Chapter III: Part 3

Unfortunately, we have no minute description of the art of type-making as it was practised before Moxon. Those who were competent to describe the work, refrained from description, either because they thought that the subject was trivial or technical, or because they intended to conceal the process. The authors who did undertake to describe the art were incompetent; they did not thoroughly understand the subject, and have treated it slightingly and incorrectly. But we are not entirely in the dark.

Our most authentic information is contained in a queer little book by Jost Amman, which is known to modern book-collectors as _The Book of Trades_,[14] and which was published at Frankfort-on-the-Main, in the year 1564. The title of the book, with text in German, describes it as _Hans Sachs’ Correct Description of all Arts, Ranks and Trades_, with printed [p062] illustrations. The descriptions, so called, which were written in verse, by Hans Sachs, the cobbler poet, are of no value for this inquiry: they describe nothing. To men seeking trustworthy information about art or manufactures, all the merit of the book is in its numerous engravings on wood, which may be accepted as faithful illustrations of the methods and usages observed during the sixteenth century.

[From Jost Amman.]]

Among the illustrations is the _schriftgiesser_, or the type-founder, with the accessories of his art about him. We see the furnace for melting the metal, the bellows, the tongs and the basket of charcoal. That the man is founding types is apparent, not only from the bowl of cast types on the floor before the stool, but from his position with spoon in hand. Here we begin to note differences. The type-caster of 1683 stands up to his work; the _schriftgiesser_ of Amman is sitting down. The mould of 1683, like the hand moulds that were in use forty years ago, is provided with a wire spring, to keep the matrix firmly in position; the mould of Amman has no spring of iron wire and it is nested in a pyramid-shaped box, which seems to be used as a protection to the hand. How the mould was nested in the box, how the matrix was attached to the mould, how the cast types were dislodged from the mould, is not shown in the engraving. We have to regret [p063] that the wood-cut is so small, and that Amman’s engraving is so coarse. There are some indications that, in its more important features, the mould of Amman was like that of Moxon. The little opening in the side of the mould which rests on the shelf may have been an opening for the insertion of matrices. That metal matrices were used is dimly shown by the three little bars resting on the top of a small nest of drawers, which has the appearance of a chest for punches and matrices. The pyramidal box was not only the nest of the mould, but served also as a support for the matrix. The sitting position of the caster permitted him to give the box a throw or jerk; with his right hand at liberty, he could pull out the mould and dislodge the type in the usual manner.

There are other features in Amman’s wood-cut requiring notice. Upon the lower shelf are two crucibles, which were put in use, probably, when making the alloy of type-metal. The use of the sieves is not apparent; they may have been needed to sift the sand for the sand moulds, in which bars of type-metal were made, and in which large initial types were cast. The crucibles, the furnace, the mould, the position of the type-caster, and the single types with jets attached, are enough to prove that types were cast, one by one, by the process subsequently described by Moxon. It is plain that the elementary principles of type-founding were as clearly understood in 1564 as they are at this day.

The most obscure feature in this wood-cut is the matrix. The three little bits resting on the chest of drawers are too rudely cut to enable us to decide positively that they are matrices. We infer that they are from their surroundings and from the apparent necessity for such implements; but it would be more satisfactory to know, and not infer, that the early type-founders used matrices of hard metal.

There are no engravings of type-founding of earlier date than this cut of Amman’s, but we have some evidences which point to a very early use of moulds of hard metal. We find in many of the books of the sixteenth and fifteenth centuries [p064] occasional allusions to type-making. Considered separately, they are of little importance; considered together, they are ample proof that types were made of fluid metal in moulds and matrices of brass, not less than one hundred years before Amman made his wood-cuts.

In 1507, Ivo Wittig put up a stone to the memory of John Gutenberg, on which he had engraved that Gutenberg was the first to make printing letters _in brass_. We do not find in any record of authority that Gutenberg printed books by types cut out of brass. There are difficulties connected with the cutting and use of brass types which would make such an assertion incredible. If we accept the literal translation of the Latin epitaph, and supplement it with a little knowledge of type-founding, we shall then understand what Wittig meant—that Gutenberg, by using melted metal, made types in brass moulds.

Trithemius, writing in 1514, observes that Gutenberg and Fust “discovered a method of founding the forms of all the letters, which they called matrices, from which they cast metal types.” The statement of the bishop is somewhat confused, and his specification of Fust as an inventor is, probably, incorrect, but every typographer who reads his description cannot fail to see that he has endeavored to describe the established method of making types—the method in use to this day.

Peter Schœffer, in a book printed by him in 1466, makes the book metaphorically say, “I am cast at Mentz.” He says the types were cast, although he elsewhere praises himself as a more skillful cutter of letters than Fust or Gutenberg.

Bernard Cennini, writing at Florence in 1471, says that the letters of his book were first cut and then cast.

Nicholas Jenson, who calls himself a cutter of books, says in one of them, published in 1485, that the book, meaning the types of the book, was cut and cast by a divine art.

