Chapter I: Preface

The subject of printers’ ornaments can be defined in its stricter meaning as the decoration of books as apart from book illustration, the aim of both decoration and ornamentation being to heighten the attraction of the letterpress, although the one is not in any way dependent upon the other.

In the following pages an attempt has been made to give an outline history of the introduction of ornaments into books printed by English printers and the subsequent growth and development of the art down to the present day.

Printers’ ornaments include head and tail pieces, initial letters, borders to title-pages or text, and decorative blocks such as those which were used freely by the sixteenth century printer, Henry Bynneman, and others. Printers’ devices, being in the nature of trade marks, have no place in this volume, as, although decorative in themselves, they were not used simply for the sake of embellishing the page.

Although it is generally believed that English printers were on the whole inartistic, and that many of the best designs were borrowed from foreign countries, there is no lack of good material for a work on English printers’ ornaments from the fifteenth onwards to the nineteenth century. Many famous names of special printers come to mind in early English books of the sixteenth century, such as Denham, Bynneman, Wolfe, and John Day.

It only remains to acknowledge the courtesy of those who have helped in the production of this book by granting permission for the reproduction of illustrations and for the loan of blocks.

To Mr E. Gordon Duff and the Cambridge University Press for permission to reproduce the Machlinia border; to Prof. A. W. Pollard, C.B., both for kindly suggestions and for the loan of illustrations; to Mr C. Sayle of Cambridge University Library for permission to reproduce initials; to Mr Ralph Straus for permission to use the block of the Baskerville ornaments from his book on the well-known printer, and to the Cambridge University Press for the loan of the block; also to Messrs Bowes & Bowes for the loan of blocks; to Messrs Maggs Bros. for two whole-page illustrations, and to the Oxford University Press for past and present ornaments.

For illustrations to the chapter on Modern Work we have to thank Messrs Charles Whittingham & Griggs, Ltd.; Messrs H. W. Caslon & Co., Ltd.; Messrs R. & R. Clark, Ltd., of Edinburgh; the Trustees of the Kelmscott Press, and Messrs Emery Walker, Ltd.; The Curwen Press; The Morland Press, Ltd.; The Pelican Press; Messrs P. M. Shanks & Sons, Ltd., and Messrs Stephenson, Blake & Co., Ltd. The additional illustrations in the Edition de Luxe which do not appear in the ordinary edition are two especially representative lace borders of the sixteenth century, a beautiful ornamented page reproduced by kind permission of the Trustees of the Kelmscott Press in red and black, and one of the rare early coloured decorative titles.

H. R. PLOMER

LONDON
_Xmas 1923_

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

PAGE

_The Genesis of Printers’ Ornaments_ 1

CHAPTER II

_English Printers and their Ornaments_ 15

CHAPTER III

_Borders_ 31

CHAPTER IV

_Head and Tail Pieces--Small Ornaments_ 53

CHAPTER V

_Head and Tail Pieces--Decorative Blocks_ 65

CHAPTER VI

_Miscellaneous Ornaments_ 81

CHAPTER VII

_Initial Letters and Factotums_ 87