Читать книгу Early Typography - William Skeen - Страница 7

Table of Contents

[16] This is shewn, in the history of wood-cutting by Mr. J. Jackson, not to have been the original title of the work, which was rather, says the writer, a book for the use of preachers than the laity—“A series of skeleton sermons, ornamented with woodcuts to warm the preacher’s imagination, and stored with texts to assist his memory.”

[17] The blocks of the original Biblia Pauperum re-appeared in this city on the revival of wood-engraving in Holland; and it is the opinion of Mr. Bradshaw, that it was here the earliest of the block-books was produced. This opinion has additional importance attached to it, from the fact that Zwolle was, in the early part of the Fifteenth century, celebrated as a seat of learning. “Thomas à Kempis, according to Meiners, whom Eichhorn and Heeren have followed presided over a school at Zwoll, wherein Agricola, Hegius, Langius, and Dringeberg, the restorers of learning in Germany, were educated.”—Hallam’s Introduction to the Literature of Europe, 8vo. 1837. vol. i. p. 149.

[18] Some writers consider that the whole of the text of what are considered the first and last editions, and a large portion of the text of the other two, were printed from moveable wooden letters; others again assert, that these letters were made of cast fusile metal. No positive proof, however, has been, or can be given that they were the latter. That the texts were separately printed, is evident, from the different inks employed, the burnished appearance of the paper at the back of the cuts, and the indentations at the back of the lines of type. These last, differing considerably in different specimens, give rise to differences of opinion as to whether the impressions were produced by an ordinary printing press, or by some other method of imparting pressure. The presumption is that all, or nearly all, the impressions of the oldest specimens of the art, printed only on one side of the paper or vellum, were taken in the Chinese way. Before the press was invented, there certainly was a possibility, but that was all, of printing otherwise; but after its invention, impressions could most easily be taken on both sides of the paper, without the risk of spoiling the first, while ‘perfecting’ (i.e. printing) the reverse or blank side of the sheet. As the press was not an essential in block-printing, it was probably not thought of in that embryonic state of the art. But after separable, and especially metallic, letters were made, the press could no longer be dispensed with; types would be all but useless without it; for although impressions might still be taken by careful rubbing, the paper being sufficiently damped, that process would be attended with much additional trouble, owing to the precautions rendered necessary to avoid cutting through the paper, or otherwise spoiling it by blacking the margins on the inked coffin or chase in which the types, when formed into a page, were screwed or quoined or wedged together. The date of the invention of the Letter press, by the adaptation of the screw to the purposes of book-printing, is thus an important element in the consideration of questions relating to the origin of Typography.

[19] About £1000, or £1200, of current English money.

[20] Paper with the same water-mark was also used by the First Printer in England. Vide Plate IX in vol. ii. of The Life and Typography of William Caxton.

[21] Letter in Builder, Nov. 26, 1870.

[22] So called after Andrea Mantegna, a celebrated Italian painter and engraver, born in Padua 1431, died 1505. Cards designed and coloured by this artist are very highly prized.

[23] Builder, Nov. 19, 1870.

[24] “The word which has been translated printed is ‘stampide’ (‘Carte e figure depinte e stampide’), and the question arises as to the meaning of that word in 1441. ‘Stampide,’ according to Florio, signifies ‘to print, to presse, to stampe, to form, to figure;’ and ‘stampe’ in like manner, besides a print or impression, is said to be ‘a marke, a shape, a figure.’ The word existed before printing, in its modern sense, had been heard of, and the natural application of it to the new art, does not in the least determine the question of when that art was invented. ‘Stampide’ in 1441, might simply mean formed, figured, or shaped, by the means of the stencil, a process which we know was adopted at that period, and which being much more rapid than drawing and coloring by hand, would doubtless affect very seriously the art of the card illuminator, similarly as photography, at the present day, has the art of the miniature painter.”—J. R. Planché. Builder, Nov. 19, 1870.