Husner of Strasburg, in the imprint of a book made by him in 1473, says (translating his language literally) that it was printed “with sculptured letters from brass,” or, as it [p065] could be more clearly construed, with letters in high relief, made from brass matrices. That Husner did not mean to say that his printing types were cut out of brass, is more clearly shown in the imprint of another book printed by him in 1476, in which he says, literally, that it was printed, “without doubt, with sculptured letters, scientifically begun in brass.”[15]

That the cutting, so frequently mentioned by the early printers, was the cutting of punches, is apparent to every modern typographer who knows that, in the manufacture of types, punch-cutting is not only the first process in order of time, but first in order of artistic importance. That the types said to be made of brass were made in brass moulds and matrices could, in the absence of other proof, be inferred from the appearance of the books of the fifteenth century. These types often show varieties of the same letter and have other peculiarities disagreeable to modern tastes, but there is strict uniformity in each variety, and an accuracy of body which could have been secured by no other method than [p066] that of casting them in moulds and matrices of hard metal. There is other evidence which is even more direct. In the Magliabechi library at Florence is preserved the original Cost Book of the Directors of the Ripoli Press of that city, for the interval between the years 1474 and 1483.[16] In this book may be found, among other papers of value, a list of the prices which were then paid for the supplies or materials used in the type-foundry connected with the Ripoli Press. In this list we see the names of the metals that are used in all modern type-foundries. There can be no question of the statement that the types of this foundry were cast in metal moulds.

PRICES OF MATERIAL FOR THE TYPE-FOUNDRY.

_Materials._ _Tuscan_ _American_
_Currency_ _Currency_
_per pound._ _per pound._

Steel, lir. 2 8 0 $2.18 Metal, (Antimony?) 11 0 .50 Brass, 12 0 .54 Copper, 6 8 .30 Tin, 8 0 .36 Lead, 2 4 .10-1/2 Iron Wire, 8 0 .36

It would not be difficult to present additional evidence tending to prove that the punch, the matrix and the mould of hard metal were used by the earliest typographers, but this evidence will be given with more propriety in another chapter. On this page, it is enough to record, as the result of the future inquiry, that printing types have always been made by one method. The significance of this fact should not be overlooked. It has been shown that printing, as we now use it, could not exist without types, and that there would be no types if we did not know how to make them in adjustable type-moulds. In this type-mould we find the key to the invention of typography. It is not the press, nor the types, but the type-mould that must be accepted as the origin and the symbol of the art. He was the inventor of [p067] typography, and the founder of modern printing, who made the first adjustable type-mould.

It is a curious circumstance, and not creditable to the sagacity of the historians of typography, that the importance of this implement, upon which the existence of typography depends, has never been fully appreciated. That the type-mould was first made by the inventor of typography need not be discussed. We have no knowledge that any method of founding different sizes and forms from an adjustable mould was attempted before the fifteenth century. There was no need for such a mould in any other art. But we have indirect evidences in abundance that the early printers considered their method of making types as a meritorious and original invention. Peter Schœffer described it as a new and unheard-of art; Bishop Trithemius said that it was found out only through the good providence of God; Jenson said it was a divine art; Husner said it was a scientific method; Wittig said that the inventor has deserved well of the wide world. It would be useless to attempt to add anything to these tributes—quite as useless to attempt to break their force. Typography, made practicable and perfect by means of the type-mould, was an original and a great invention. If the inventor had produced nothing more than the type-mould, this would be enough to entitle him to the highest honor.

It is tribute enough to acknowledge that the inventor of the type-mould was the inventor of typography. It is not logical nor truthful to attribute to him the introduction or the rediscovery of the simple elements of relief printing. It is not derogatory to his honor to confess that his labors were materially lightened by the services of men who had gone before him and had prepared materials for his use. The inventor of the type-mould did not invent paper, for that had been known for two centuries before; he did not originate engraving on wood, nor impressions from relief surfaces, for both processes were known before paper was made; he was not the first to print upon paper, for printed matter, in the [p068] forms of playing cards and prints of pictures, was a merchantable commodity before he was born. He was not the first to make printed books; it is not certain that he made the first printing press; it is not probable that he was the first to think of movable types. His merits rest on a securer basis. While others dreamed and thought, and, no doubt, made experiments, he was the first to do practical and useful work—the first to make types that could be used—the first to demonstrate the utility of typography. The first practical typographer, but not the first printer, he was really at the end of a long line of unknown workmen whose knowledge and experience in ruder forms of printing were important contributions toward the invention of the perfect method.

The contributions made by the men who practised ruder forms of printing demand a fuller description. The merit of printing with types cannot be fully appreciated until it has been contrasted with the printing that preceded types. It will be an instructive lesson to trace the origin of a great art to its sources.

[p069]

IV

The Image Prints of the Fifteenth Century.

