Illustrated books -- Bibliography; Illustration of books; Printing -- History
Although, as we shall see, from this time forward a great number of
English books contain engraved work, those which can be said to be
illustrated during the next sixty years are few enough, a study of Mr.
A. M. Hind's very useful _List of the Works of Native and Foreign
Line-Engravers in England from Henry VIII to the Commonwealth_,[68]
tempting me to place the number at about a score. The year after the
_Orlando Furioso_ came another curious treatise by Hugh Broughton, not
printed with type, but "graven in brasse by J. H.," whom Sir Sidney
Colvin identifies with Jodocus Hondius, a Fleming who lived in England
from about 1580 to 1594, and may have done the plates in the _Concent of
Scripture_ and some at least of those in the _Orlando_. Six years later
(1598) we find Lomazzo's _Tracte containing the artes of curious
Paintinge_ with an emblematical titlepage and thirteen plates by Richard
Haydock, the translator, four of the plates being adapted from Durer's
book on Proportion, and all of them showing very slight skill in
engraving. In 1602 came Sir William Segar's _Honour, Military and
Civil_, with eight plates showing various distinguished persons, English
and foreign, wearing the robes and insignia of the Garter, the Golden
Fleece, S. Michael, etc. Three of the plates are signed by William
Rogers, the most distinguished of the English Elizabethan engravers, and
the others are probably his also. Most of them are very dignified and
effective in the brilliantly printed "first states" in which they are
sometimes found, but ordinary copies with only the "second states" are
as a rule disappointing.
The beginning of the reign of James I was directly responsible for one
ambitious engraved publication, Stephen Harrison's _The Archs of Triumph
erected in honor of the High and mighty prince James, the first of that
name king of England and the sixt of Scotland, at his Maiesties Entrance
and passage through his Honorable City & Chamber of London vpon the
15th day of march 1603 [1604] Invented and published by Stephen Harrison
Joyner and Architect and graven by William Kip_. Here an engraved
titlepage, with dangling ornaments in the style of the De Bry alphabet,
is followed by seven plates of the seven arches, the most notable of
which (a pity it was not preserved) was crowned with a most interesting
model of Jacobean London, to which the engraver has done admirable
justice.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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