COLOGNE AND GENEVA
The early printers at Cologne do not appear to have made much use
of woodcut initials, the first known to us being the R of a missal
by H. Quentell of 1494. This, although cut somewhat roughly, shows
considerable vigour. It is highly probable that the splendid P with
the Virgin and Child and grotesque profiles in two of the corners is
of the same or earlier date. The book in which it occurs is an undated
Donatus, which J. Rosenthal, to whom the volume was submitted, thinks
was printed by H. Quentell towards the end of the fifteenth century. It
looks at first sight as if a missal or Psalter letter had been used, as
was so often the case at the time, because it happened to be in stock,
but the Donatus, as has been said, often began with an initial of the
kind. We have not been able to trace this P to any other press or
publication.
The D with a fool’s head in cap and bells is to be found frequently in
Quentell’s books. The specimen from which it was copied is in a book
already mentioned, the _Tractatus Consultatorii Venerandi Magistri
Henrici de Gorychum_, printed _anno supra Jubileum tertio_. It is to be
found at the beginning of the chapter, _De observatione Festorum_.
On the title-page of a treatise called _Quodlibeta_, by St. Thomas
Aquinas, is a curious black U. This is also by Quentell.
Another class book, a Latin verse primer, entitled _Sequentiarum et
hymnorum Expositio_, etc. etc., printed by Herman Bumgart de Ketwyck in
1501, has the strangest initials that can be conceived. The book was a
very well known one, and other editions exist with a similar cut on the
title-page, representing a master at his desk surrounded by scholars.
But Cologne, like other German towns, was now to feel the influence
of the Renaissance, and adopt for book ornamentation such artists as
Albert Dürer, Holbein, and Anton von Worms. In the case of Holbein,
such ornamental letters as appeared in Cologne books were copied from
models that had been used previously at Basle, in the same way that
the letters of other artists were copied from books of Hagenau and
elsewhere, but Dürer and Anton von Worms’s designs were printed first
in works of Cologne.
Of the initials attributed to Albert Dürer, the finest are those
comprising the alphabet used by Eucharius Hirtzhorn, who latinised his
name to Cervicornus. These initials, which are the largest of their
kind, represent children playing and romping sometimes with animals,
such as horses and monkeys, and make up a very remarkable set. It
is highly probable that Albert Dürer, as is generally admitted, was
the designer of this alphabet, but there is no positive proof, and a
writer on this special question in _Le Livre_, M. Glucq, gives it as
his opinion that these letters were designed by Hans Burgkmair, and
instances the treatment of the horses’ heads in borders by the latter
as being identical with the heads in some of the letters.
This alphabet was often copied by printers of other towns, particularly
Lyons, and by Hubert de Crooce of Bruges, but the copies are always
greatly inferior in execution, and can be distinguished also by having
a wavy linear, or _criblé_, groundwork instead of a black one.
The reader can compare the initials given here, which comprise the most
interesting of the set, with those by H. Weiditz, described in the
chapter on Augsburg. For comparison between the Cervicorn initials and
the borders alluded to, reference can be made to the _Bücherornamentik_
of Butsch.
The smallest of the Cologne children’s alphabets is to be found almost
complete in different works by J. Gymnicus, and was designed by the
painter Anton von Worms. The C with a child playing with a snake is an
example. The D and O, from a somewhat larger alphabet, are principally
found in the works of Melchior Novesianus, as are also those imitated
from Holbein’s alphabet of Death. The largest Q, the S with the
bishop and the symbols of the Apostles in the corners, also by Anton
von Worms, and the Q with the death’s head, all come from volumes by
Quentell. The three smallest letters belong to an alphabet used by
Melchior Novesianus.
_Geneva._--Genevan incunabula are of the very greatest rarity, and very
few initials of that town are mentioned by bibliographers. Of very
large letters the most curious are two of the calligraphic L’s that are
so popular on the title-pages of French impressions, and the larger of
which is evidently inspired by a Paris or Lyons L of the same general
design. Our reproduction comes from the _Doctrinal de Sapience_,
printed in 1493, no doubt by Bellot, as the book has two impressions
of the C of his alphabet. This composition is greatly superior to
the French original, known as the January and May initial, and if
the artist has intended to represent innocence and cunning, he has
succeeded to perfection. Compared with it, that which may be found on
the title-page of Verard’s edition of the _Doctrinal de Sapience_ and
in many other works, is insipid.
The letter with a hooded dog, or perhaps a monkey holding a book,
with a clerk below, is accompanied on the title-page by a border
representing the birth of Eve.
As regards the volume itself, which is entitled _Les Fleurs et Manières
des Temps passés_, it is without date or printer’s name, but at the
beginning of the front page after the title is a Bellot A, whilst on
the verso of the title is the mark of Loys M. Cruse.
A still earlier _Doctrinal de Sapience_ of 1488, also without printer’s
name or date, has a C on the second page of comparatively little
interest, which has been reproduced by Humphreys in his _History of
Printing_. The C reproduced here is at the beginning of the fourth
page. A _Kalendrier des Bergers_ of J. Bellot, 1497, has a Q with a
cock in the Lyons style, a curious U, and the P of his fine alphabet.
Initials are occasionally met with in which the printer’s mark is
worked into the design, as, for instance, a D of Kobel of Oppenheim.
In a treatise on the right way of preaching, by that _sacratissimus_
doctor of the Christian Church, St. Thomas Aquinas, L. M. Cruse
of Geneva in 1485 uses capitals which he embellishes with his own
initials. Sorg and some Strasburg printers have ornamental letters with
initials on them, but not corresponding to their own names--most likely
to those of the artists.
Better known than the large historiated letters just described is the
alphabet of which we give the M, the N, and the T. These letters occur
in many of Bellot’s publications, but in the _Dialogus Creaturarum_ it
is nearly complete.
This is one of the most decorative alphabets of the time, but good
proofs of the Wagner alphabet of Nuremberg, in which the same design
had already been used, are even more effective--compare this M, N, or T
with the Wagner E. Unfortunately, very few of the latter, which are on
a black ground, print well. The Avignon initials given further on are
also of this pine-cone pattern, as are those also in the _Psalterium
Virginis Marie_ of Alanus de Rupe, printed, it is stated, in the most
Christian kingdom of Sweden, _cum initialibus ligno incisis_, in 1498.
It is quite possible that the later printers copied from Wagner, but
the design they all use is one that is frequently met with in old
manuscripts, and, like most other fundamental patterns, there is no
doubt that this was its origin.
Our last Geneva specimens are taken from the very rare missal printed
by Bellot. The M is from the title-page. The other initials are
somewhat in the style of the Lyons _Catalogus Sanctorum_, but they are
even more like those of a Troyes missal printed by Lecoq.