Were Engraved on Wood . . . Print of St. Christopher . . . Print of Annunciation . . . Print of St. Bridget . . . Other German Engravings on Wood . . . Flemish Indulgence Print . . . The Brussels Print . . . The Berlin Print . . . All Image Prints from Germany or the Netherlands . . . How were they Printed? . . . Not by the Frotton . . . Methods of taking Proof now used by Engravers and Printers . . . Images copied from Illustrated Manuscripts . . . Not made by Monks . . . Images highly prized by the People . . . The Beginning of Dissent in the Church . . . Preceded by Ruder Prints.

* * * * *

Book printing and picture printing have both the same inner cause for their origin, namely, the impulse to make each mental gain a common blessing. Not merely princes and rich nobles were to have the privilege of adorning their private chapels and apartments with beautiful religious pictures; the poorest man was also to have his delight in that which the artist had devised and produced. It was not sufficient for him when it stood in the church as an altar shrine, visible to him and to the congregation from afar. He desired to have it as his own, to carry it about with him, to bring it into his own home. The grand importance of wood engraving and copper-plate is not sufficiently estimated in historical investigations. They were not alone of use in the advance of art; they form an epoch in the entire life of mind and culture. The idea embodied and multiplied in pictures became like that embodied in the printed word, the herald of every intellectual movement, and conquered the world.

_Woltmann._

* * * * *

Size of original, 8-1/8 by 11-1/4 inches.]

One of the purposes to which early printing was applied was the manufacture of engraved and colored pictures of sacred personages. These pictures, or image prints, as they are called by bibliographers, were made of many sizes; some of them are but little larger than the palm of the hand, others are of the size of a half sheet of foolscap. In a few prints there are peculiarities of texture which have provoked the thought that they may have been printed from plates of [p070] soft metal like lead or pewter; but this conjecture has never been verified. We find in many of the prints the clearest indications that they were taken from engravings on wood. With a few exceptions, these prints were colored; some were painted, but more were colored by means of stenciling, as is abundantly proved by the mechanical irregularities which are always produced by the occasional slipping of the stencil. The colors are gross, glaring, and so inartistically applied that the true outlines of the figures are frequently obscured. The quality of the engraving is unequal; some prints are neatly, and others are rudely cut, but in nearly all of them the engraving is in simple outline. We seldom see any shading tints, or any cross-hatchings, rarely ever any attempt to produce a perspective by the use of fine or faint lines. The absence of shading lines is not entirely due to the imperfect skill of the engravers. The engravings seem to have been cut for no other purpose than that of showing the colors of the stencil painter to advantage, by giving a definite edge to masses of color. The taste for prints in black and white had not then been developed. To the print-buyer of the fifteenth century, the attraction of the image print was not in its drawing, but in its vivid color, and its supposed resemblance to the paintings that adorned [p071] the walls of churches and monasteries. The image print of the fifteenth century was the prototype of the modern chromo.

The St. Christopher, a bold and rude engraving on wood, which represents the saint in the act of carrying the infant Saviour across a river, is one of the most remarkable of the image prints. This print was discovered in the cover of an old manuscript volume of 1417, among the books of one of the most ancient convents of Germany, the Chartreuse at Buxheim, near Memmingen, in Suabia.[17] The monks said that the volume was given to the convent by Anna, canoness of Buchau, who is known to have been living in 1427. The name of the engraver is unknown. This convent is about fifty miles from Augsburg, a city which seems to have been the abode of some of the early engravers on wood. The date is obscurely given in Roman numerals at the foot of the picture.

‹f›Christoferi faciem die quacunque tueris, Millesimo cccc.‹/f› ‹f›Illa nempe die morte mala non morieris. rrº tertio.‹/f›

In whatsoever day thou seest the likeness of St. Christopher, In that same day thou wilt at least from death no evil blow incur. 1423.

The date 1423 is evidence only so far as it shows that the block was engraved in that year. The printing could have been done at a later date. As it is printed in an ink that is almost black (in which feature it differs from other early image prints, that are almost invariably in a dull or faded brown ink), there is reason to believe that this print was made some time after the engraving, when the method of making prints with permanent black ink was more common. [p072]

This engraving has its merits as well as its absurdities. Chatto says that the design is better than any he has found in the earlier type-printed books; that the figure of the saint and that of the youthful Christ are, with the exception of the extremities, designed in such a style that they would scarcely discredit Albert Durer himself.

The accessories are grotesquely treated. One peasant is driving an ass with a loaded sack to a water-mill; another is toiling with a bag of grain up a steep hill to his house; another, to the right, holds a lantern. The relative proportions of these figures are but a little less absurd than those made famous in Hogarth’s ironical study of false perspective.

These faults of drawing are counterbalanced by real merits of engraving. There is a noticeable thickening and tapering of lines in proper places, a bold and a free marking of the folds of drapery, and a general neatness and cleverness of cutting that indicate the hand of a practised and judicious engraver. This engraving of St. Christopher is obviously not the first experiment of an amateur or an untaught inventor.

In the book which contained this print of the St. Christopher was also found, pasted down within the cover, another [p073] engraving on wood, that is now known as the Annunciation. It is of about the same size as the print of St. Christopher. It is printed on the same kind of paper, with the same dull black ink. There is some warrant for the general belief that both engravings were executed at or about the same time, but they are so unlike that they cannot be considered as the work of the same designer nor of the same engraver. The lines of the Annunciation are more sharply cut; the drawing has more of detail; there are no glaring faults of perspective.

