
which had been used by Gerard Leeu for the title-page
of his English Solomon and Marcolplms, found its way
to England and was used by Copland.

In the last years of Henry Vll.'s reign, from 1501 to
1 509, a few books may be mentioned as particularly in-

England 235

teresting from their illustrations. In 1502 De Worde
printed the Ordinary of Chrysten Men, a large book
with a block-printed title. It was reprinted in 1506.
In 1503 appeared the Recuyles of y Hy story es of
Troye, a typical example of an illustrated book of the
period. There are about seventy cuts of all kinds, of
which twelve were specially cut for the book : many
others were used in the Morte d^ Arthur, and the rest
are miscellaneous. In 1505 we have the Craft to
live and die well, of which there is another edition in
the following year. In 1506 appears the Castle of
Labour, one of the few books entirely illustrated with
cuts specially made for it ; in 1 508 the Kalendar of
Shepherdes. An edition of the Seven wise Masters of
Rome, of which the only known copy is imperfect,
appeared about 1506, though the cuts which illustrate
it were made before 1500. The fragment contains
seven cuts, but the set must have consisted of eleven.
They are very careful copies of those used by Gerard
Leeu in his edition of 1490, and have lost none of the
feeling of the originals.

Three books only of Pynson's production during
this period call for special notice. About 1505 he
issued an edition of the Castle of Labour, with very
well-cut illustrations closely copied from the French
edition. In 1506 appeared his edition of the Kalendar
of Shepherdes, which is illustrated for the most part
with cuts obtained from Verard, and in 1507 an edi-
tion of the Golden Legend. Of each of these books
but one copy is known.

236 Early Illustrated Books

For some unknown reason, the accession of Henry
VII. acted in the most extraordinary way upon the
Engh'sh presses, which in that year issued a very large
number of books. Perhaps the influx of visitors to
London on that occasion made an unusual demand ;
but at any rate a number of popular books were then
issued. Amongst them are Rychard Cuer de Lyott, the
Fiftene Joyes of Mary age, the Convercyon of Swerers,
the Parliament of Devils, and many others. Besides
these there were, of course, a number of funeral
sermons on Henry Vll., many of which have curious
frontispieces. In one the coffin of the late King forms
a prominent object in the foreground, but it has been
inserted into a cut with which it had originally nothing
to do. This method of inserting new pieces into old
blocks, technically termed plugging, was not much
used at this period when wood-engraving was so
cheap. An excellent example will be found in the
books printed for William Bretton, which contain a
large cut of his coat of arms. A mistake was made
in the cutting of the arms, and a new shield was in-
serted, the mantling and supporters being untouched.
Another notable book of that period is Barclay's Ship
of Fools y issued by Pynson in 1509. It contains one
hundred and eighteen cuts, the first being a full-page
illustration of the printer's coat of arms. The rest
are copies, roughly executed, of those in the original
edition. Another version of this book, translated by
Henry Watson, was issued the same year by Wynkyn
de Worde. It is illustrated with a special series of

England 237

cuts, which are used again in the later editions. Of
the original edition of 1509 only one copy is known,
printed on vellum and preserved in the Bibliotheque
Nationale. Stray cuts from this series are found in
several of De Worde's other books, but may be at
once recognised from the occurrence of the * fool ' in
his typical cap and bells.

About this time and a little earlier the title was
very often cut entire on a block. The De Proprie-
tatibus of c. 1496 contains the first and the most
elaborate specimen, in which the words 'Bartholomeus
de proprietatibus rerum ' are cut in enormous letters
on a wooden board ; indeed the whole block was so
large that hardly any copy contains the whole.
Faques, Pynson, and others used similar blocks, in
which the letters were white and the ground coloured
(one of Pynson's printed in red is to be found in the
Ortus Vocabulorum of 1509), but their uncouthness
soon led to their disuse. Numbers of service-books
were issued by Pynson and Wynkyn de Worde, pro-
fusely illustrated with small cuts, most of which appear
to have been of home manufacture, though unoriginal
in design. It is worth noticing one difference in the
cuts of the two printers. Pynson's small cuts have
generally an open or white background, De Worde's
are, as a rule, dotted in the French style. Since in
some of their service-books these two printers used
exactly similar founts of type the identification of
their cuts is of particular value. But these service
books almost from the first began to deteriorate.

