PARIS
As with Lyons, the material upon which one could draw for Paris is
almost inexhaustible. Dibdin considers the initials of this town to be
the finest that can be found, and gives the letters of Josse Bade with
branches growing out of the heads of the personages as examples. As
regards book illustration, however, Paris was behind Lyons, where the
earliest attempts at decoration were made in 1478.
The first book printed in Paris with ornamental letters was the _Vies
des Anciens Sainctz Pères of Dupré_, which appeared in 1486, that is
to say, eight years later. Mr. Pollard thinks that these initials, of
which there are only eight, five of which we reproduce, afforded the
first hint for the first calligraphic initials used for title-pages,
of which several have been given under Lyons. Dupré was one of the
printers who worked for Vérard, who was chiefly a publisher. An
alphabet of small calligraphic initials was frequently used in the
volumes printed for him by the Lerouges of Paris and Troyes, and is to
be found complete in the _Jardin de Santé_. Pen-letters, as they are
called, of this type, are of frequent occurrence in manuscripts.
Of the large calligraphic initials a sufficient number of specimens
have been given under the heading of Lyons, and, as a rule, they are
more quaint than those used by Paris printers.
The huge initials already spoken of in the _Mer des Hystoires_ are too
large for our _format_. In the same work is a serpentine S equally
out of proportion to this volume, an I with a picture of Christ, and
a P of similar size in the style of those that often occur in works
of Vérard, representing a scribe at work, and recalling the cuts so
often seen on the verso of title-pages. For these initials, which are
too large for reproduction in this volume, the reader is referred to
Claudin’s _History of French Printing_ and Monceau’s monograph on the
Lerouges. Of those more moderate in size, the January and May initial
on the title-pages of the _Doctrinal de Sapience_, the _Quinze Joyes
du mariage_, and many other works by Vérard, Trepperel, and Lenoir,
is the best known (see under Geneva). The _Livre du Faulcon_ has an
initial with two grotesque profiles, also very frequently met with on
other title-pages. This, together with the L with three monkeys, is
reproduced by Mr. Pollard in his _Early Illustrated Books_, to which
the reader is referred.
Shortly before the end of the fifteenth century, in 1497, Bocard
published an edition of Robert Gaguin’s _De origine et gestis
Francorum_, with a few large grotesque initials, and a very pretty
one of the Virgin of the same size, as well as an alphabet of smaller
letters. The first leaf of this book begins with an initial which is
badly coloured in the only original at our disposal, but which is
interesting as forming at the same time an _ex-libris_. The letter in
question is an F, and in each of the segments (separated by the central
bar) is a scroll, in which an early owner of the volume had written his
name.
In the _Nef de Santé et Condemnacion des Banquetz_ of Trepperel are
some other grotesques, found also in others of his publications.
About the same time the use of ornamental initials was commenced by
Rembolt and Gering. Gering, who was one of the earliest German printers
to settle in Paris, published with his partner, in 1499, a book
entitled _Divi Augustini in sacras Pauli epistolas Interpretatio_, with
the large P, representing, no doubt, St. Augustine preaching to his
followers, which occurs at the beginning of almost every chapter, and a
number of smaller ones.
It is in the smaller initials of Gering and Rembolt that we have some
of the best examples, as far as historiated letters are concerned,
of those compound animals so often met with in the ornamentation
of the fifteenth century. If we look at the records of antiquity,
such as Egyptian hieroglyphs, Roman medals and pottery, and other
artistic remains, it will be seen that from a very early time it was
considered humorous to represent animals carrying on the occupations
of men, or doing the duties of other animals. By a natural extension
of this idea, men were depicted in the roles of animals who had
usurped their supremacy, and who are represented as treating their
tyrant in the way that they themselves were accustomed to be treated.
Wright and Champfleury in their Histories of Caricature have given
numerous examples. In an Egyptian papyrus, a cat is seen walking
erect and driving a flock of geese, a fox is carrying a basket and
playing the flute, and the lion and the unicorn are playing at chess.
In a thirteenth-century tile, a rabbit going a-hunting is riding his
hereditary foe the dog, and in a manuscript of the fourteenth, a dog
with his paws tied is being conveyed in a cart drawn by two rabbits and
led by a third, towards a hill on which a gallows has been prepared for
him. In a carving of the same period, another example of ‘the world
turned upside down,’ four geese are shown hanging their old enemy the
fox. Roman statuettes still exist, in which the personages represented
are satirised by their heads being replaced by those of animals, such
as rats or wolves.
