The early printed books did not have title-pages. The slow development of this feature after the invention of printing is accounted for by the reason that in this respect, as in others, the first printed books were modelled in imitation of the illuminated missals, and it was not deemed necessary in the mediæval books and manuscripts to have a title-page, the scribe of the olden time merely recording in a note or label fastened to the end of the volume the name and description of his work; so this habit was continued for a long time by the early printers. This note or ending was called a _Colophon_. Title-pages began to come into use about 1490, but it was not until about forty years later that they became general. Printers’ devices, which were generally of an heraldic character, were commonly seen on the title-pages, some of which were very elaborate and finely designed. The famous printing house of Aldus at Venice had a device of an anchor with a dolphin twined around it, and the motto “Propera tarde,” or “Festina lente” (hasten slowly). It was from the printing press of Aldus, in 1499, that the celebrated book called _Poliphili Hypnerotomachia_, “The Dream of Poliphilus,” was issued. It is a finely illustrated book, consisting of classical compositions of figures and processions, many architectural designs, ornamental letters, emblems, and devices, all of which are executed in outline and printed from wood blocks. The illustrations have a fine quality of line, somewhat in the spirit and style of Mantegna’s processional designs, or like those great woodcuts in the “Triumph of Maximilian” by Hans Burgmair and Albert Dürer; they are supposed—without, however, any definite proof—to be the work of Gentile or Giovanni Bellini. The book is a romance written and illustrated in the spirit of classical antiquity that so deeply coloured the art and literature of the early Renaissance epoch. A reproduction of the illustrations of this book in photo-lithography by Mr. W. Griggs, with notes by Dr. Appell, was issued by the Science and Art Department in 1888. [Illustration: Fig. 314.—Illustration from Woodcut of Dante’s “Inferno;” Fifteenth Century.] Somewhat in the style of “The Dream of Poliphilus” is the illustration (Fig. 314) from an edition of Dante’s “Inferno” of the same period. A reduced specimen of the flat treatment of a Renaissance border, from a woodcut which appeared in an edition of “Herodotus” printed at Venice in 1470, is shown as the Frontispiece of this volume. This rich and delicate design is extremely effective in white on a black ground, and is artistically appropriate to the decoration of the page, much more so than the later French and German work in borders and title-pages, which was usually of an extremely heavy character.