238 Early Illustrated Books

The use of borders was abandoned, and little care
was given to keeping sets of cuts together, or using
those of similar styles in one book. We find the
archaic cuts of Caxton, the delicate pictures copied
from French models, and roughly designed and
executed English blocks all used together, sometimes
even on the same page. The same thing is notice-
able in all the illustrated books of the period. De
Worde used Caxton's cuts up to the very end of his
career, though in many cases the blocks were worm-
eaten or broken. The peculiar mixture of cuts is
very striking in some books. Take as an example
the edition of Robert the Devil, published about
1 5 14. No cut used in it is original: one is from a
book on good living and dying, another from the
Ship of Fools} a third is from a devotional book of
the previous century, and so on. In the Oliver of
Castile of 15 18, though there are over sixty illus-
trations, not more than three or four are specially cut
for it, but come from the Morte d' Arthur, the Gesta
Romanoruni, Helias Knight of the Swan, the Body of
Policy, Richard Cuer de Lion, the Book of Carving,
and so on, and perhaps many had been used more
than once. Indeed, W. de Worde minded as little
about using the same illustrations over and over
again as some of our modern publishers.

^ This particular cut, which represents the Fool looking out of a
window while his house is on fire, meant to illustrate the chapter * Of
bostynge or hauynge confydence in fortune,' is not used in the edition
of 1517. It may, perhaps, occur in the edition of 1509, of which the
unique copy is at Paris.

England 239

For all books issued in the early years of the six-
teenth century it was thought necessary to have at
least an illustration on the title-page, so that practically
an examination of the illustrated books of the period
means almost an examination of the entire produce
of the printing press. In time, when the subject has
been thoroughly studied, it will be possible to separate
all the cuts into series cut for some special purpose.
At present the study of early woodcuts in England
is like making bricks without straw. We have no
bibliography of the books in any way adequate.
Herbert's Typographical Antiquities, published in
1785, is the latest working book of any value, and
until there is a fairly good list of books, it is im-
possible to study their illustrations.

A rather important influence was introduced into
the history of English book illustration about 15 18,
when Pynson obtained from Froben some borders and
other material designed by Holbein.^ They are the
first important examples of ' renaissance ' design used
in English books, and their effect was rapid and
marked. Wynkyn de Worde, who in his devices had
hitherto been content to use Caxton's trade-mark
with some few extra ornaments, introduced a hideous
parody of one of Froben's devices, poor in design,
and wretched in execution. The series of borders
used by Pynson were good in execution, and their
stj^le harmonised with the Roman type used by him

^ Sir Thomas More, the mutual friend and employer of Pynson and
Froben, had probably a good deal to do with this purchase of material.

240 Early Illustrated Books

at that time, but with other books it was different.
The heavy English black letter required something
bolder, and unless these borders were heavily cut,
they looked particularly meagre. A very beautiful
title-page of this type (here somewhat reduced) is
that in Sir Thomas Elyot's Image of Governance^
printed by Thomas Berthelet at London in 1 540.

The illustrated books of this period offer a curious
mixture of styles, for nothing could be more opposed
in feeling than the early school of English cuts and
the newly introduced renaissance designs. The out-
sides of the books underwent exactly the same change,
for in place of the old pictorial blocks with which the
stationers had heretofore stamped their bindings, they
used hideous combinations of medallions and pillars.

The device of Berthelet is an excellent specimen of
the new style. Despising good old English names
and signs, he carried on business at the sign of
Lucretia Romana in Fleet Street, and his device de-
picts that person in the act of thrusting a sword into
her bosom. In the background is a classical land-,
scape, and on either side pillars. Above are festoons,
and on ribbons at the head and feet of the figure the
name of the printer and of his sign. Though the cut
is uninteresting it is a beautiful piece of work.