These fancies, which are said to have come from Greece, led to the
creation of such beings as the Sphinx, the most celebrated of the
compound animals of antiquity, and later on to the Chimerae and Grylli,
which were the predecessors of the innumerable fantastic hybrids
that the imaginations of the artists of the Middle Ages called into
existence. These creatures have already been represented in our Lyons
initials. In one of Saccon’s letters there is a kind of armadillo
with a human head, and amongst the reproductions from the _Regimen
Sanitatis_ there are two copied from Gering and Rembolt originals,
which are also given.
In these latter the R, with a monster with a neck ending in a human
head, is particularly noticeable, as it occurs frequently in the
borders of the same printers, and the Books of Hours of other presses.
It is to be remarked that the belief in the existence of these
unnatural monsters was quite general. Wright quotes Giraldus Cambrensis
as describing animals in Ireland, some half bulls, half men, others
half stags, half cows, others half monkeys, half dogs. The dog-faced
monkeys had always been worshipped in Egypt, and for this reason
possibly had become an object of suspicion to the mediæval clergy, who
made them figure as devils both in church architecture and manuscript
decoration. It is in this rôle that they are constantly represented in
woodcut initials.
The following year the first edition of the _Cornucopia_ of Perottus
appeared, the first part of which has one of the larger initials on
every twentieth or thirtieth page. Towards the end of the volume they
become much more frequent; not only are they to be met with on every
page, but on some there are half a dozen or more. Another edition of
this work, which was often printed, was published by Rembolt in 1507,
mostly with the same initials, but the P with the Nativity was not used
in the second edition.
The two armorial initials are from a French translation of the _History
of Denmark_ by Saxo Grammaticus, published by Josse Bade in 1514.
Besides these there are three others in the same style, a D, an I,
and a P. The D is like the N in general arrangement, but without the
supporters, and the legend ‘Arma regis Dacie’ is in scrolls with the
letters C. P. and C. L. In the I the central shield is suppressed, and
the shields are framed by banderolles with the legend: ‘Arma regis
Dacie Swecie Norvegie, sclavorum gottorumque anno domini MDXIIII.’ The
P is similar to the two others in being without supporters, and the
legend is slightly modified: ‘Arma regis Dacie Swecie Norvegie.’ These
initials were particularly admired by Dibdin, who calls attention to
their beauty.
Amongst the publications of Trepperel are several editions of the
_Jardin de Santé_, which, in the Latin _Hortus Sanitatis_, is a thick
folio dealing first with birds, beasts, and fishes, and finishing
with an alphabetical account of medicinal plants, and finally stones
(minerals). A treatise, _De urinis_, completes the whole.
Vérard’s edition already mentioned was of the same proportions, but
Trepperel published his as an octavo on plants only. The initials are
not always well printed, rather the reverse. The best are given in our
illustrations. A few of these letters are to be found in a small folio
with woodcuts, entitled _Les œuvres de Justin, vray hystoriographe sur
les faictz et gestes de Troge Pompee_, etc. etc., in much better proof.
In this same book is the L with a harpy, which, together with the M,
the only other letter of the kind we have seen, is to be frequently
met with in the _Chroniques de France_ and in a great many other books
by Philippe Lenoir, finally in a Paris _Missale Carthusiense_. The
two letters with children, inspired by Venetian initials, with the
linear R of the same size and the big ‘philosophus’ Q, are taken from
a work on the Logic of Aristotle by Jacobus Stapulensis, published
by H. Estienne in 1510. In other works the same initial occurs, but
the word ‘philosophus’ is replaced by ‘Aristoteles,’ or by some other
philosopher’s name. We have met with several varieties. The smaller
letters are to be found also in books printed by J. Petit, H. Estienne,
and Josse Bade.
It may be here observed that the Paris printers had quite a specialty
for missals, and in some of them initial letters of the most
varied origin are mixed together. In one of them, the _Missale ad
consuetudinem insignis ecclesie Parisiensis_, by Wolfgang Hopyl, in
1504, the initials belong to different alphabets. The best are the A
(Annunciation), the P (Nativity), another P (the Circumcision), an E
(visit of the wise men), S (Pentecost), C (a priest saying mass), and
when the proofs are perfect it would be difficult to imagine anything
more effective. But the handsomest set is in the _Missale Leodiense_,
also printed by Wolfgang Hopyl, in 1513. These initials are used in
other missals, but are here in their best condition. Some of them
are to be found in the 1526 edition of the Liége missal by Marnef and
Hopyl, and again in the _Missel de Chartres_ of Kerver, 1529.