[25] This phrase seems specially to refer to the method of stencilling.

[26] Equivalent to about £5 15s. sterling.

[27] St. Louis of France, after his return from the Crusade, [A. D. 1254], interdicted the use of all playing cards throughout his dominions. They were also forbidden by the Council of Cologne in the year 1281. These prohibitions most probably arose from their being used for purposes of fortune-telling.

[28] Gringonneur was paid for the cards drawn and painted for Charles VI in 1392, fifty-six sous of Paris, which is calculated to be about £7 1s. 8d. of our present money, and a single pack of “tarots,” admirably painted about 1415 by Marziano, Secretary to the Duke of Milan, cost the enormous sum of 1,500 golden crowns (about £625); but in 1454 a pack of cards intended for the Dauphin of France, cost only five sous of Tours, about 11s. or 12s.—The Arts in the Middle Ages, by M. Paul Lacroix.

[29] Several ancient specimens of Greek and Roman signets are still extant. The most remarkable of these is a brass sigillum of C. J. Cæcilius Hermias, in the Duke of Richmond’s collection. It was found near Rome, and is supposed to belong to the Fourth century. The characters are reversed, engraved in relief, the back metal being cut away to a considerable depth and left in a rough state. The inscription is surrounded with a border, as shewn below.

The size of the signet is two inches long by one inch wide. At the back is a ring. If used for printing, its application was no doubt the same as that of the blocks used by the Paper Stainers of the present day. Coloured pigments would be applied to the face of the letters, and the signet would then be stamped on whatever substance was to be marked. It might, in this way, have been used for stamping on the covers of letters or parcels, to mark the name of the party from whom they were sent, in the same way as engraved fac-simile signatures are officially used for franking such documents through the post at the present day. It may, however, have been the receipt stamp of a man in trade; or a trade-mark, used, for instance, to stamp the wares while in a semi-plastic state, of a baker or brick-maker.

After the above was in type, the writer was informed by Dr. J. D. M. Coghill, Superintendent of the Convict Establishment at Wẹlikaḍa, near Colombo, that the probability of the first of the purposes to which the signet is supposed to have been applied, was much strengthened by the somewhat similar practice, though not for an exactly similar object, which prevails in parts of China, in the use of chops—“house-signs,”—by professional men, traders, &c. These chops are small blocks of box or other hard wood, on the upper surfaces of which the name and profession of an individual or firm are cut by itinerant engravers, at the rate of thirty for a Mexican dollar. To meet the requirements of business and to facilitate intercourse between Europeans and native Chinese, each foreign house, or firm, or professional man, furnishes all those with whom he or they have transactions, with his ‘chop,’ on the sides of which his name and address are also written in Roman characters. Whatever letter, document, packet or parcel is thenceforth sent to him or them, besides the address written with ordinary ink and in Roman characters, a red ink impression of the chop is stamped on the envelope or cover. This any native can read, and the addressee is without difficulty found. To this information Dr. Coghill kindly added the gift of the accompanying original chop, which belonged to his brother, Dr. Sinclair Coghill, when practising as a physician with his partner, Dr. Bell, in Shanghai. The characters represent the words ‘Peh-i-sang,’ the nearest equivalent the Shanghai dialect of the Chinese language gives to ‘Bell, Physician.’ It is a small block, an inch and a quarter long, three-eighths of an inch broad, and was one inch and three-eighths high. It has, however, been reduced to an inch in height to suit the size of the type and allow of its being herewith printed.

[30] For, says the Bishop in his ‘Philobiblon,’ “Books are masters who instruct us without rods, without hard words and anger, without clothes and money. If you approach them they are not asleep; if investigating you interrogate them, they conceal nothing; if you mistake them they never grumble; if you are ignorant they cannot laugh at you.”

[31] Vide vol. i. of The Life and Typography of William Caxton, from the second chapter of which the two preceding paragraphs have been abridged.