Another result of the new movement was the
banishment of woodcuts from the title-page. Those
to Pynson's books have already been noticed, but
lesser printers like Scot, Godfrey, Rastell, and Treveris
also made use of borders of classical design, and gave

242 Early Illustrated Books

up the use of woodcuts. It is extremely curious to
notice what excellent effects on a title-page the
printers at this time produced from the poorest
materials. They seem to have understood much
better than those of a later date how to use different-
sized type with effect, and to make the whole page
pleasing, without attracting too much attention to
one particular part.

Before leaving this early period it will be as well to
return a little, and briefly notice some of the more
marked illustrated books produced by printers other
than Pynson and De Worde. The two printers of
the name of Faques, Guillam, and Richard, produced
a few most interesting books, and the device of the
last named, founded on that of the Paris printer,
Thielman Kerver, is a fine piece of engraving. The
name was originally cut upon the block as Faques,
and was so used in his two first books ; but in order
to make the name appear more English in form, the
' ques ' was cut out and ' kes ' inserted in type. The
last dated book which he printed, the Mirrour of our
Lady of 1530, contains several fine illustrations ; that
on the reverse of the title-page depicting a woman
of some religious order writing a book, has at the
bottom the letters E. G. joined by a knot, which may
be the initials of the engraver.

The Cambridge press of 1521-1522, from the scho-
lastic nature of its books, required no illustrations, but
it used for the title-page of the Galen a border en-
graved on metal, rather in the manner of Holbein,

England 243

but evidently of native production. The Oxford
press of the early sixteenth century borrowed some
of its cuts from De Worde, but a few, such as the
ambitious frontispiece and the four diagrams in the
Compotus of 1 5 19, were original.

John Rastell in his Pastyme of People used a number
of full-page illustrations of the kings of England,
coarse in design and execution, and very remarkable
in appearance. Peter Treveris issued a number of
books with illustrations, some of which are well worthy
of notice. The Grete Herbal, first published in 15 16,
contained a large number of cuts. Jerome of Bruyns-
wyke's Worke of Surgeri has some curious plates of
surgical operations, and though the subjects are rather
repulsive, they are excellent specimens of the wood-
cutting of the period. Treveris' best-known book is
the Policronicon of 1527, printed for John Reynes,
whose mark in red generally occurs on the title-page.
This title-page is a fine piece of work, and has been
facsimiled by Dibdin in his Typographical Antiquities.
Some of the cuts and ornaments used by Treveris
passed after his death into the hands of the Edin-
burgh printer, Thomas Davidson.

Lawrence Andrewe of Calais, who printed shortly
before 1530, also issued some curious illustrated books.
Before coming to England he had translated the ex-
traordinary book, The wonderful shape and nature of
man, beasts, serpentes, etc., printed by John of Does-
borch, whom we have spoken of above. On his own
account he issued the Poke of distyllacyon of waters

244 Early Illustrated Books

by Jerome of Brunswick, illustrated with pictures of
apparatus, and The Mirror of the World. This is
founded on Caxton's edition, but is much more fully
illustrated, the cuts to the Natural History portion
being particularly curious. It is worth noticing that
Andrewe, like some other printers at this time, intro-
duced his device into many of the initial letters and
borders which were cut for him, so that they can be
readily identified when they occur, after his death, in
books by other printers.

After the death of Wynkyn de Worde in 1535,
ideas as regards book-illustration underwent a great
change. Theology had become popular, and theo-
logical books were not adapted for illustratioij. The
ordinary book, with pictures put in haphazard, abso-
lutely died out ; and cuts were only used in chap-books,
or in large illustrated volumes, — descriptions of hor-
rible creatures, and the likenesses of comets or por-
tents on the one hand, chronicles, books of travel, and
scientific works on the other. The difference which
we noticed between W. de Worde and Pynson, the
one being a popular printer and the other a printer of
standard works, is distinctly marked in the succeed-
ing generation. While Wyer, Byddell, and Copland
published the popular books, Grafton and Whyt-
church, Wolfe and Day, issued more solid literature.
The old woodcuts passed into the hands of the
poorer printers, and were used till they were worn
out, and it is curious to notice how long in many
cases this took. On the other hand, the illustrations