In most works of this kind the subjects of the _histoires_ are of a
Biblical nature, particularly incidents in the lives of the saints,
although relieved sometimes by a touch of the grotesque.
In other missals the grotesque reigns supreme, showing how intimately
it was associated with the idea of Church Art, as is well seen in the
beautiful Books of Hours by Philippe Pigouchet and others, in which the
borders are a mixture of the grotesque and the macabre.
One of the books most frequently reprinted at this period was the
_Propriétaire_, the translation of the work of Bartolomæus de
Glanville, _De proprietatibus rerum_, which was the book on which
Caxton worked at Cologne. It is a kind of general encyclopædia,
beginning with a disquisition on the Trinity, and ending with a chapter
on Astrology. It is from this work that we have reproduced the twelve
letters, amongst others the Q with a bagpiper, and an L representing a
person in a fool’s cap giving a baby pap. These occur in a great many
other works of Philippe Lenoir.
In the treatise ‘On Men and Women,’ the different sections are preceded
by initials which correspond to the signs of the Zodiac, as in the
Lyons copy, of which we have given specimens. But in the Paris edition,
curiously enough, the first two sections, Aries and Taurus, have no
initials, although ornamental letters with a ram and bull respectively,
and entirely inappropriate anywhere else, are to be found in other
books published by this printer, such as the _Chroniques de France_ and
the _Saint Graal_.
The two large initials, one of them with a portrait, formed part of the
alphabet of Vascosan, used in, amongst other books, the work of Oronce
Fine, or Finée, as he is variously called. The vignette of the O is
said to be his portrait. It is authenticated by the initials O. F.
Josse Bade has some large initials in the Venetian style, with
intertwisting bands and no historiation, generally described in
book catalogues as ‘magnificent ornamental letters.’ We admit to a
predilection for initials with personages, and prefer to give here some
of the smaller set, sometimes printed in red in the original, which
particularly excited Dibdin’s admiration, and which are graceful, even
when not historiated. They are to be found in a great many of this
printer’s productions, as well as in those of Simon de Colines and
others.
The missal letters of two sizes, beginning with an A representing the
Trinity, are considered by experts to have been designed by Geoffroy
Tory or members of his school. They form part of a fragment consisting
of eight or nine pictorial pages, such as are to be met with in the
missals. Several have the Crucifixion surrounded by an ornamental
border, in one of which is the mark of Tory’s _atelier_--the cross of
Lorraine. On these leaves, which have not been identified--they were
perhaps only proof-sheets--the letters did not serve as initials, but
were placed end to end, to form a compartment border.
In two instances where initials were used at the beginning of the text,
they came from an alphabet of one of the missals given above.
The smaller of the two remaining sets, with the little D dated 1526,
was used in the publications of Simon de Colines and others.
A similar initial used by Chevallon at the beginning of a treatise of
diseases of women by Hippocrates is dated 1524, but after 1545 the date
is replaced by the letters C. G., the initials of Chevallon’s widow,
Charlotte Guiard.
In a large folio edition published by Chevallon in 1528 of the _Digesta
seu Pandectae Juris Civilis_, most of the initials are too badly
printed for reproduction. One of them, however, is of good impression,
and besides that is supremely interesting, as it forms a little picture
representing a scene from one of the xylographic _Ars Moriendi_. It is
the only letter of the kind we know, and this is the only time we have
met with it. In the original the initial is of the smaller dimension,
but it is so interesting that we have had it enlarged. In the block
books, scrolls are generally seen emerging from the mouths of the
devils, with the suggestions printed on them by which they attempt
to turn aside the dying soul from thoughts of piety. This miniature
composition is too small for such insertions, but the attitude of the
arch fiend shows that he is ready to seize any opportunity that may
present itself.
There are a great many more alphabets of Paris printers that we should
have liked to reproduce, had it been possible to multiply our examples
indefinitely--amongst them that of Kerver, of which we give the C with
a knight in armour. The three others, B, C, and L, are coarse copies of
Kerver letters used in England, these being taken from a medical work
by Bullein. Of the next three, the L with a saint is a copy of the same
letter of Rembolt, the two others from Philip le Noir both recurring
frequently in his impressions.
The P with a master and pupils is from the press of N. de la Barre.
The three little pen letters are from the same source.
We cannot bring this short selection of Parisian letters to a close
without mentioning the Royal letters designed by Geoffroy Tory and
used by Robert Estienne in a Bible and in other books after 1536.
Independently of the accessory ornamentation, the letters themselves
have since served as models of proportion.