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| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-14 18:34:39 -0700 |
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| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-14 18:34:39 -0700 |
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padding: .1em;} + +div.correction {font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 88%; +margin: .25em 5%; padding: .5em .75em;} +div.correction p {margin-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;} + +span.citation {font-size: medium; font-family: serif;} + +/* page number */ +span.pagenum {font-size: small; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; +text-align: right; text-indent: 0;} + +/* Transcriber's Note */ +.mynote {font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 92%;} +div.mynote {margin: 1em 5%; padding: .5em 1em 1em;} +div.mynote a {text-decoration: none;} + +div.endnote {padding: .5em 1em 1em; margin: 1em; border: 3px ridge #A9F; +font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 90%;} + +@media print { + .screenstyle {display: none;} + body {margin-left: 2%; margin-right: 2%;} + a {text-decoration: none; color: inherit;} + div.maintext {page-break-before: always;} + div.verse, p.synopsis {page-break-inside: avoid;} + h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6 {page-break-after: avoid;} + p.caption {page-break-before: avoid;} + span.pagenum {position: static; float: right; width: auto; + margin-right: -10%;} + ins.correction, a.error {background-color: #CCC;} + ins.correction {border-bottom: none;} +} + +@media screen { + span.pagenum {position: absolute; right: 2%;} + .mynote ins.correction, a.error {border-bottom: 1px dotted red;} +} +</style> + +</head> + +<body> +<div class = "mynote"> +<p class = "center"> +<a href = "WoodEngraving.html">Introduction</a> (separate file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving.html#illus">List of Illustrations</a> (separate +file)</p> + +<p class = "center"> +<a href = "WoodEngraving1.html">Chapter I</a> (separate file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving1.html#chap_II">Chapter II</a> (separate +file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving1.html#chap_III">Chapter III</a> (separate +file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving4.html">Chapter IV</a> (separate file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving4.html#chap_V">Chapter V</a> (separate file)<br> +Chapter VI<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving7.html">Chapter VII</a> (separate file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving8.html">Chapter VIII</a> (separate file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving9.html">Chapter IX</a> (separate file)</p> + +<p class = "center"> +<a href = "WoodEngraving.html#index">Index</a> (separate file)</p> +</div> + +<div class = "titlepage"> + +<h2><span class = "smallest">ON</span><br> +WOOD ENGRAVING.</h2> + +</div> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page324" id = "page324"> +324</a></span> + +<h3><a name = "chap_VI" id = "chap_VI">CHAPTER VI.</a><br> +<span class = "subhead">FURTHER PROGRESS AND DECLINE OF WOOD +ENGRAVING.</span></h3> + +<p class = "synopsis"> +The dance of death—painted in several old churches—two +paintings of this subject at basle—old editions of la danse +macabre, with wood-cuts—les simulachres et historiées faces de la +mort, usually called the dance of death, printed at lyons, +1538—various editions and copies of this work—icones +historiarum veteris testamenti, or bible cuts, designed by hans +holbein—similarity between these cuts and those of the lyons dance +of death—cuts of both works, probably designed by the same +person—portrait of sir t. wyatt—cuts in cranmer’s +catechism—and in other old english works—wood-engraving in +italy—chiaro-scuro—marcolini’s sorti—s. munster’s +cosmography—maps—virgil solis—bernard +solomon—jost ammon—andrea andreani—henry +goltzius—english wood-cuts—cuts by christopher jegher from +the designs of rubens—general decline of the art in the +seventeenth century.</p> + +<div class = "maintext"> + +<p class = "first"> +<span class = "firstword"><span class = "dropcap"> +<a name = "illus_324" id = "illus_324"><img src = "images/illus_324.png" +width = "188" height = "187" alt = "T"></a></span>he</span> +best of the wood-cuts of the time of Albert Durer, more especially those +executed by German engravers, are for the most part of rather large +size; the best of those, however, which appeared within forty years of +his decease are generally small. The art of wood engraving, both as +regards design and execution, appears to have attained its highest +perfection within about ten years of the time of Durer’s decease; for +the cuts which, in my opinion, display the greatest excellence of the +art as practised in former times, were published in 1538. The cuts to +which I allude are those of the celebrated Dance of Death, which were +first published in that year at Lyons. So admirably are those cuts +executed,—with so much feeling and with so perfect a knowledge of +the capabilities of the art,—that I do not think any wood engraver +of the present time is capable of surpassing them. The manner in which +they are engraved is comparatively simple: there is no laboured and +unnecessary cross-hatching where the same effect might be obtained by +simpler means; no display +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page325" id = "page325"> +325</a></span> +of fine work merely to show the artist’s talent in cutting delicate +lines. Every line is expressive; and the end is always obtained by the +simplest means. In this the talent and feeling of the engraver are +chiefly displayed. He wastes not his time in mere mechanical +execution—which in the present day is often mistaken for +excellence;—he endeavours to give to each character its +appropriate expression; and in this he appears to have succeeded better, +considering the small size of the cuts, than any other wood engraver, +either of times past or present.</p> + +<p>Though two or three of the cuts which will subsequently be given may +be of rather earlier date than those of the Dance of Death, it seems +preferable to give first some account of this celebrated work; and to +introduce the cuts alluded to, though not in strict chronological +order,—which is the less necessary as they do not illustrate the +progress of the art,—with others executed in a similar style.</p> + +<p>Long before the publication of the work now so generally known as +“The Dance of Death,” a series of paintings representing, in a +similar manner, Death seizing on persons of all ranks and ages, had +appeared on the walls of several churches. A Dance of Death was +painted in the cloisters of the Church of the Innocents at Paris, in the +cloisters of St. Paul’s, London, and in the portico of St. Mary’s, +Lubec. The painting in St Paul’s is said to have been executed at the +cost of one Jenkin Carpenter, who lived in the reign of Henry VI, and +who was one of the executors of that famous “lord-mayor of London,” +Richard Whittington; and Dugdale, in his History of St. Paul’s +Cathedral, says that it was in imitation of that in the cloisters of the +Church of the Innocents at Paris.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI1" id = +"tagVI1" href = "#noteVI1">VI.1</a> This subject seems to have been +usually known in former times by the name of “The Dance of Machabre,” +from a French or German poet—for this point is not settled by the +learned—of the name of Macaber or Macabre, who is said to have +written a poem on this subject.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI2" id = +"tagVI2" href = "#noteVI2">VI.2</a> The +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page326" id = "page326"> +326</a></span> +Dance of Death, however, which as a painting has attained greater +celebrity and given rise to much more discussion than any other, is that +which was painted on the wall of a kind of court-house attached to the +Church of the Dominicans at Basle. This painting has frequently been +ascribed to Holbein; but it certainly was executed before he was born; +and there is not the slightest reason to believe that he ever touched it +in any of the repairs which it underwent in subsequent years.</p> + +<p>The following particulars respecting this painting are such as seem +best authenticated.