England 245

made for new books are, as a rule, of excellent design
and execution, owing a good deal, in all probability,
to the influence of Holbein, who, for the latter portion
of his life, was living in England. As examples of
his work, we may take two books published in 1548,
Cranmer's Catechism, published by Walter Lynne,
and Halle's Chronicles, published by Grafton, The
first contains a number of small cuts, one of which
is signed in full, Hans Holbein, and two others only
with his initials, H. H. Some writers insist that
these three cuts alone are to be ascribed to him, and
that the rest are from an unknown hand. Besides
these small cuts, there is one full-page cut on the
back of the title, of very fine work. It represents
Edward VI. seated on his throne with the bishops
kneeling on his right, the peers on his left. From the
hands of the king the bishops are receiving a bible.
The cut at the end of Halle's Chronicles, very similarly
executed, and also ascribed to Holbein, represents
Henry VIII. sitting in Parliament. Almost all the
volumes of chronicles, of which a number were issued
in the sixteenth century, contain woodcuts, and two
are especially well illustrated, — Grafton's Chronicles,
published in 1569, and Holinshed's Chronicles in
1577. The illustrations in the latter book, which
Mr. Linton considers to have been cut on metal, do
not appear in the later edition of 1586. Among the
illustrations in the first edition, so Dibdin says, is to
be found a picture of a guillotine.

Of all the English printers of the latter half of the

tl)t MUpttittoit. ftUtU

t()efp]Cte petition,'
^oloe \xit rue to
(IgoD,t^dti?elt)pli
tuIe,8ouetne anD
ftten3t^ettto,bp
1^10 bol^ gl|o(l,tbdt lue nidpe be a^

WetofpgWaU^^ttftfP""^ ^^^^
ftanDC al tl^e pecctlous tentation!^
of tlie fle(I;e, t^e too^loe anD tbe
Heu^lI^anDto ouetcome tbeim^fo
(battoeinape become tpg^tuouc^
snD boIpe«j|%otDe ColotDttb diefe^
iientl^ lafte petition, ia tbe toJ^tcW

From Cranmer's CaUchisui, London, 1548.

England 247

sixteenth century, none produced finer books than
John Day, who seems to have been not only a printer,
but also a wood-engraver and type-cutter. The
best known, perhaps, of his books is the Book of
Christian Prayers, commonly called Queen Elizabeth's
Prayer Book, which he published in 1569. In a way,
this book is undoubtedly a fine specimen of book-
ornamentation, but as it was executed in a style then
out of date, having borders like the earlier service
books, it suffers by comparison with the 'Books of
Hours ' of fifty years earlier. Another book of Day's
which obtained great popularity was the History of
Martyrs, compiled by John Fox. We read on Day's
epitaph in the church of Bradley-Parva —

He set a Fox to wright how martyrs runne,

By death to lyfe. Fox ventured paynes and health,

To give them light ; Daye spent in print his wealth.

Considering the popularity of the book, and the
number of editions that were issued, we can hardly
imagine that Day lost money upon it. The illustra-
tions are of varied excellence, but the book contains
also some very fine initial letters. One, the C at the
commencement of the dedication, contains a portrait
of Queen Elizabeth on her throne, with three men
standing beside her, two of whom are supposed to be
Day and Fox, Below the throne, forming part of
the letter, is the Pope holding two broken keys.

Initial letters about this time arrived at their best.
They were often very large, and contained scenes,
mythological subjects, or coats-of-arms. A fine

248 Early Illustrated Books

specimen of this last class is to be found in the
Cosmographical Giasse, by William Cuningham, 1559.
It is a large D containing the arms of Robert, Lord
Dudley, to whom the book is dedicated. Very soon
after this some ingenious printer invented the system
of printing an ornamental border for the letter with
a blank space for the insertion of an ordinary capital
letter, — a system which soon succeeded in destroying
any beauty or originality which letters had up to this
time possessed.