The Virgin is represented as receiving the salutation of the angel Gabriel; the Holy Spirit descends in the shape of a dove proceeding from a part of the print which has been destroyed, and in which was some symbol of the Almighty. The black field in the centre of the print was left unrouted by the engraver, apparently for no other purpose than that of lightening the work of the colorist, who would otherwise have been required to paint it black. This method of producing the full blacks of a colored print was practised by many of the early engravers. Full black shoes on the feet of human figures may be noticed in many of Caxton’s wood-cuts while other portions of the print are in outline. There are portions of this print in which the practical engraver will note an absence of shading where shades seem to be needed. The body of the Virgin appears as naked, except where it is covered by her mantle. It was intended that an inner garment should be indicated by the brush of the colorist. What the early engravers on wood could not do with the graver, they afterward did with the brush. They not only printed but colored their prints, and the colored work was usually done in a free and careless manner.

These prints do not contain internal evidences of their origin. They were found in Germany, but there is nothing in the designs, nor yet in their treatment, that is distinctively German. The faces and costumes reveal to us no national characteristics; the legends are in Latin; the architecture of the Annunciation is decidedly Italian. [p074]

But there is a print known as the St. Bridget, a print supposed to be of nearly the same age as the St. Christopher, which gives us at least an indication of the people by whom it was purchased and of the country in which it was printed.

Saint Bridget of Sweden, born 1302, died 1373, was one of the chosen saints of Germany. The print represents her as writing in a book while the Virgin and the infant Christ look down approvingly. The letters S. P. Q. R. on the shield, and the pilgrim’s hat, staff and scrip are supposed to indicate her pilgrimages to Rome and Jerusalem. The armorial shield has the arms of Sweden. The legend, if it can be so called, at the top of the print is in German: _O Brigita bit got für uns_—O, Bridget, pray to God for us. The letters _M. I. Chrs_ at the bottom of the print have been construed as, Mother of Jesus Christ.

The lines of this print are of a dull brown color. The face and hands are of flesh color, the gown, hat and scrip are dark grey; the desk, the staff, letters, lion and crown, as well as the glory or nimbus about the head, are yellow. The ground is green, and the whole cut is surrounded with a border of shining lake or mulberry color. This harsh [p075] arrangement of the colors is a proper illustration of the inferiority of the workmanship of the colorist to that of the designer.

Other prints in European libraries have been attributed to unknown engravers of Germany, who are supposed to have practised their art between the years 1400 and 1450. One of these prints, to which is attached a short prayer and the date of 1437, and which was discovered in a monastery in the Black Forest near the border of Suabia,[18] represents the martyrdom of St. Sebastian. These prints are rare: of the St. Christopher only three copies are known;[19] of the St. Bridget and Annunciation there is but one copy each. All of them were discovered in German religious houses, in which places it seems that they have been preserved ever since they were printed. They were found in a part of Germany that is famous as the abode of early engravers on wood, and as the birthplace of several great German artists. Prints of a similar nature were subsequently made in Germany in greater quantity than in any other part of Europe. The legend of St. Bridget is in German; the costumes of the archers in St. Sebastian are German. They are trustworthy evidences in favor of the hypothesis that engraving on wood was first practised in Germany.

This hypothesis has been disputed. It is opposed by several contradictory theories, which may be stated in the following words: (1) that engraving on wood was applied to the manufacture of playing cards in France at the end of the fourteenth century; (2) that it was derived from China; (3) that it was invented in Italy; (4) that it was practised in the Netherlands before it was known in Germany. As the theories of French, Chinese and Italian origin have no early [p076] prints of images to offer, they need not be considered in this chapter. The argument in favor of a very early practice of engraving in the Netherlands is based on its prints of images. [p077]

The illustration on the opposite page is the reduced fac-simile of an old print once known as the _Indulgence Print of 1410_, and then considered as of greater age than the print of Saint Christopher. The inscription at the foot of the indulgence; which is in old Dutch or Flemish, is to this effect:

“Whoever, regarding the sufferings of our Lord, shall truly repent of his sins, and shall thrice repeat the _Pater Noster_ and the _Ave Maria_, shall be entitled to seventeen thousand years of indulgence, which have been granted to him by Pope Gregory, as well as by two other popes and by forty bishops. [This has been done so that] the rich as well as the poor may try to secure this indulgence.”