</p> + +<p>It is said to owe its origin to a plague which ravaged the city of +Basle in 1439, during the time of the great council, which commenced in +1431, and did not terminate till 1448. A number of persons of +almost all ranks, whom the council had brought to this city, having +fallen victims to the plague, it is said that the painting was executed +in remembrance of the event, and as a memento of the uncertainty of +life. Though it may be true that the great mortality at Basle in 1439 +might have been the occasion of such a picture in the +church-court—<i>Kirchhofe</i>, as it is called by Hegner in his +Life of Holbein—of the Dominicans in that city, it is almost +certain that the subject must have been suggested by one of much earlier +date painted on the walls of an old building which had formerly been the +cloisters of a nunnery which stood in that part of Basle which is called +the Little City. This convent was founded in 1275; and the painting +appears to have been executed in 1312, according to the following date, +which was to be seen above one of the figures, that of the Count, who +was also one of the characters in the painting in the church-court of +the Dominicans: “<span class = "blackletter">Dussent jar treihuntert und +Xii</span>;” in English: One thousand three hundred and twelve. Several +of the figures in this old painting were almost the same as in that of +the church-court of the Dominicans, though executed in a coarser manner; +and, like the latter, were accompanied with explanatory inscriptions in +verse. This curious old work appears to have remained unnoticed till +1766, when one Emanuel Büchel, of Basle, by trade a baker, but an +admirer of art, and an industrious draughtsman, had his attention +directed to it. He made a careful copy in colours of all that then +remained of it, and his drawings are now in the public library of Basle. +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page327" id = "page327"> +327</a></span> +“This oldest Dance of Death,” says Hegner, writing in 1827, “is almost +entirely effaced, and becomes daily more so, as well on account of age +as from the cloisters of the old nunnery having been for many years used +as a warehouse for salt.”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI3" id = "tagVI3" +href = "#noteVI3">VI.3</a></p> + +<p>It is supposed that the Dance of Death in the church-court of the +Dominicans at Basle was originally painted in <i>fresco</i> or +distemper. The number of characters, each accompanied by a figure of +Death, was originally forty;<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI4" id = +"tagVI4" href = "#noteVI4">VI.4</a> but in 1568, a painter, named +Hans Hugo Klauber, who was employed by the magistrates to repair the old +painting, introduced a figure of the reformer Oecolampadius as if +preaching to the characters composing the Dance, with portraits of +himself, his wife, and their little son, at the end. It is probable that +he painted over the old figures in oil-colour, and introduced sundry +alterations, suggested by other paintings and engravings of the same +subject. It appears likely that, at the same time, many of the old +inscriptions were changed for others more in accordance with the +doctrines of the Reformation, which then prevailed at Basle. The verses +above the figure of the Pope were certainly not such as would have been +tolerated at the period when the subject is supposed to have been first +painted.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI5" id = "tagVI5" href = +"#noteVI5">VI.5</a> In 1616 the painting was again repaired; but, though +a Latin inscription was then added containing the names of the +magistrates who had thus taken care to preserve it, there is no mention +made of any artist by whom the subject +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page328" id = "page328"> +328</a></span> +had been originally painted or subsequently retouched. Had there been +any record of Holbein having been at any time employed on the work, such +a circumstance would most likely have been noticed; as his memory was +then held in the highest estimation, and Basle prided herself on having +had so eminent an artist enrolled among the number of her citizens. In +1658 the painting was again renewed: and there seems reason to believe +that further alterations were then introduced both in the costume and +the colouring. It was retouched in 1703; but from that time, as the +paint began to peel off from the decaying walls, all attempts for its +further preservation appear to have been considered hopeless. It would +indeed seem to have become in a great measure disregarded by the +magistrates, for a rope-maker used to exercise his trade under the roof +that protected it from the weather. As the old wall stood much in the +way of new buildings, it is not unlikely that they might be rather +wishful to have it removed. In 1805 the magistrates pronounced sentence +against the Dance of Death, and the wall on which it was painted was by +their orders pulled down, though not without considerable opposition on +the part of many of the citizens, more especially those of the suburb of +St. John, within which the old church-court of the Dominicans stood. +Several pieces of the painting were collected, and are still preserved +at Basle as memorials of the old “Todten-tanz,” which was formerly an +object of curiosity with all strangers who visited the city, and which +has been so frequently the subject of discussion in the history of +art.</p> + +<p>Mr. Douce has given a list of many books containing the figures of a +Dance of Death printed before the celebrated Simulachres et Historiées +Faces de la Mort of Lyons, 1538; and among the principal the following +may be here enumerated.—A German edition, intitled “Der Dodtendanz +mit figuren. Clage und Antwort schon von allen staten der Welt.” This +work, which is small folio, is mentioned in Braun’s Notitia librorum in +Bibliotheca ad SS. Udalricum et Afram Augustæ, vol. ii. p. 62. It +is without date, but Braun supposes that it may have been printed +between 1480 and 1500. It consists of twenty-two leaves, with wood-cuts +of the Pope, Cardinal, Bishop, Abbot, &c. &c. accompanied +by figures of Death. The descriptions are in German verse, and printed +in double columns.—The earliest printed book on this subject with +a date is intitled “La Danse Macabre imprimée par ung nommé Guy +Marchand,” &c. Paris, 1485, small folio. In 1486 Guy +Marchand,—or Guyot Marchant, as he is also called,—printed +another edition, “La Danse Macabre nouvelle,” with several additional +cuts; and in the same year he printed “La Danse Macabre des Femmes,” +a small folio of fifteen leaves. This is the first edition of the +Macaber Dance of females. Thirty-two subjects are described, but there +are only cuts of two, the +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page329" id = "page329"> +329</a></span> +Queen and the Duchess. In 1490 an edition appeared with the following +title: “Chorea ab eximio Macabro versibus Alemanicis edita, et à Petro +Desrey emendata. Parisiis, per magistrum Guidonem Mercatorem [Guy +Marchand] pro Godefrido de Marnef.” In the same year Marchand printed +another edition of “La nouvelle Danse Macabre des Hommes;” and in the +year following there appeared from his press a second edition of “La +Danse Macabre des Femmes,” with cuts of all the characters and other +additions. A Dance of Death, according to Von der Hagen, in his +Deutsche Poesie, p. 459, was printed at Leipsic in 1496; and in +1499 a “Grande Danse Macabre des Hommes et Femmes” was printed in folio +at Lyons. The latter is supposed to be the earliest that contains cuts +of both men and women. About 1500, Ant. Verard printed an edition, in +folio, of the Danse Macabre at Paris; and in various years between 1500 +and 1530 a work with the same title and similar cuts was printed at +Paris, Troyes, Rouen, Lyons, and Geneva. Besides those works, characters +from the Dance of Death were frequently introduced as incidental +illustrations in books of devotion, more especially in those usually +denominated Horæ or Hours of the Virgin, and printed in France.<a class += "tag" name = "tagVI6" id = "tagVI6" href = "#noteVI6">VI.6</a></p> + +<p>The celebrated “Dance of Death,” the cuts of which have been so +generally ascribed to Hans Holbein as the engraver as well as designer, +was first published at Lyons, in 1538. It is of small quarto size, and +the title is as follows: “Les Simulachres & Historiées faces de la +Mort, autant elegammēt pourtraictes, que artificiellement imaginées. +A Lyon, Soubz l’escu de Coloigne. <span class = +"smallroman">M.D.XXXVIII.</span>” On the title-page is an emblematic +wood-cut, very indifferently executed, representing three heads joined +together, with a wreath above them; the middle one a full face, and +those on each side in profile. Instead of shoulders, the heads, or +busts, are provided with a pair of wings of peacock’s feathers; they +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page330" id = "page330"> +330</a></span> +rest on a kind of pedestal, on which is also an open book inscribed with +the maxim, “<span class = "greek smallroman" lang = "el" title = +"(Greek) GNÔTHI SEAUTON">ΓΝΩΘΙ ΣΕΑΥΤΟΝ</span>.” A large serpent is seen +confined by the middle in a hole which must be supposed to pass through +the pedestal; and to it (the pedestal) are chained two globes,—one +surmounted by a small cross, like the emblem of imperial authority, and +the other having two wings. This emblematic cut, which is certainly not +“l’escu de Coloigne,” is accompanied with the motto “<i>Usus me +Genuit</i>.”