In conclusion, it will be well to notice the growth
of engraving on metal in England. The earliest
specimen that I know of is the device first used by
Pynson about 1496. It is certainly metal, and has
every appearance of having been cut in this country.
Some writers have put forward the theory that the
majority of early illustrations, though to all appear-
ance woodcuts, were really cut on metal. But
wherever it is possible to trace an individual cut for
any length of time, we can see from the breakages,
and in some cases from small holes bored by insects,
that the material used was certainly wood. Julian
Notary had some curious metal cuts, but they were
certainly of foreign design and workmanship, and the
same may be said of the metal cuts found amongst
the early English service-books. The Cambridge
Galen of 1521 has an engraved title-page. It is not
till 1 540 that we find a book illustrated with engrav-
ings produced in this country. This was Thomas
Raynald's Byrth of Mankynde, which contains four

England 249

plates of surgical diagrams. In some of the later
editions these plates have been re-engraved on wood.
In 1545 another medical book appeared, Compendiosa
totius delineatio aere exarata per Thomam Geminum.
It has a frontispiece with the arms of Henry VIIL,
and forty plates of anatomical subjects. Other
editions appeared in 1553 and 1559, and the title-page
of the last is altered by the insertion of a portrait of
Elizabeth in place of the royal arms. The Stirpiuvt
Adversaria, nova author ibus Petro Pena et Mathia de
Lobel of 1570 has a beautifully engraved title-page,
and the 1572 edition of Parker's Bible contains a map
of the Holy Land with the following inscription in
an ornamental tablet : — * Graven bi Humfray Cole,
goldsmith, an English man born in y^ north, and
pertayning to y^ mint in the Tower, 1572.' Humfray
Cole is supposed by some authorities to have
engraved the beautiful portraits of Elizabeth, the
Earl of Leicester, and Lord Burleigh, which appear
in the earlier edition of 1568. Saxton's maps, which
appeared in 1579, are partly the work of native
engravers, for at least eight were engraved by
Augustine Ryther and Nicholas Reynolds. In 1591
there are two books, — Broughton's Concert of Scrip-
ture, 2.Vi6i Sir John Harrington's ^r/<7j/^. The latter
contains almost fifty plates, and was the most ambi-
tious book illustrated with metal plates published in
the century. There are a few other books published
before 1600 which contains specimens of engraving,
but none worthy of particular mention.

INDEX

Abbeville, 149, 150 note.

/Esop, Steinhowel's, 50 ; Italian,
Verona 1479, 88 ; Naples 1485,
86 ; Venice 1487, 94 ; Florence,
for Piero Pacini, 125 ; Brescia
1487, 134; Milan 1498, 136;
Dutch, Leeu's, 206 ; English,
Caxlon's, 225.

Albi, 146.

Aldus, 102, 107.

Antwerp, 176.

Appell, Dr., 102.

Arms on title-pages, 20, 215.

Arndes, S., 70.

Augsburg, 39-49, 75-77.

Avisio, G., 88.

Aymon, Les Quatre Filz, 146.

b (engraver's or artist's signature),

99-
Back, G., 208, 211.
Bacon, Sir N., book plate, 22.
Baldassaris, H., 142.
Baldini, B., 90.
Baleni, G., 129.
Bazaleriis, de, 138.
Bamler, J., 44-46.
Barberiis, P. de, 84.
Basle, 79.

Batines, Colomb de, 126, 129-30.
Beauvais, V. de, Miroir Historial,

154.
Belcari, M., 128.

Belial oi Jacobus de Theramo, 41,
48 ; Dutch version called Der
Sonderen troest, 203-5.

Bellaert, J., 202-5, 211.

Bellescullee, P., 147.

Bellini, Monte Santo di Dio, 90.

Benaliis, B. de, 94, 99.

Benivieni, D., 119.

Benvenuto, F., 129.

Bergomensis, P. , De Claris mulieri-
bus, 135.

Berthelet, T., 240.

Bettini, Monte Santo di Dio, I lO.

Bevilaqua, S., 141.

Bibles (i) Latin — 42-line, 3, 6, 9,
24 ; 36-line, 8 ; 1462, ID, 26 :
(ii) German, 1472, 55; 1473
and 1477, 40, 41 ; 1480, 56, 99 ;
Koburger's, 56 ; Lubeck, 1494,
70 : (iii) Italian, Venice, 1490,
98.

Biblia Pauperum, Pfister's, 27-30.