That this print was made in Flanders is apparent from the language, as well as from the peculiar shape of the letter t at the end of words. The perpendicular bar dropping from the top of this t was so seldom used in Germany that it may be regarded as a very old Flemish mannerism. That the print was engraved in 1410 is extremely improbable. The Pope Gregory here mentioned is undoubtedly Pope Gregory xii, who reigned from 1406 to 1415. It was once believed that the two other popes mentioned in the indulgence were the rivals of Gregory, the anti-popes Benedict XII and John XXII. It was supposed that this print was published during this period,[20] and for this reason, it has sometimes been called the _Indulgence Print of 1410_. [p078]

M. Wetter, a learned German critic, has pointed out the absurdity of the belief that three popes at enmity with each other should unite in the promulgation of this document.[21] It is now understood that the two other popes mentioned in the indulgence are Pope Nicholas V, who reigned from 1447 to 1455, and Pope Calixtus III, who reigned from 1455 to 1458. The publication of the indulgence is therefore placed between the years 1455 and 1471. Consequently, the print is of no value as an evidence of Flemish priority, for it was made more than thirty years after the St. Christopher.

A much more satisfactory evidence of the great age of Flemish engraving on wood is afforded by the _Brussels Print_, which was discovered in 1848 by an innkeeper, pasted down on the inside of an old chest. It was bought by an architect of the town of Mechlin, who sold it for five hundred francs to the Royal Library of Brussels, where it is now preserved. This print bears the date 1418, but the validity of the date has been challenged. It was alleged that the numerals that form the date had been repaired with a lead pencil in such a manner as to provoke doubts of its genuineness; that the true date is 1468, instead of 1418; that an alteration was made, by scratching out the L from the middle of the numerals [thus, MCCCC(L)XVIII] and by substituting a period—a fraud that puts the date backward fifty years. The charge of fraud has been denied with ability, and seemingly with justice. The print has passed the ordeal of hostile criticism, and is now accepted as a genuine print of 1418. It represents the Virgin and infant Saviour, when surrounded by St. Barbara, St. Catharine, St. Veronica and St. Margaret. The design is somewhat stiff and mechanical, but the composition is not devoid of merit. The lines of the engraving were purposely broken, for it was intended that the print should be more fully developed by the bright colors [p079] of the stencil painter. The fac-simile is taken from Holtrop’s _Monuments typographiques_. Holtrop says that the fac-simile is slightly reduced in height. The size of the block, as he represents it, is 9-7/8 by 13-3/4 American inches. [p080]

The Flemish origin of the _Brussels Print_ is established by an image, in the Cabinet of Engravings at Berlin, now known as the _Berlin Print_. It is of the same size as the _Brussels Print_, and is, apparently, the work of the same designer, for in these prints a remarkable similarity of treatment in designing and engraving may be noticed in the wings of the angels, in the figure and position of the angel who crowns the Virgin, in the crowns of St Catharine and the Virgin, in the flowing hair of the three saints, and that of the Virgin, and in the collars on the doves. This print represents the Virgin as carrying in her arms the infant Saviour. It is described in the catalogue as an early xylographic engraving, printed by friction about the middle of the fifteenth century. It is without date or name of artist. The language of the legend is Flemish. The Virgin holds in her right arm the infant Jesus, and in her left hand an apple. The child caresses the chin of his mother with one hand, while he drops a rose from the other. The Virgin, enshrined in an aureole of glory, encircled by four angels and four doves, placidly stands upon a crescent. The legend in the four corners is in metre, and is an exhortation to the reader to serve the Virgin, and imitate her example.

Who is this queen who is thus exalted?
She is the consolation of the world.
What is her name? tell me, I pray!
Mary, blessed Mother and Virgin.
How did she attain this exaltation?
By love, humility and charity.
Who will be uplifted with her, on high?
Whoever knows her best in life.

Connoisseurs in prints disagree as to the age and merit of this print. Passavant says that the _Berlin Print_, which he describes as of fine execution, is undoubtedly of Dutch origin, but he thinks it is the design of a German artist. He places its date in the same period as that of the _Brussels Print_, which, according to him, is 1468. Renouvier says that the outlines of the _Berlin Print_ are in the style of well-known Dutch or Flemish prints. He hazards no conjecture as to [p081] the exact date of its publication, but intimates that it may properly be classified with the older prints of the Netherlands.

Holtrop says that the language of the legend in the Berlin print decides its origin; the design is of the [p082] Netherlandish school; the language is Flemish, and not Dutch. He further says: “These two prints (of Berlin and Brussels) complement each other; the print of Berlin shows their common origin; the print of Brussels indicates their date. It may be said that they were engraved in the Netherlands, probably in Flanders, and perhaps in Bruges, at the beginning of the fifteenth century.”

The prints herein described are the earliest prints with dates, but they are not, necessarily, the earliest of all. There are prints known to collectors as the _Crucifixion_, the _Last Judgment_ and the _St. Jerome_, which are regarded by many bibliographers as the work of unknown engravers at or about 1400. There is a print of _St. George_ which competent judges say was done in the thirteenth century. None of the prints contain the name or the place of the engravers, but it is plain that they were made in the Southern Netherlands, as well as in Southern Germany. It would be premature to assume that they were made nowhere else; but it must be acknowledged that there are no image prints on paper which can be ascribed to any engraver in France, Italy, Spain, Holland or England, during the first fifty years of the fifteenth century. There is a plausible statement on record, which will be reviewed on another page, that artistic engravings on wood were made in Italy before this period. We find, also, a more questionable statement, that engraving on wood was practised in France before the year 1400—a statement based entirely on a print in the public library of the city of Lyons, with a printed date which has been represented as that of the year 1384. The age of this print has been denied. It is alleged, with every appearance of probability, that there is mistake or fraud in the numerals, for the costumes of the figures prove that the print should have been made in the sixteenth century.