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI7" id = "tagVI7" href = +"#noteVI7">VI.7</a> At the conclusion of the book is the imprint, within +an ornamental wood-cut border: “<span class = "smallroman">EXCVDEBANT +LVGDVNI MELCHIOR ET GASPAR TRECHSEL FRATRES. 1538.</span>” The title is +succeeded by a preface, of six pages, which is followed by seven pages +more, descriptive of “diverses tables de Mort, non painctes, mais +extraictes de l’escripture saincte, colorées par Docteurs +Ecclesiastiques, et umbragées par Philosophes.” After those verbal +sketches of Death come the cuts, one on each page; and they are +succeeded by a series of descriptions of death and reflections on +mortality, the general title to which, commencing at signature H, is, +“Figures de la Mort moralement descriptes, & depeinctes selon +l’authorité de l’scripture, & des sainctz Peres.”</p> + +<p>By far the most important passage in the book, at least so far as +relates to the designer or engraver of the cuts, occurs in the preface, +which is written much in the style of a pedantic father-confessor to a +nunnery who felt a pleasure in ornamenting his Christian discourses and +exhortations with the flowers of Pagan eloquence. The preface is +addressed, “A moult reverende Abbesse du religieux convent +S. Pierre de Lyon, Madame Jehanne de Touszele, Salut dun vray +Zele,”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI8" id = "tagVI8" href = +"#noteVI8">VI.8</a> and the passage above mentioned is to the following +effect. “But to return to our figured representations of Death, we have +greatly to regret the death of him who has imagined such elegant figures +as are herein contained, as much excelling all those heretofore +printed,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI9" id = "tagVI9" href = +"#noteVI9">VI.9</a> as the pictures of Apelles or of Zeuxis surpass +those of modern times; for, his funereal histories, +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page331" id = "page331"> +331</a></span> +with their gravely versified descriptions, excite such admiration in +beholders, that the figures of Death appear to them most life-like, +while those of the living are the very pictures of mortality. It +therefore seems to me that Death, fearing that this excellent painter +would paint him in a manner so lively, that he should be no longer +feared as Death, and apprehensive that the artist would thus become +immortal, determined to shorten his days, and thus prevent him finishing +other subjects which he had already drawn. Among these is one of a +waggoner, knocked down and crushed under his broken waggon, the wheels +and horses of which appear so frightfully shattered and maimed that it +is as fearful to see their overthrow as it is amusing to behold the +liquorishness of a figure of Death, who is perceived roguishly sucking +the wine out of a broken cask, by means of a reed. To such imperfect +subjects, as to the inimitable heavenly bow named Iris,<a class = "tag" +name = "tagVI10" id = "tagVI10" href = "#noteVI10">VI.10</a> no one has +ventured to put the last hand, on account of the bold drawing, +perspectives, and shadows contained in this inimitable chef-d’œuvre, +there so gracefully delineated, that from it we may derive a pleasing +sadness and a melancholy pleasure, as in a thing mournfully delightful.” +The cut of the waggoner, described by the French euphuist, was, however, +afterwards finished, and, with others, inserted in a subsequent edition +of the work. It is figured in the present volume at page 344.</p> + +<p>The number of cuts in the first edition, now under examination, is +forty-one; above each is a text of Scripture, in Latin; and below are +four verses in French—the “descriptions severement rithmées,” +mentioned in the preface—containing some moral or reflection +germane to the subject. A few sets of impressions of all those +cuts, except one, appear to have been taken before the work appeared at +Lyons. They have been printed by means of a press,—not taken by +friction in the manner in which wood engravers usually take their +proofs,—and at the top of each cut is the name in the German +language, but in Italic type. “Why those German names,” says Hegner, “in +a work which, so far as we know, was first published at Lyons? They +appear to confirm the opinion of the cuts having been actually engraved +at Basle; and the descriptions correspond with the dialect of that +city.” The late Mr. Ottley had impressions of forty of those original +cuts, and six of those which were inserted in a later edition. In his +Inquiry into the Origin and Early History of Engraving, Mr. Ottley, +speaking of the Dance of Death, says: “It is certain that the cuts had +been previously printed at Basle; and, indeed, some writers assert that +the work was published in that city, with texts of Scripture, in the +German language, above the cuts, and verses, in the +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page332" id = "page332"> +332</a></span> +same language, underneath, as early as 1530; although, hitherto, +I have been unable to meet with or hear of any person who had seen +a copy of such an edition.” In a note upon this passage, Jansen, the +compiler of an Essay on the Origin of Engraving, and the anonymous +author of a work entitled Notices sur les Graveurs, Besançon, 1807, are +cited as mentioning such an edition. To give every one his due, however, +and to show the original authority for the existence of such an edition, +I beg here to give an extract from Papillon, who never felt any +difficulty in supposing a date, and whose conjectures such writers as +Jansen have felt as little hesitation in converting into certainties. +The substance of Papillon’s observations on this point is as follows: +“But to return to Holbein’s Dance of Death, which is unquestionably a +master-piece of wood engraving. There are several editions; the first of +which, <i>so far as may be judged</i>, ought to be about 1530, as has +been already said,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI11" id = "tagVI11" href += "#noteVI11">VI.11</a> and was printed at Basle or Zurich, with a title +to each cut, and, <i>I believe</i>, verses underneath, all in the +German language.” What Papillon puts forth as a matter of conjecture and +opinion, Von Murr, Jansen, and the author of the Notices sur les +Graveurs, promulgate as facts, and Mr. Ottley refers to the two latter +writers as if he were well inclined to give credit to their +assertions.</p> + +<p>From the following passage it would appear that Mr. Ottley had also +been willing to believe that those impressions might have been +accompanied with explanatory verses and texts of Scripture. “I have +only to add, upon the subject of this celebrated work, that I am myself +the fortunate possessor of forty pieces, (the complete series of the +first edition, excepting one,) which are printed with the greatest +clearness and brilliancy of effect, on one side of the paper only; each +cut having over it its title, printed in the German language with +moveable type. It is possible that they may originally have had verses +underneath, and texts of Scripture above, in addition to the titles just +mentioned: but as the margins are clipped on the sides and at bottom, it +is now impossible to ascertain the fact.”<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI12" id = "tagVI12" href = "#noteVI12">VI.12</a></p> + +<p>Had the forty impressions in question been accompanied with verses +and texts of Scripture, they certainly might be considered as having +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page333" id = "page333"> +333</a></span> +belonged to an earlier edition of the work than that of 1538, and for +the existence of which Mr. Ottley has referred to the testimony of +Jansen and the editor of the Notices sur les Graveurs, printed at +Besançon. There is, however, a set of those cuts preserved in the +public library at Basle, which seems clearly to prove that they had only +been taken as specimens without any further accompaniment than the +titles. They are printed on four folio leaves, on only one side of the +paper, and there are ten cuts on each page; the title, in the German +language, and in Italic type, like Mr. Ottley’s, is printed above each; +and the same cut—that of the astrologer—is also wanting. +From these circumstances there can scarcely be a doubt that the set +formerly belonging to Mr. Ottley<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI13" id = +"tagVI13" href = "#noteVI13">VI.13</a> had been printed in the same +manner, and that each impression had subsequently been cut out, perhaps +for the purpose of mounting them singly. The following are the titles +given to those cuts, and to each is subjoined a literal translation. +They are numbered as they follow each other in <span class = +"smallcaps">Les Simulachres et Historiees Faces de la Mort</span>, 1538, +which perhaps may not be incorrectly expressed by the English title, +“Pictorial and Historical Portraits of Death.”