Bineant, G., 162.

Blastos, N., 139.

Boccaccio, De Claris Mulieribus,
49, 53 ; Decamerone, lOO.

Bonaventura, S., Denote Medita-
tiotu, 96.

Bodner, Edehtein, 27-30.

Bonhomme, J., 162.

M., 173.

Bourgeois, J. le, 150.

Brandis, L., 53, 55.

252

Early Illustrated Books

Brant, S., Narrenschtff, 67-70.

Copilacion de leyes, 1485, 216.

Breda, J. de, 208.

Cousteau, G., 158.

Brescia, 132.

Cranach, L., 77.

Breydenbach, B. von, 59-63, 166.

Cremer, H., 6, 7

Brocar, A. G., 221.

Cremonese, P., 99,

Brocar, J., 221.

Bruges, 3, 201-2.

Dance of Death or Danse Macabre,

Buck der Natur, 45.

163, 172.

Btuh der vier Historien, 27, 28.

Dante, Divina Commedia, Flor-

Buck der Weisheit, 53.

ence, 1481, 90 ; Brescia, 1487,

Buck von den Sieben Todsiinden,

99 ; Venice, 149 1, 99.

44.

Dati, A., 128.

Buonaccorsi, F., 119.

G., 128.

Burgkmair, 75, 77.

Day,;,, 247.

Delaborde, Vicomte, lO.

Calandro, p., Arithmetic, iio.

Delft, 207.

Calendar of litl^), 33.

Deventer, 208.

Caliergi, Z., 106.

Dialogus Creaturarum, 201-2.

Cambridge, 242.

Dienecker, J., 73.

Camus, 27.

Dinkmuth, 53.

Capranica, D. , Arte di bene Morire,

Dino, F. di, 86, 109.

125.

Directors, 26.

Caxton, 13, 223 sqq.

Doesborch, J. of, 234, 243.

Celtes, C, 71.

Dolea, C, 10.

Centenera, A., 215.

Dorothea, S.,Rappresentatiotu, 130

Cessolis, J. de, Chess-book, German,

Du Pre, G,, 169.

41; Italian, 120; Dutch, 207;

J., 144, 148, 149, ISO, 162,

English, 224.

l8i, 184-86.

Chamb^ry, 147.

Durandus, Rationale, 1459, 5, 6.

Champjleury, 170.

Durer, A., 71-73-

Chaucer, Canterbury Tales, Cax-

ton's edd. 223, 225 ; Pynson's,

Egmont, F., 139, 229.

231.

Epistole ed Evangelii, 1 19.

Chroniques de France, 165.

Eustace, G., 196.

Codecha (or Capcasa) M. di, 96, 99.

Cologne, 55.

Faques, G. and R., 242.

Colonna, F., 103.

Fasciculus Temporum, German,

Colophons, 24-26.

56 ; Ratdolt's 93 ; Louvain,

Columna, A., De regimine princi-

1475. »48o, 201.

pum of 1493, 36.

Ferdinand ll.. King of Naples, 18.

Contrasti, 130-132.

Ferrara, 134.

Conway, W. M., quoted. Chap. ix.

Fichet, G., 15.

passim.

FifUen O'es, 228, 230.

Index

253

Fior di Virtu, Venice, 98; Flor-
ence, 122 ; Brescia, 134.

Florence, ill sqq.

Fogel, J., 6, 7.

Foresti of Bergamo, G. P. , Supple-
vtentum Chronicarum, 66 note,

93-
Forfengo, B. da, 1491, 134.
Fox, John, Book of Martyrs, 247.
Freydal, 73-75.
Frezzi, F., Quatriregio, 125.
Furter, Michael, 67, 79,

Gafori, 135, 136.

Game of Chess. See Cessolis, J. de.

Gart der Gesundheyt, 59,

Gerard, P., 149.

Giunta, L. A., 98, 102, 108.

Godard, G., 196.