The question whether image prints were first made in the Netherlands or in Suabia need not now be considered. It is enough to say that, although the Brussels print bears the earliest date, the manufacture of these image prints was more [p083] common in Germany, not only in the first but in the latter half of the fifteenth century. That these few accidentally discovered prints represent the half, or even one-tenth, of the images then published, is not at all probable. We have good reason for the belief that they were as abundant in Southern Germany during the year 1450 as cheap lithographs were in the United States during the year 1830. That the greater part of these image prints have been destroyed and forgotten may be explained by the improved taste of the succeeding generation. The artistic copper-plate prints which came in fashion soon after swept away as rubbish the once admired image prints, just as the chromos of this period have supplanted the painted lithographic prints of 1830.

How were these images printed? Almost every author who has written on printing has said that they were printed by friction, with a tool known as the frotton, which has been described as a small cushion of cloth stuffed with wool. It is said that when the block had been inked, and the sheet of paper had been laid on the block, the frotton was rubbed over the back of the sheet until the ink was transferred to the paper. We are also told that the paper was not dampened, but was used in its dry state. The shining appearance on the back of the paper is offered as evidence of friction. This explanation of the method used by the printers of engraved blocks has been accepted, not as a conjecture, but as the description of a known fact. I know of no good authority for it. I know no author who professes to have seen the process. I know no engraver who has taken impressions with a cloth frotton. I doubt the feasibility of the method. The reasons for this doubt will be apparent when this conjectural method is contrasted with the methods used by modern printers and engravers for taking proofs off of press.

The modern engraver on wood takes his proofs on thin India paper. He uses a stuffed cushion to apply the ink to the cut. The ink, which is sticky, serves to make thin paper adhere to the block. He gets an impression by rubbing the [p084] back of the paper after it is laid on the block, with an ivory burnisher. If he is careful, he can take with a burnisher a neater proof than he could get from a press. But the only point of similarity between the imaginary old process and the present process is in the method of rubbing or friction. The materials are different: the modern paper is thin and soft, the old was coarse and harsh; modern ink is glutinous, medieval ink was watery; the burnisher is hard, the frotton was very elastic; the burnisher will give a shining appearance to the back, the soft frotton will not. If the modern engraver should attempt to use coarse, thick, dry paper, fluid ink, and a cloth frotton, he could not keep the sheet in place on the block during the slow process of rubbing. No care could prevent it from slipping when rubbed with an elastic cushion. The least slip would produce a distorted impression.

The modern printer takes his proof on dampened paper with a tool known as the proof-planer. This proof-planer is a small thick block of wood, one side of which is perfectly flat and covered with thick cloth. When the paper, which must be dampened, has been laid on the inked type or engraving, the printer places the planer carefully on the paper, holding it firmly with his left hand; with a mallet, held in his right hand, he strikes a strong hard blow on the planer. He then lifts his planer carefully and places it over the nearest unprinted surface and repeats the blow. In like manner he repeats the blow until every part of the type surface has been printed. Rude as this method may seem, a skillful workman can obtain a fair print with the planer. Although the wet paper clings to the type, and the ink is sticky, great care is needed to prevent the slipping of the sheet, and the doubling of the impression. The back of a thick sheet printed in this manner often shows a shining appearance in the places where the blow was resisted by the face of the type or by the engraved lines.

It will be seen that the printer’s method of taking proof differs in all its details from the supposititious method of the [p085] early engravers. We have soft, damp paper, sticky ink, and a sudden flat pressure against a hard surface shielded with cloth, in opposition to fluid ink, dry paper, rubbing pressure and an elastic printing tool.

As we can find no positive knowledge of the method of printing which was adopted by the early printers of engravings on wood, it is somewhat hazardous to offer conjectures in place of facts. It is begging the question to assume that they were not printed by a press. The presswork of early prints is coarse and harsh, and could have been done with simple mechanism, with rude applications of the screw or of the lever, that could have been devised by any intelligent workman. It is more reasonable to assume that the early prints were made by a press, or with some practicable tool like a proof-planer, rather than with the impracticable frotton. One cannot resist the suspicion that the chronicler of early block printing who first described the frotton attempted to describe what he did not thoroughly understand—that he mistook the engraver’s inking cushion for the tool by which he got the impression.

It should be noticed that all these old prints are of a religious character. Portraits of remarkable men or women, landscapes, representations of cities or buildings, caricatures, illustrations of history or mythology—none of these are to be found in any collection of the earliest prints. The early engravers were completely under the domination of religious ideas. Their prints seem to have been made with the permission, and possibly under the direction, of proper clerical authority. The designs are of much greater merit than any that could have been created by amateurs in the art of engraving on wood. They were, undoubtedly, copied from the illuminated books of piety which were then to be found in all large monasteries. Ecclesiastics of this period were careful of their books and jealous of their privileges, and not disposed to allow either to become cheap or common, but they must have favored an art that multiplied the images of [p086] patron saints. It was an age of great disbelief, and the image prints were of service as reminders of religious duty.