</p> + +<div class = "list"> + +<div class = "starting"> +<p>1. <i>Die schöpfung aller ding</i>—The creation of all +things.</p> + +<p>2. <i>Adam Eua im Paradyſs</i>—Adam and Eve in Paradise.</p> + +<p>3. <i>Vertribung Ade Eue</i>—The driving out of Adam and +Eve.</p> + +<p>4. <i>Adam baugt die erden</i>—Adam cultivates the earth.</p> + +<p>5. <i>Gebeyn aller menschen</i>—Skeletons of all men.</p> + +<p>6. <i>Der Papst</i>—The Pope.</p> + +<p>7. <i>Der Keyser</i>—The Emperor.</p> + +<p>8. <i>Der Künig</i>—The King.</p> + +<p>9. <i>Der Cardinal</i>—The Cardinal.</p> +</div> + +<p>10. <i>Die <ins class = "correction" title = "anomalous . in original">Keyserinn.</ins></i>—The Empress.</p> + +<p>11. <i>Die Küniginn</i>—The Queen.</p> + +<p>12. <i>Der Bischoff</i>—The Bishop.</p> + +<p>13. <i>Der Hertzog</i>—The Duke.</p> + +<p>14. <i>Der Apt</i>—The Abbot.</p> + +<p>15. <i>Die Aptissinn</i>—The Abbess.</p> + +<p>16. <i>Der Edelman</i>—The Nobleman.</p> + +<p>17. <i>Der Thümherr</i>—The Canon.</p> + +<p>18. <i>Der Richter</i>—The Judge.</p> + +<p>19. <i>Der Fürspräch</i>—The Advocate.</p> + +<p>20. <i>Der Rahtsherr</i>—The Magistrate.</p> + +<p>21. <i>Der Predicant</i>—The Preaching Friar.</p> + +<p>22. <i>Der Pfarrherr</i>—The Parish-priest.</p> + +<p>23. <i>Der Münch</i>—The Monk.</p> + +<p>24. <i>Die Nunne</i>—The Nun.</p> + +<p>25. <i>Dass Altweyb</i>—The Old Woman.</p> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page334" id = "page334"> +334</a></span> +<p>26. <i>Der Artzet</i>—The Doctor.</p> + +<p>27. (Wanting in the specimens.) The Astrologer.</p> + +<p>28. <i>Der Rychman</i>—The Rich Man.</p> + +<p>29. <i>Der Kauffman</i>—The Merchant.</p> + +<p>30. <i>Der Schiffman</i>—The Sailor.</p> + +<p>31. <i>Der Ritter</i>—The Knight.</p> + +<p>32. <i>Der Graff</i>—The Count.</p> + +<p>33. <i>Der Alt man</i>—The Old Man.</p> + +<p>34. <i>Die Greffinn</i>—The Countess.</p> + +<p>35. <i>Die Edelfraw</i>—The Lady.</p> + +<p>36. <i>Die Hertzoginn</i>—The Duchess.</p> + +<p>37. <i>Der Krämer</i>—The Pedlar.</p> + +<p>38. <i>Der Ackerman</i>—The Farmer.</p> + +<p>39. <i>Das Jung Kint</i>—The Young Child.</p> + +<p>40. <i>Das Jüngst Gericht</i>—The Last Judgment.</p> + +<p>41. <i>Die Wapen des Thots</i>—Death’s coat-of-arms.</p> +</div> + +<p>In 1542 a second edition of the Dance of Death, with the same cuts as +the first, was published at Lyons, “Soubz l’escu de Coloigne,” by John +and Francis Frellon, who appear to have succeeded to the business of the +brothers Trechsel,—if, indeed, the latter were not merely the +printers of the first edition. In a third edition, with the title +Imagines Mortis, 1545, the verses underneath each cut are in Latin.<a +class = "tag" name = "tagVI14" id = "tagVI14" href = +"#noteVI14">VI.14</a> A cut of a lame beggar, which has no relation +to the Dance of Death, is introduced as a tail-piece to one of the +discourses on death—Cypriani Sermo de Mortalitate—at the end +of the volume; but it is neither designed nor executed in the same style +as the others.</p> + +<p>In a fourth edition, with the title “Imagines Mortis,”<a class = +"tag" name = "tagVI15" id = "tagVI15" href = "#noteVI15">VI.15</a> 1547, +eleven additional cuts are introduced; namely: 1. Death fighting +with a soldier in Swiss costume; 2. Gamblers, with a figure of +Death, and another of the Devil; 3. Drunkards, with a figure of +Death; 4. The Fool, with a figure of Death playing on the bagpipes; +5. The Robber seized by Death; 6. The Blind Man and Death; +7. The Waggoner and Death; 8. Children, one of whom is borne +on the shoulders of the others as a conqueror triumphing; 9. A +child with a shield and dart; 10. Three children; one riding on an +arrow, another on a bow, as on a hobby-horse, the third carrying a hare +over his shoulder, suspended from a hunting pole; 11. Children as +Bacchanalians. The last four subjects have no relation to a Dance of +Death, but have evidently been introduced merely to increase the number +of the cuts; they are, however, beautifully designed and well engraved. +This edition contains twelve more cuts, reckoning the tail-piece of the +Lame Beggar, than the first. Another edition, forming the fifth, was +also published in 1547 under the title of “Les Images de la +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page335" id = "page335"> +335</a></span> +Mort,” with French verses, as in the edition of 1538. The number of cuts +is the same as in the edition of 1547 with Latin verses, and the title +“Imagines Mortis,” or “Icones Mortis.”</p> + +<p>In 1549, a sixth edition, with the same number of cuts as the last, +was published, under the title of “Simolachri, Historie, e Figure +de la Morte,” with the letter-press in Italian, with the exception of +the texts of Scripture, which were in Latin, as in the others. In the +preface, John Frellon—whose name appears alone in the edition of +1547, and in those of subsequent years—complains of a piracy of +the book, which was printed at Venice in 1545, with fac-similes of the +cuts of the first edition. “Frellon, by way of revenge,” says Mr. Douce, +“and to save the trouble of making a new translation of the articles +that compose the volume, made use of that of his Italian competitor.”<a +class = "tag" name = "tagVI16" id = "tagVI16" href = +"#noteVI16">VI.16</a> A seventh edition, with the title “Icones +Mortis,” and containing fifty-three cuts, appeared, without any +printer’s name, in 1554.</p> + +<p>In an eighth edition, 1562, with the title “Les Images de la Mort, +auxquelles sont adjoustees dix-sept figures,” five additional cuts are +introduced, thus making seventeen more than are contained in the first. +The total number of cuts in the edition of 1562 is fifty-eight; and that +of the Lame Beggar, which first appeared as a tail-piece in the edition +of 1545, has now a place among the others in the body of the book. The +subjects of the five new cuts are: 1. The Husband, with a figure of +Death; 2. The Wife,—Death leading a young woman by the hand, +preceded by a young man playing on a kind of guitar; 3. Children as +part of a triumph, one of them as a warrior on horseback; 4. Three +children; one with a trophy of armour, another carrying a vase and a +shield, the third seated naked on the ground; 5. Children with +musical instruments. The subjects of children are designed and executed +in the same style as those first introduced in the edition of 1547. The +last of those five new cuts does not appear in regular order with the +other fifty-seven; but is given as a tail-piece at the end of a preface +to a devotional tract—La Medicine de l’Ame—in the latter +part of the book. Mr. Douce mentions another edition with the date 1574. +He, however, observes in a note: “This edition is given on the authority +of Peignot,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI17" id = "tagVI17" href = +"#noteVI17">VI.17</a> page 62, but has not been seen by the author of +this work. In the year 1547 there were three editions, and it is not +improbable that, by the transposition of the two last figures, one of +these might have been intended.” As one of Mr. Douce’s <i>three</i> +editions of 1547 differs only +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page336" id = "page336"> +336</a></span> +from another of the same date by having “<i>Icones</i>” instead of +“<i>Imagines</i>” in the title-page, he might as consistently have +claimed a fourth for the same year on the ground of a <i>probable</i> +transposition of 74 for 47. All the authentic editions of the “Dance of +Death,” previously noticed, were published at Lyons. The first, as has +been already observed, was in small quarto; the others are described by +Mr. Douce as being in duodecimo. In a Dutch Dance of Death, intitled “De +Doodt vermaskert met swerelts ydelheit,” duodecimo, Antwerp, 1654, +fourteen of the cuts, according to Mr. Douce, were from the original +blocks which had been used in the Lyons editions.</p> + +<p>It seems probable that the earliest copies of the cuts in “Les +Simulachres et Historiées Faces de la Mort,” or Dance of Death, as the +work is more frequently called, appeared in a small folio, intitled +“Todtentantz,” printed at Augsburg in 1544, by “<i>Jobst Denecker, +Formschneyder</i>.” As I have never seen a copy of this edition, +I take the liberty of extracting the following notice of it from +Mr. Douce: “This edition is not only valuable from its extreme rarity, +but for the very accurate and spirited manner in which the fine original +cuts are copied. It contains all the subjects that were then published, +but not arranged as those had been. It has the addition of one singular +print, intitled, ‘Der Eebrecher,’ <i>i. e.