Golden Legend. See Voragine,

J. de,
Gouda, 201, 207.
Gorgonzola, N., 140.
Gorricio, Contemplaciones sobre el

rosario, 218.
Graf, Urs, 79.
Granjon, 175.
Gregoriis, G. de, loo-ioi.
Grun, Hans Baldung, 79.
Gruninger, 70, 79.
Gruyer, G., ill, 113.
Gryphius, F., 173.
Guillireti, S., 138.

Haarlem, 202-5.

Hahn, U., 83.

Harrington, Sir J., Ariosto, 1591,

249.
Head-lines, 36.
Head-pieces, 36.
Historiarum Veteris Testamenti

Icones, 173.
Hoemen, Arnold ther, 31, 36.

Hohenwang, L., 40 note.

Holbein, A., 80.

Holbein, H., 56, 79-80, 172, 173,

239. 245-
Holl, L., 53.

Hours, Books of, 17. Chap. viii.
Hroswitha, 71.
Husz, M., 146.

Hyginus, Poeticon Astronomicon, 93.
Hypnerotomachia, 102-107.

Ingold, Das gulditt Spiel, 41.

Jenson, N., 10, II.

Johann Petri, 119.

Jomandes De Rebus Gothorum, 75

note.
Josephus, De la bataille judaique,

ISI-IS3-

Kerver, J., 106.

T. 195.

Ketham, J., Fasciculo de Medicina,

lOI.

Knoblochzer, 57.
Knoblouch, J., 79.
Koburger, A., 56, 63.
KoelhoflF, J., 36.
Konigshoven, 45.
Kristeller, Dr., 10, II, 96, 137.
Kropfenstein, 39.

L, French initial, i55-7-

Landino, C., 18, 120.

L'art de bien vivreet de bien niourir,

158.60.
Lavagnia, P. 90.
Leeu, G., 202, 206-211.
Le Rouge, P. 151, 155, 162.
Le Signerre, G. 135, 136.
Lettou, 227.
Lieseveldt, A. van, 209.
Lignamine, J. P. de, 84-86.

254

Early Illustrated Books

Lippmann, Dr., 12 note ; 66 note.

Numeister, 89, 146.

Lorenz, N., 90.

Nuremberg, 55, 79.

Louis II., Marquis of Saluzzo, 137.

Nuremberg Chronicle. See Sche-

Louvain, 201.

del, H.

Lubeck, 53, 70.

Lucidario^ I494> 122.

Olpe, B. de, 67-70.

Lutzelburger, 172.

Os, G. van, 207, 233.

Lydgate, Falle of Princes, 231.

P. van, 207.

Lyndewode, Constitutions, 227.

Ovid, Metamorphoses, Lyons, 1556,

Lyons, 145-146, 165-166, 172.

175 ; Mansion's, 1484, 201 ;

Venice, 1497, 102 ; Verard's,

Machlinia, 34, 227.

1493. 152.

Maillet, J., 155.

Oxford, 227-8, 243.

Mansion, C, 201, 202, 211.

Marchant, G., 160, 162.

Pachel, L., 90.

Martorel, T.,Tirant lo Blanch, 218.

Pacini, B., 119, 124.

Maximilian, Emperor, 72-75.

P. di, 141.

Mazalis, F. de, 139.

Pagination, 36.

Medici, L. de, 128, 130.

Paris et Vienne, 165.

Meer, J. van der, 207.

Passion of our Lorde Jesu, 234.

Meidenbach, J., Hortus Sanitatis,

Pasti, M. de, 88.

59-

Petrarch, De Remediis utriusque

Menard, J., 158.

Fortunae, 1532, 76 ; Trionfi,

Mer des Hystoires, 162.

96. 135-

Middleton, Prof., 6, 7.

Petri, Johann, 109.

Milan, 90, 135.

Pfister, A., 27-30.

Mirrour of our Lady, 1 5 30.

Pflanzmann, J., 40.

Mirror of the World, 1480.

Pigouchet, 190-95.

Mischomini, A., 96, 115, 116, 120,

Plantin, J., 176.

122, 124, 132.

Politiano, A., Favola d'Orfeo,

More, Sir T., 239 note.

130.

Moravus, M., 87.

Polono, Stanislao, 14, 218.

Morgiani, Lorenzo di, 109, I19.

Pont Notre Dame, 155.

