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
adopted another device with the same subject, but differing in many
important particulars. In the second, the composing-stick used by the
figure in the act of setting type is changed from the right to the left
hand; the press shows improved mechanical construction, indicating
greater solidity and strength. In the latter example also the figure
sitting at the case on the right side of the engraving is intended to
represent a woman, instead of a man as in the earlier illustration.
Contemporary with both Petit and Bade, Gilles or Gillet Hardouyn,
1491-1521, was both a printer and a bookseller, and used two Marks, of
which we give the more striking. Germain Hardouyn, possibly a son of the
preceding, confined himself more particularly to selling books during
the first forty years of the sixteenth century.
[Illustration: PHILIPPE PIGOUCHET.
pp.
PHILIPPE PIGOVCHET]
[Illustration: JEHAN PETIT.
I P
IEHAN PETIT]
[Illustration: J. BADE.
Prelũ Ascẽsianũ
I B]
[Illustration: GILLET HARDOUYN.]
[Illustration: GEOFFREY TORY.
NON PLVS]
Geoffrey Tory resembled many others of the early printers in being also
a scholar; but he was also an artist and an engraver, taking up and
carrying on the great work inaugurated by Vostre and Vérard. He was born
at Bourges in 1480, and one of his earliest works, which was published
by Petit and printed by Gilles De Gourmont, was an edition of the
“Geography” of Pomponius Mela, 1507, and between this time and his death
he produced a number of Books of Hours, the decoration of which can only
be described as marvellous. One of the most beautiful is undoubtedly the
“Heures de la Vierge,” executed for Simon De Colines. What interests us
most, however, is the Mark which he adopted when he entered into
business as a printer and bookseller; it is perhaps the most elegant
that had been up to that time designed. This Mark of the broken pitcher,
with the motto “Non plus,” first appeared at the end of a Latin poem
issued in 1524, is regarded as a _memento_ of the death of his little
daughter in 1522, and is thus explained: the broken pitcher symbolizes
her career cut short; the book with clasps her literary studies; the
little winged figure her soul; and the motto “Non plus,” “Je ne tiens
plus à rien.” He gives his own interpretation of this Mark, however, in
that curious medley of poetry and philosophy which he called
“Champfleury,” 1529. It may be mentioned that on some of the bindings of
his quarto volumes the broken pitcher is transversed by the wimble or
_toret_--an obvious pun on his name.
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