</i> the Adulterer, +representing a man discovering the adulterer in bed with his wife, and +plunging his sword through both of them, Death guiding his hands. On the +opposite page to each engraving there is a dialogue between Death and +the party, and at bottom a Latin hexameter. The subject of the Pleader +has the unknown mark <img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_336.png" +width = "30" height = "20" alt = "symbol"> and on that of the Duchess in +bed, there is the date 1542.”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI18" id = +"tagVI18" href = "#noteVI18">VI.18</a> Mr. Douce is of opinion that the +“<i>Jobst Denecker, Formschneyder</i>,” who appears as the printer, was +the same person as Jobst or Jost de Negker, the wood engraver whose name +is at the back of one of the cuts of the Triumphal Procession of +Maximilian.—The next copy of the work is that intitled +“Simolachri, Historie, e Figure de la Morte,” Venice, 1545, the +piracy complained of by Frellon in his Italian edition of 1549. It +contains forty-one cuts, as in the first Lyons edition of 1538. There is +no variation in the figures; but the expression of the faces is +frequently lost, and the general execution of the whole is greatly +inferior to that of the originals. Another edition, in Latin, was +published in 1546; and Mr. Douce says that there are impressions of the +cuts on single sheets, at the bottom of one of which is the date +1568.—In 1555, an edition with the title “Imagines Mortis,” with +fifty-three cuts, similar to those in the Lyons edition of 1547, was +published at Cologne by the heirs of Arnold Birkman, Cologne, 1555; and +there are four other editions of the same work, respectively dated 1557, +1566, 1567, and 1572. Alterations are +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page337" id = "page337"> +337</a></span> +made in some of those cuts; in five of them the mark <img class = +"middle" src = "images/illus_337a.png" width = "28" height = "21" alt = +"SA"> is introduced; and in the cut of the Duchess the mark <img class = +"middle" src = "images/illus_337b.png" width = "19" height = "17" alt = +"symbol">, seen on the bed-frame in the original, is omitted. All the +alterations are for the worse; some of the figures seem like caricatures +of the originals; and the cuts generally are, in point of execution, +very inferior to those in the Lyons editions. The name of the artist to +whom the mark <img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_337a.png" width += "28" height = "21" alt = "SA"> belongs is unknown. In the preface to +the Emblems of Mortality, page xx, the writer says it is “that of <span +class = "smallcaps">Silvius Antonianus</span>, an artist of considerable +merit.” This, however, is merely one of the blunders of Papillon, who, +according to Mr. Douce, has converted the owner of this mark into a +cardinal. Papillon, it would seem, had observed it on the cuts of an +edition of Faerno’s Fables—printed at Antwerp, 1567, and dedicated +to Cardinal Borromeo by Silvio Antoniano, professor of Belles Lettres at +Rome, afterwards a cardinal himself—and without hesitation he +concluded that the editor was the engraver.<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI19" id = "tagVI19" href = "#noteVI19">VI.19</a> The last of the +editions published in the sixteenth century with wood-cuts copied from +the Lyons work, appeared at Wittemberg in 1590.</p> + +<p>Various editions of the Dance of Death, with copper-plate engravings +generally copied from the work published at Lyons, are enumerated by Mr. +Douce, but only one of them seems to require notice here. Between 1647 +and 1651 Hollar etched thirty subjects from the Dance of Death, +introducing occasionally a few alterations. From a careful examination +of those etchings, I am inclined to think that most of them were +copied not from the cuts in any of the Lyons editions, but from those in +the edition published by the heirs of Birkman at Cologne. The original +copper-plates of Hollar’s thirty etchings having come into the +possession of Mr. James Edwards, formerly a bookseller in Pall-Mall, he +published an edition in duodecimo, without date, but about 1794,<a class += "tag" name = "tagVI20" id = "tagVI20" href = "#noteVI20">VI.20</a> +with preliminary observations on the Dance of Death, written by the late +Mr. F. Douce. Those preliminary observations are the germ of Mr. +Douce’s beautiful and more complete volume, published by +W. Pickering in 1833 (and republished with additions by Mr. Bohn in +1858). As Petrarch’s amatory sonnets and poems have been called +“a labour of Love,” with equal +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page338" id = "page338"> +338</a></span> +propriety may Mr. Douce’s last work be intitled “a labour of +Death.” Scarcely a cut or an engraving that contains even a death’s head +and cross-bones appears to have escaped his notice. Incorporated is a +<i>Catalogue raisonné</i> which contains an enumeration of all the +tomb-stones in England and Wales that are ornamented with those standard +“Emblems of Mortality,”—skull, thigh-bones in saltire, and +hour-glass. In his last “Opus Magnum Mortis,” the notices of the several +Dances of Death in various parts of Europe are very much enlarged, but +he has not been able to adduce any further arguments or evidences beyond +what appeared in his first essay, to show that the cuts in the original +edition of the Dance of Death, published at Lyons, were not designed by +Holbein. Throughout the work there are undeniable proofs of the +diligence of the collector; but no evidences of a mind that could make +them available to a useful end. He is at once sceptical and credulous; +he denies that any poet of the name of Macaber ever lived; and yet he +believes, on the sole authority of one T. Nieuhoff Picard, whose +existence is as doubtful as Macaber’s, that Holbein painted a Dance of +Death as large as life, in fresco, in the old palace at Whitehall.</p> + +<p>Having now given a list of all the authentic editions of the Dance of +Death and of the principal copies of it, I shall next, before +saying anything about the supposed designer or engraver, lay before the +reader a few specimens of the original cuts. Mr. Douce observes, of the +forty-nine cuts given in his Dance of Death, 1833, that “they may be +very justly regarded as scarcely distinguishable from their fine +originals.” Now, without any intention of depreciating these clever +copies, I must pronounce them inferior to the originals, especially +in the heads and hands. In this respect the wood-cuts of the first Lyons +edition of the Dance of Death are unrivalled by any other productions of +the art of wood engraving, either in past or present times. In the +present day, when mere delicacy of cutting in the modern French taste is +often mistaken for good engraving, there are doubtless many admirers of +the art who fancy that there would be no difficulty in finding a wood +engraver who might be fully competent to accurately copy the originals +in the first edition of the Dance of Death. The experiment, however, +would probably convince the undertaker of such a task, whoever he might +be, that he had in this instance over-rated his abilities. Let the heads +in the Lyons cuts, and those of any copies of them, old or recent, be +examined with a magnifying glass, and the excellence of the former will +appear still more decidedly than when viewed with the naked eye.</p> + +<p>The following cut is a copy of the same size as the original, which +is the second of the Dance of Death, of the edition of 1538. The subject +is Adam and Eve eating of the forbidden fruit; and in the series of +early impressions, formerly Mr. Ottley’s, but now in the Print Room of +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page339" id = "page339"> +339</a></span> +the British Museum, it is intitled “<i>Adam Eva im +Paradyss</i>”—Adam and Eve in Paradise. The serpent, as in many +other old engravings, as well as in paintings, is represented with a +human face. In order to convey an idea of the original page, this cut is +accompanied with its explanatory text and verses printed in similar +type.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_339" id = "illus_339"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_339.png" width = "253" height = "461" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p class = "right"> +<a class = "mynote" href = "#note_6a">Text within illustration</a></p> + +<p>In the two first cuts, which represent the Creation of Eve, and Adam +taking the forbidden fruit, the figure of Death is not seen. In the +third, Adam and Eve driven out of Paradise, Death, playing on a kind of +lyre, is seen preceding them; and in the fourth, Adam cultivating the +earth, Death is perceived assisting him in his labour. In the fifth, +intitled <i>Gebeyn aller menschen</i>—Skeletons of all +men—in the early impressions of the cuts, formerly belonging to +Mr. Ottley, but now in the British Museum, all the figures are +skeletons; one of them is seen beating a pair of kettle drums, while +others are sounding trumpets, as if rejoicing +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page340" id = "page340"> +340</a></span> +in the power which had been given to Death in consequence of the fall of +man. The texts above this cut are, “Væ væ væ habitantibus in terra. +<span class = "smallcaps">Apocalypsis viii</span>;” and “Cuncta in +quibus spiraculum vitæ est, mortua sunt. <span class = +"smallcaps">Genesis vii.