There is no evidence that these prints were made by the monks themselves. There is a statement current in German books of bibliography that one Luger, a Franciscan monk in Nordlingen, engraved on wood at the end of the fourteenth century. But this statement needs verification. It is not at all certain that the word which is here translated engraver on wood was written with clear intention to convey this meaning. The earliest typographers were not monks, nor were they favored with the patronage of the church.[22] It is not probable that any monk who had been educated for the work of a copyist or an illuminator, would forsake his profession for the practice of engraving on wood or printing. Prints, as then made, were coarse, mechanical copies of meritorious originals. The artistic scribe rightfully felt that engraving was beneath him. He must have looked on the people who bought image prints with the same pitying scorn that a true artist feels for the uneducated taste of those who now buy glaring lithographs of sacred personages, and he must have felt as little inducement to engage in their manufacture.

And yet the multitude received them gladly. Wealthy laymen who could afford to buy gorgeous missals, and priests who daily saw and handled manuscript works of art, might put the prints aside as rubbish; but poor men and women, whose work-day lives were unceasing rounds of poverty and drudgery, unrelieved by art, ideality or sentiment, must have hailed with gladness the images in their own houses which shadowed ever so dimly the glories of the church and the rewards of the righteous. The putting-up of the image print on the wall of the hut or the cabin was the first step toward [p087] bringing one of the attractions of the Catholic church within the domestic circle. It was the erection of a private shrine, an act of rivalry, pitiable enough in its beginning, but of great importance in its consequences. For it was the initiation of the right of private judgment, and of the independence of thought which, in the next century, made itself felt in the formidable dissent known in all Protestant countries as the Great Reformation.

Our knowledge of the origin of engraving on wood has not been materially increased by the recent discovery of the _Berlin_ and _Brussels Prints_. We see that wood-cuts of merit were made during the first quarter of the fifteenth century, but we see also that they could not have been the first productions of a recently discovered or newly revived art. They present indications of a skill in engraving which could have been acquired only through experience. One has but to compare them with wood-cuts made by amateurs in typographic printing in Italy, Germany and Holland between the years 1460 and 1500, to perceive that the manufacturers of the image prints were much more skillful as engravers. If there were no other evidences, we could confidently assume that this skill could have been acquired only by practice on ruder and earlier engravings. Of this preliminary practice-work we find clear traces in the stenciled and printed playing cards which were popular in many parts of Europe before the introduction of images.

[p088]

V

Printed and Stenciled Playing Cards.

Playing Cards not made by the Frotton . . . Their Manufacture an Industry of Importance . . . Decree of the Senate of Venice prohibiting the Importation of Cards . . . Early Notices of Card-Making in Germany . . . Probable Method of Manufacture . . . Illustrations of a Playing Card of the Fifteenth Century . . . Jost Amman’s Illustrations of a Print Colorer and an Engraver on Wood . . . Playing Cards made from Engraved Blocks . . . Early Notices of Card Playing in France . . . Cards Prohibited to the People in France and Spain . . . Introduced in Italy in 1379 . . . Not Invented in Germany . . . An Oriental Game . . . Illustrations of Chinese Cards . . . Originated in Hindostan . . . Transmitted to Europe through the Saracens . . . Popularity of Cards in Europe . . . Cards Denounced by the Clergy . . . New Forms and New Games of Cards, with Illustrations . . . Unsuccessful Attempts to make Cards a Means of Instruction . . . Cards not an Unmixed Evil . . . Induced Respect for Letters and Education . . . Cards probably made before Images . . . Made by Block-Printing . . . Most largely made by this process in Germany.

* * * * *

After innumerable experiments and disappointments, the art so eagerly sought and so sorely needed was at last discovered. And what is strange, although in accordance with the capriciousness of invention, this art that had eluded all the efforts and aspirations of intelligence, was discovered by makers of cards. It was by them, and for the peculiar requirements of their work, that xylography was invented.

_Bibliophile Jacob._

* * * * *

The hypothesis, for it is nothing more, that all the early prints were produced by the frotton does not satisfactorily explain the large production of merchantable printed matter during the first half of the fifteenth century. Friction would have served then, as it does now, for trial proofs or experiments, but it was a method altogether too slow and uncertain to meet the requirements of an extended business. The playing cards and prints so common during this period must have been made by a quicker method. That there was an established international trade in playing cards and in other kinds of printed work, as early as the year 1441, may be inferred from the following decree of the senate of Venice: [p089]