Morin, Martin, 166.

Presentation Copies, 14.

Morton Missal, 20, 232.

Printers' workshop, cuts of, 163,

Muther, Dr. 40 note ; 47 note.

164.

Mystery Plays, 195.

Priiss, J., 57.

Ptolemy, Cosmographia, 53.

Naples, 86.

Pulci, L., Morgante Maggiore,

Neyret, A., 147.

125.

Nider, Expositio Decalogi, 36.

Pynson, 231 sqq.

Novara, B., 93, 94.

Novelle, 132.

QUENTEL, H., 56.

Index

255

Rappresentationiy 126.

Rastell, J., 240, 243.

Ratdolt, E., 33, 47, 9I-93-

Rechtstreit des Menschen mit dent
Tode, 27,

Regnault, F., 196.

Reichenthal, • Council of Con-
stance,' 46.

Rennes, 147.

Riessinger, S., 85.

Rivoli, Due de, 10, II.

Robert tke Devil, c, 1514, 238.

Rome, 83-86.

Rouen, 150, 166.

Rudimenta Novicioru?n, 53, 162.

Rupertus de Sancto Remigio, 45.

Saluzzo, 136.

San Pedro, D. di. Career d'Amor,

1493 and 1496, 218.
Santis, I. de, 96.
Savonarola Tracts, 111-113.
Schaufelein, H., 74, 75.
Schedel, H., Liber Chronicarum,

63-67.
Schenck, P., 147.
Schobsser, J., 47.
Schceffer, P., 4, 5, 7, 8, 26, 59,

60.
Schonsperger, H., 47, 73.
Schott, M., 57.
Scinzenceller, U., 90.
Scotus, O., 93.
Seville, 218-20.
Seven Wise Masters of Rome, 206,

235-
Sforza family, 18.
Shields in printed borders, 19.
Simoneta, G., 18.
Snellaert, C, 207.
Speculum vite Christi, Caxton's,

226 ; De Worde's, 229 ; Pyn-

son's, 232.

Soi^, A., 46.

St. Alban's, Book of, 227.
Steiner, J. A., 27.
Stephan, Schatzbehalter, 63, 66.
Strasburg, 57.
Strozzi family, 18.
Supple mentum Chronicarum. See
Foresti.

Tail-Pieces, 36.

Terence, Works, 166 ; Eunuchus,

53, 54-
Thetierdank, 73-75'
Theramo, J. de, 41. See Belial.
Thodesco, G., 109.
Title-pages, first use of, 3I-35-
Tirant lo Blanch, 218.
Tory, Geoffrey, 170-71, 197.
Tournes, J. de, 17, 175.
Trechsel, J., 166.

M., 172, 173.

Trepperel, J., 165.

Trabajos de Hercules, 215, 216, 220.

Turrecremata, Cardinal, Medita-

tiones, 83, 89, 146.

Ulm, 49-53.

Ungut, M., 214, 218.

Utrecht, 201.

Varnhagen, Dr., 132.

Valturius, De Re Militari, 40 note,

87.
Vegetius, early German, 40 note.
Vellum used, g.
Venetian books, stamped borders

in, 10-12.
Venice, 91-107.
Verard, A., 15-17, 148-60, 186-90,

202.
Verona, 87.

Vespasian, Romance of, 220.
Vienne, 147.

256

Early Illtistrated Books

ViIIena,E. de, Trabajos de Hercules,

Wittenberg, 77.

215, 216, 220.

Wohlgemuth, Michael, 63, 71.

Vivaldus, 136.

Worde, Wynkyn de, 226, 229 sqq.

Voragine, J. de, Caxton's, 20, 225 ;

cuts for an Oxford (?) edition of,

Zainer, G., 36, 40-44.

227 ; De Worde's, 229 ; Notary's,

Jm 49-53.

234; in German, 40; French, 154.

Zamora, 215.

Vostre, Simon, 190.

Zaroto, A., 135.

Zell, U., 55-

Weisskunig, 73-75.

Zwolle, 207.

Westphalia, J. de, 201, 207, 209.

Zoppino, N., 141.

/

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at the Edinburgh University Press.

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