</span>” In the sixth cut there are two figures +of Death,—one grinning at the pope as he bestows the crown on a +kneeling emperor, and the other, wearing a cardinal’s hat, as a witness +of the ceremony. In the thirty-sixth cut, the Duchess, there are two +figures of Death introduced, and there are also two in the +thirty-seventh, the Pedlar; but in all the others of this edition, from +the seventh to the thirty-ninth, inclusive, there is only a single +figure of Death, and in every instance his action and expression are +highly comic, most distinctly evincing that man’s destruction is his +sport. In the fortieth cut there is no figure of Death; the Deity seated +on a rainbow, with his feet resting on the globe, is seen pronouncing +final judgment on the human race. The forty-first, and last cut of the +original edition, represents Death’s coat-of-arms——<i>Die +wapen des Thots</i>. On an escutcheon, which is rent in several places, +is a death’s-head, with something like a large worm proceeding from the +mouth; above the escutcheon, a barred helmet, seen in front like +that of a sovereign prince, is probably intended to represent the power +of Death; the crest is a pair of fleshless arms holding something like a +large stone immediately above an hour-glass; on the dexter side of the +escutcheon stands a gentleman, who seems to be calling the attention of +the spectator to this memento of Death, and on the opposite side is a +lady; in the distance are Alpine mountains, the top of the highest +partly shaded by a cloud. The appropriate text is, “Memorare novissima, +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page341" id = "page341"> +341</a></span> +et in æternum non peccabis. <span class = "smallcaps">Eccle. +vii</span>;” and the following are the verses underneath:</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "open">“Si tu veulx vivre sans peché</p> +<p>Voy ceste imaige a tous propos,</p> +<p>Et point ne seras empesché</p> +<p>Quand tu t’en iras en repos.”</p> +</div> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_340" id = "illus_340"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_340.png" width = "205" height = "267" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>The total number of cuts of the first edition in which Death is seen +attending on men and women of all ranks and conditions, mocking them, +seizing them, slaying them, or merrily leading them to their end, is +thirty-seven.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_341" id = "illus_341"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_341.png" width = "240" height = "462" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p class = "right"> +<a class = "mynote" href = "#note_6b">Text within illustration</a></p> + +<p>The above cut is a copy of the thirty-third, the Old Man—<i>Der +Alt man</i>—whom Death leads in confiding imbecility to the grave, +while he +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page342" id = "page342"> +342</a></span> +pretends to support him and to amuse him with the music of a dulcimer. +The text and verses are given as they stand in the original.</p> + +<p>The following cut is a copy of the thirty-sixth, the +Duchess—<i>Die Hertzoginn</i>. In this cut, as has been previously +observed, there are two figures of Death; one rouses her from the +bed—where she appears to have been indulging in an afternoon +nap—by pulling off the coverlet, while the other treats her to a +tune on the violin. On the frame of the bed, or couch, to the left, near +the bottom of the cut, is seen the mark <img class = "middle" src = +"images/illus_342b.png" width = "29" height = "21" alt = "HL">, which +has not a little increased the difficulty of arriving at any clear and +unquestionable conclusion with respect to the designer or engraver of +those cuts. The text and the verses are given literally, as in the two +preceding specimens.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_342" id = "illus_342"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_342.png" width = "214" height = "452" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p class = "right"> +<a class = "mynote" href = "#note_6c">Text within illustration</a></p> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page343" id = "page343"> +343</a></span> + +<p>The following cut, the Child—<i>Das Iung Kint</i>—is a +copy of the thirty-ninth, and the last but two in the original edition. +Death having been represented in the preceding cuts as beguiling men and +women in court and council-chamber, in bed-room and hall, in street and +field, by sea and by land, is here represented as visiting the +dilapidated cottage of the poor, and, while the mother is engaged in +cooking, seizing her youngest child.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_343" id = "illus_343"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_343.png" width = "274" height = "442" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "right"> +<a class = "mynote" href = "#note_6d">Text within illustration</a></p> + +<p>The cut of the Waggon overturned, from which the following is copied, +first appeared with ten others in the edition of 1547. From an +inspection of this cut, which most probably is that mentioned as being +left unfinished, in the prefatory address to Madame Jehanne de Touszele +in the first edition, 1538, it will be perceived that the description +which is there given of it is not correct, and hence arises +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page344" id = "page344"> +344</a></span> +a doubt if the writer had actually seen it. He describes the driver as +knocked down, and lying bruised under his broken waggon, and he says +that the figure of Death is perceived roguishly sucking the wine out of +a broken cask by means of a reed.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI21" id = +"tagVI21" href = "#noteVI21">VI.21</a> In the cut itself, however, the +waggoner is seen standing, wringing his hands as if in despair on +account of the accident, and a figure of Death,—for there are two +in this cut,—instead of sucking the wine, appears to be engaged in +undoing the rope or chain by which the cask is secured to the waggon. +A second figure of Death is perceived carrying off one of the +waggon-wheels. In this cut the subject is not so well +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page345" id = "page345"> +345</a></span> +treated as in most of those in the edition of 1538; and it is also not +so well engraved.—The text and verses annexed are from the edition +of 1562.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_344" id = "illus_344"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_344.png" width = "232" height = "417" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p class = "right"> +<a class = "mynote" href = "#note_6e">Text within illustration</a></p> + +<p>Of the eleven additional cuts inserted in the edition of 1547, there +are four of children, which, as has already been observed in page 334, +have not the slightest connexion with the Dance of Death. The following +is a copy of one of them. The editor seems to have found no difficulty +in providing the subject with a text; and it serves as a peg to hang a +quatrain on as well as the others which contain personi­fications of +Death.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_345" id = "illus_345"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_345.png" width = "232" height = "426" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p class = "right"> +<a class = "mynote" href = "#note_6f">Text within illustration</a></p> + +<p>In the edition of 1562 five more cuts are inserted; but two of them +only—the Bridegroom and the Bride—have relation to the Dance +of Death; the other three are of a similar character to the four cuts of +children first inserted in the edition of 1547. All the seven cuts of +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page346" id = "page346"> +346</a></span> +children have been evidently designed by the same person. They are well +engraved, but not in so masterly a style as the forty-one cuts of the +original edition. The following is a copy of one of the three which were +inserted in the edition of 1562.