Printers' Marks: A Chapter in the History of Typography — John Shaqi
Printers' Marks: A Chapter in the History of TypographyRoberts, W. (William)
History
Printers' Marks: A Chapter in the History of Typography
Roberts, W. (William)
Printers' marks
The angels nearly always occur in couples, as in the case of
Antoine Vérard, one of the earliest printers to adopt this form; but a
few exceptions may be mentioned where only one appears, namely, in the
Mark of Estienne Baland, Lyons (1515), in which an angel is represented
as confounding Balaam’s ass; and in that of Vincent Portunaris, of the
same place and of about the same time, in which an angel figures holding
an open book; in the four employed by G. Silvius, an Antwerp printer
(1562), in three of which the figure is also holding a book; in the
elaborate Mark of Philip Du Pré, Paris, 1595, and in the exceeding rough
Mark of Jannot de Campis, of Lyons, 1505. Curiously enough, the subject
of Christ on the cross was very rarely employed, an exception occurring
in the case of Schäffeler, of Constance, or Bodensee, Bavaria, 1505. The
same centre-piece, without the cross, was employed by Jehan Frellon,
Paris, 1508, and evidently copied by Jehan Burges, the younger, at
Rouen, 1521, whilst that of Guillaume Du Puy, Paris, 1504, has already
been referred to. The Virgin Mary occurs occasionally, the more notable
examples being the Marks of Guillaume Anabat, Paris, 1505-10, really a
careful piece of work; and the elder G. Ryverd, Paris, 1516, and in each
case with the infant Jesus. St. Christopher is a subject one sometimes
meets with in Printers’ Marks: in that of Gervais Chevallon, Paris,
1538, it however plays a comparatively subordinate part, and its merits
were only fully recognized by the Grosii, of Leipzig, who nearly always
used it for about two centuries, 1525-1732; the example bearing the last
date is by far one of the most absurd of its kind--the cowled monk with
a modern lantern lighting St. Christopher on his way through the river
is a choice piece of incongruity. Another phase of the religious element
capable of considerable expansion is that in relation to the part played
in Marks by saints and priests generally. Sometimes these are found
together with an effect not at all happy, notably the two Marks of Jehan
Olivier, Paris, 1518, which, with Jesus Christ on one side, a Pope on
the other, and an olive tree, are sufficiently crude to present an
appearance which seems to-day almost blasphemous. The last of the
several religious phases of Printers’ Marks to which we shall allude is
at the same time the most elaborate and complicated. We refer to that of
the Cross. The subject is sufficiently wide to occupy of itself a small
volume, but even after the most careful investigation, there are many
points which will for ever remain in the region of doubt and obscurity.
Tradition is proverbially difficult to eradicate; and all the glamour
which surrounds the history of the Cross, and which found expression in,
among other popular books, the “Legenda Aurea,” maintained all its
pristine force and attractiveness down to the end of the sixteenth
century. The invention of printing and the gradual enlightenment of
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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