1441, Oct 11. Whereas, the art and mystery of making cards and printed figures, which is in use at Venice, has fallen to decay, and this in consequence of the great quantity of printed playing cards and colored figures which are made out of Venice, to which evil it is necessary to apply some remedy, in order that the said artists, who are a great many in family, may find encouragement rather than foreigners: Let it be ordained and established, according to the petition that the said masters have supplicated, that from this time in future, no work of the said art that is printed or painted on cloth or paper-that is to say, altar-pieces, or images, or playing cards, or any other thing that may be made by the said art, either by painting or by printing-shall be allowed to be brought or imported into this city, under pain of forfeiting the work so imported, and thirty livres and twelve soldi, of which fine one-third shall go to the state, one-third to Giustizieri Vecchi, to whom this affair is committed, and one-third to the accuser. With this condition, however, that the artists who make the said works in this city shall not expose the said works for sale in any other place but their own shops, under the penalty aforesaid, except on the day of Wednesday at S. Paolo, and on Saturday at S. Marco.[23]

The engraved images here noticed were probably prints of saints or sacred personages like those of which engraved illustrations have been given on previous pages. The altar-pieces were prints upon cotton or linen cloth, of a similar character, but of much larger size.[24]

Playing cards, which are twice mentioned in the decree, seem to have been considered as of equal importance with images and altar-pieces. The specification of three distinct kinds of printed work, coupled as it is with the allusion to “any other thing that may be made by the said art,” is an intimation that the manufacturers, “who were a great many [p090] in family,” were even then applying the art of printing and colored stenciling to many other purposes.

The decree says that the art had fallen to decay. When it was in its most prosperous condition in Venice cannot be ascertained from the record, nor from any other source. The author[25] who found this document says that he had fragments of coarse engravings on wood which represented some parts of the city of Venice as they appeared before the year 1400. He thinks these rude engravings must have been cut in the latter part of the fourteenth century. That they could have been made at this time is not improbable, but the direct evidence is wanting. There are, however, abundant reasons for the belief that engravings on wood were made in Venice, not experimentally, but in the way of business, many years before the decree of 1441. And they must have been made elsewhere. The printers of playing cards and colored figures must have been many in family beyond as well as in Venice. If the foreign printers had not been formidable competitors, there would have been no request for the prohibitory decree.

Nothing is said in the decree about the nationality of the foreign competitors, but we may get this knowledge from another source. An authentic record of the town of Ulm in Germany contains a brief entry which tells us that playing cards in barrels were sent from that city to Sicily and Italy, to be bartered for delicacies and general merchandise.[26] [p091]

The same book contains a defense of the game of playing cards under the date of 1397. Another old German record, the Burgher Book of Augsburg for the year 1418, specifically notices card-makers. The Tax Book of Nuremberg, for the years 1433 and 1435, names Eliza, a card-maker. The same book, for the year 1438, mentions Margaret, the card-painter. The words _kartenmacherin_, card-maker, and _kartenmalerin_, card-painter, which are found in these books, do not clearly specify the process. It has been suggested that these cards could have been drawn and painted by means of stencil plates.

The word _formschneider_, form-cutter, the word now used in Germany as the equivalent of engraver on wood, appears for the first time in the year 1449, in the books of the city of Nuremberg. The same records mention one Wilhelm Kegler, _briftrucker_, or card-printer, under the date of 1420. They also mention one _Hans Formansneider_, in the year 1397, but Formansneider should not be construed as engraver on wood. It should be read Hans Forman, _schneider_ or tailor. In this, as in some other cases, it will be seen that the facility of the German language for making new words by the compounding of old ones, is attended with peculiar disadvantages. The manufactured words are susceptible of different meanings.

These notices of card-making are not enough to prove that the process employed was that of xylography. They prove only that card-making was an industry of note in the towns of Ulm, Augsburg and Nuremberg. But when these notices of early card-making are considered in connection with early German prints, like the St. Christopher of 1423, which were discovered in the vicinity of these towns, there is no room for doubt. If prints of saints were made by engraving on wood, cards should have been made by the same art. The connection of cards and image prints in the decree of the Senate of Venice is evidence that they were made by the same persons and by the same process.

It may seem strange that the little town of Ulm, in the heart of Germany, should establish by a long sea route a trade [p092] in playing cards with cities on the Mediterranean and the Adriatic. It is but one of many evidences of the growing spirit of commercial enterprise which pervaded all the cities of Germany. It is not more strange than the fact that, in 1505, merchants of Augsburg, a city at a great distance from navigable waters, joined with the Portuguese in an extensive traffic with the eastern coast of Africa.

Playing cards may have been made at as early dates in other countries besides Germany and Italy. We shall soon see that they were in common use in many parts of Europe at the beginning of the fifteenth century, but we have no certain knowledge that they were made from engraved blocks in other places. Our knowledge of the fact that they were printed in Italy and Germany is based entirely on occasional notices in old manuscript records. We have indications that they were printed, but we lack the proof. There are no cards in existence which can be offered, with any degree of confidence, as specimens of the block-printing of 1440. The xylographic cards of which fac-similes are most common in books which treat of pastimes, are of the sixteenth century; the copper-plate cards described and illustrated by Weigel and Breitkopf were made either during the latter half of the fifteenth or in the sixteenth century.