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_346" id = "illus_346"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_346.png" width = "252" height = "417" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p class = "right"> +<a class = "mynote" href = "#note_6g">Text within illustration</a></p> + +<p>Having now given what, perhaps, may be considered a sufficiently +ample account of the Lyons Dance of Death, it next appears necessary to +make some enquiries respecting the designer of the cuts. Until the +publication of Mr. Douce’s observations, prefixed to the edition of +Hollar’s etchings from those cuts, by Edwards, about 1794, scarcely any +writer who mentions them seems to entertain a doubt of their having been +designed by Holbein; and Papillon, in his usual manner, claims him as a +wood engraver, and unhesitatingly declares that not only the cuts of the +Lyons Dance of Death, but all the other cuts which are generally +supposed to have been of his designing, were engraved by himself. Mr. +Douce’s arguments are almost entirely negative,—for he produces no +satisfactory evidence to show that those cuts were certainly +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page347" id = "page347"> +347</a></span> +designed by some other artist,—and they are chiefly founded on the +passage in the first Lyons edition, where the writer speaks of the death +of the person “qui nous en a icy imaginé si elegantes figures.”</p> + +<p>The sum of Mr. Douce’s objections to Holbein being the designer of +the cuts in question is as follows. “The singularity of this curious and +interesting dedication is deserving of the utmost attention. It seems +very strongly, if not decisively, to point out the edition to which it +is prefixed, as the first; and what is of still more importance, to +deprive Holbein of any claim to the invention of the work. It most +certainly uses such terms of art as can scarcely be mistaken as +conveying any other sense than that of originality of design. There +cannot be words of plainer import than those which describe the painter, +as he is expressly called, <i>delineating</i> the subjects and leaving +several of them unfinished: and whoever the artist might have been, it +clearly appears that he was not living in 1538. Now, it is well known +that Holbein’s death did not take place before the year 1554, during the +plague which ravaged London at that time. If then the expressions used +in this dedication signify anything, it may surely be asked what becomes +of any claim on the part of Holbein to the designs of the work in +question, or does it not <i>at least</i> remain in a situation of doubt +and difficulty?”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI22" id = "tagVI22" href = +"#noteVI22">VI.22</a> With respect to the true import of the passage +referred to, my opinion is almost directly the reverse of that expressed +by Mr. Douce.</p> + +<p>What the writer of the address to Madame Jehanne de Touszele, in the +Lyons edition of 1538, says respecting the unfinished cuts, taken all +together, seems to relate more properly to the engraver than the +designer; more especially when we find that a cut—that of the +Waggoner,—expressly noticed by him as being then unfinished, was +given with others of a similar character in a subsequent edition.</p> + +<p>From the incorrect manner in which the cut of the Waggoner is +described, I am very much inclined to think that the writer had +neither seen the original nor the other subjects already +traced—the “<i>plusieurs aultres figures jà par luy +trassées</i>”—of whose “bold drawing, perspectives, and shadows,” +he speaks in such terms of admiration. If the writer knew little of the +process of wood engraving, he would be very likely to commit the mistake +of supposing that the engraver was also the designer of the cuts. Though +I consider it by no means unlikely that the engraver might have been +dead before the publication of the first edition, yet I am very much +inclined to believe that the passage in which the cuts are mentioned is +purposely involved in obscurity: the writer, while he speaks of the +deceased artist in terms of the highest commendation, at the same time +carefully conceals his name. If the account in the preface be admitted +as correct, it would +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page348" id = "page348"> +348</a></span> +appear that the cuts were both designed and engraved by the same person, +and that those already drawn on the block<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI23" id = "tagVI23" href = "#noteVI23">VI.23</a> remained +unfinished in consequence of his decease; for if he were <i>not</i> the +engraver, what prevented the execution of the other subjects already +traced, and of which the bold drawing, perspective, and shadows, all so +gracefully delineated, are distinctly mentioned? The engraver, whoever +he might be, was certainly not only the best of his age, but continues +unsurpassed to the present day, and I am satisfied that such precision +of line as is seen in the heads could only be acquired by great +practice. The designs are so excellent in drawing and composition, and +so admirably are the different characters represented,—with such +spirit, humour, and appropriate expression,—that to have produced +them would confer additional honour on even the greatest painters of +that or any other period. Are we then to suppose that those excellencies +of design and of engraving were combined in an obscure individual whose +name is not to be found in the roll of fame, who lived comparatively +unknown, and whose death is only incidentally noticed in an ambiguous +preface written by a nameless pedant, and professedly addressed to an +abbess whose very existence is questionable?<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI24" id = "tagVI24" href = "#noteVI24">VI.24</a> Such a supposition +I conceive to be in the highest degree improbable; and, on the contrary, +I am perfectly satisfied that the cuts in question were <i>not</i> +designed and engraved by the same person. Furthermore, admitting the +address to Madame Jehanne de Touszele to be written in good faith, +I am firmly of opinion that the person whose death is there +mentioned, was the engraver, and not the designer of the cuts of the +first edition.</p> + +<p>The mark <img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_342b.png" width = +"29" height = "21" alt = "HL"> in the cut of the Duchess, is certainly +not Holbein’s; and Mr. Douce says, “that it was intended to express the +name of the designer, cannot be supported by evidence of any kind.” That +it is not the mark of the designer, I agree with Mr. Douce, but my +conclusion is drawn from premises directly the reverse of his; for had I +not found evidence elsewhere to convince me that this mark can only be +that of the engraver, I should most certainly have concluded that +it was intended for the mark of the designer. In direct opposition to +what Mr. Douce here says, up to the time of the publication of the Lyons +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page349" id = "page349"> +349</a></span> +Dance of Death, the mark on wood-cuts is most frequently that of the +designer, and whenever that of the engraver appears, it is as an +exception to the general custom. It is, in fact, upon the evidence of +the mark alone that the greater part of the wood-cut designs of Durer, +Cranach, Burgmair, Behaim, Baldung, Grün, and other old masters, are +respectively ascribed to them. The cuts of the Triumphal Procession of +Maximilian with Hans Burgmair’s mark in front, and the names of the +engravers written at the back of the blocks, may serve as an +illustration of the general practice, which is directly the reverse of +Mr. Douce’s opinion. If the weight of probability be not on the opposite +side, the mark in question ought certainly, according to the usual +practice of the period, to be considered as that of the designer.</p> + +<p>In a subsequent page of the same chapter, Mr. Douce most +inconsistently says, “There is an unfortunate ambiguity connected with +the marks that are found on ancient engravings on wood, and it has been +a <i>very great error</i> on the part of all the writers who treat on +such engravings, in referring the marks that accompany them to the +block-cutters, or as the Germans properly denominate them the +<i>formschneiders</i>, whilst, perhaps, the greatest part of them really +belong to the designers.” He commits in the early part of the chapter +the very error which he ascribes to others. According to his own +principles, as expressed in the last extract, he was bound to allow the +mark <img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_342b.png" width = "29" +height = "21" alt = "HL"> to be that of the designer until he could show +on probable grounds that it was not. But though Mr. Douce might deny +that Holbein were the designer of those cuts, it seems that he durst not +venture to follow up the line of his argument, and declare that Hans +Lutzelburger <i>was</i> the designer, which he certainly might have done +with at least as much reason as has led him to decide that Holbein +<i>was not</i>. But he prudently abstained from venturing on such an +affirmation, the improbability of which, notwithstanding the mark, might +have led his readers to inquire, how it happened that so talented an +artist should have remained so long undiscovered, and that even his +contemporaries should not have known him as the designer of those +subjects.</p> + +<p>Though I am satisfied that the mark <img class = "middle" src = +"images/illus_342b.png" width = "29" height = "21" alt = "HL"> is that +of the <i>engraver</i> of the cuts in the first edition of the Lyons +Dance of Death, I by no means pretend to account for its appearing +alone—thus forming an exception to the general rule—without +the mark of the designer, and without any mention of his name either in +the title or preface to the book. We have no knowledge of the connexion +in the way of business between the working wood engravers and the +designers of that period; but there seems reason to believe that the +former sometimes got drawings made at their own expense and risk, and, +when engraved, either published them on their own account, or disposed +of them to booksellers and printers. It is +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page350" id = "page350"> +350</a></span> +also to be observed that about the time of the publication of the first +Lyons edition of the Dance of Death, or a few years before, wood +engravers began to occasionally introduce their name or mark into the +cut, in addition to that of the designer. A cut, in a German +translation of Cicero de Officiis, Frankfort, 1538, contains two marks; +one of them being that of Hans Sebald Behaim, and the other, the letters +H. W., which I take to be that of the engraver. At a later period +this practice became more frequent, and a considerable number of +wood-cuts executed between 1540 and 1580 contain two marks; one of the +designer, and the other of the engraver: in wood-cuts designed by Virgil +Solis in particular, double marks are of frequent occurrence. As it +seems evident that the publishers of the Lyons Dance of Death were +desirous of concealing the name of the designer, and as it appears +likely that they had purchased the cuts ready engraved from a Swiss or a +German,—for the designs are certainly not French,—it surely +cannot be surprising that he should wish to affix his mark to those most +admirable specimens of art. Moreover, if those cuts were not executed +under the personal superintendence of the designer, but when he was +chiefly resident in a distant country, the engraver would thus have the +uncontrolled liberty of inserting his own mark; and more especially, if +those cuts were a private speculation of his own, and not executed for a +publisher who had employed an artist to make the designs. Another +reason, perhaps equally us good as any of the foregoing, might be +suggested; as those cuts are decidedly the best executed of any of that +period, the designer—even if he had opportunities of seeing the +proofs—might have permitted the mark of the engraver to appear on +one of them, in approbation of his talent.</p> + +<p>This mark, <img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_342b.png" width += "29" height = "21" alt = "HL">, was first assigned to a wood engraver +named Hans Lutzelburger, by M. Christian von Mechel, +a celebrated engraver of Basle, who in 1780 published forty-five +copper-plate engravings of a Dance of Death from drawings said to be by +Holbein, and which almost in every respect agree with the corresponding +cuts in the Lyons work, though of greater size.<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI25" id = "tagVI25" href = "#noteVI25">VI.25</a> M. Mechel’s +conjecture respecting the +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page351" id = "page351"> +351</a></span> +engraver of those cuts appears to have been first published in the +sixteenth volume of Von Murr’s Journal; but though I am inclined to +think that he is correct, it has not been satisfactorily shown that Hans +Lutzelburger ever used the mark <img class = "middle" src = +"images/illus_342b.png" width = "29" height = "21" alt = "HL">. He, +however, lived at that period, and it is almost certain that he executed +an alphabet of small initial letters representing a Dance of Death, +which appear to have been first used at Basle by the printers Bebelius +and Cratander about 1530. We give (on the following page) the +entire series. He is also supposed to have engraved two other alphabets +of ornamental initial letters, one representing a dance of peasants, +“intermixed,” says Mr. Douce, “with other subjects, some of which are +not of the most delicate nature;” the other representing groups of +children in various playful attitudes. All those three alphabets are +generally described by German and Swiss writers on art as having been +designed by Holbein; and few impartial persons I conceive can have much +doubt on the subject, if almost perfect identity between most of the +figures and those in his known productions be allowed to have any +weight.</p> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page352" id = "page352"> +[352]</a></span> + +<div class = "picture"> +<a name = "illus_352" id = "illus_352"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_352a.png" width = "428" height = "97" +alt = "A B C D"> +<img src = "images/illus_352b.png" width = "431" height = "95" +alt = "E F G H"> +<img src = "images/illus_352c.png" width = "431" height = "96" +alt = "I K L M"> +<img src = "images/illus_352d.png" width = "430" height = "99" +alt = "N O P Q"> +<img src = "images/illus_352e.png" width = "431" height = "102" +alt = "R S T V"> +<img src = "images/illus_352f.png" width = "432" height = "105" +alt = "W X Y Z"> +</div> + +<p>There is a set of proofs of the alphabet of the Dance of Death, +printed on one sheet, preserved in the Public Library at Basle, and +underneath is printed in moveable letters the name <span class = +"blackletter">HAnns Lützelburger formschnider, genannt +Franck</span>,—that is, “Hanns Lutzelburger, wood engraver, named +Franck.” The first H is an ornamented Roman capital; the other letters +of the name are in the German character. The size of the cuts in this +alphabet of the Dance of Death is one inch by seven-eighths. The reason +for supposing that Hans Lutzelburger was the engraver of the cuts in the +first edition of the Lyons Dance of Death are: 1. The similarity of +style between the latter and those of the Basle alphabet of the same +subject; and 2. The correspondence of the mark in the cut of the +Duchess with the initial letters of the name H[ans] L[utzelburger], and +the fact of his being a wood engraver of that period. Mr. Douce, in the +seventh chapter of his work, professes to +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page353" id = "page353"> +353</a></span> +examine the “claim of Hans Lutzelburger as to the design or execution of +the Lyons engravings of the Dance of Death,” but his investigations seem +very unsatisfactory; and his chapter is one of those “in which,” as +Fielding says, “nothing is concluded.” He gives no opinion as to whether +Lutzelburger was the designer of the Lyons cuts or not, though this is +one of the professed topics of his investigation; and even his opinion, +for the time being, as to the engraver, only appears in the heading of +the following chapter, where it is thus announced: “<i>List of several +editions of the Lyons work on the Dance of Death, with the mark of +Lutzenburger</i>.”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI26" id = "tagVI26" href += "#noteVI26">VI.26</a> His mind, however, does not appear to have been +finally made up on this point; for in a subsequent page, 215, speaking +of the mark <img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_342b.png" width = +"29" height = "21" alt = "HL"> in the cut of the Duchess, which he had +previously mentioned as that of Hans Lutzelburger, he says, “<i>but to +whomsoever this mark may turn out to belong</i>, certain it is that +Holbein never made use of it.” His only unalterable decision appears to +be that Holbein did not design the cuts of the Lyons Dance of Death, and +in support of it he puts forth sundry arguments which are at once absurd +and inconsistent; rejects unquestionable evidence which makes for the +contrary opinion; and admits the most improbable that seems to favour +his own.</p> + +<p>Mr. Douce, in his seventh chapter, also gives a list of cuts, which +he says were executed by Hans Lutzelburger; but out of the seven single +cuts and three alphabets which he enumerates, I am inclined to +think that Lutzelburger’s name is only to be found attached to one +single cut and to one alphabet,—the latter being that of the +initial letters representing a Dance of Death. The single cut to which I +allude—and which, I believe, is the only one of the kind that +has his name underneath it,—represents a combat in a wood between +some naked men and a body of peasants. Within the cut, to the left, is +the mark, probably of the designer, on a reversed tablet, <img class = +"middle" src = "images/illus_353.png" width = "76" height = "31" alt = +"symbol"> thus; and underneath is the following inscription, from a +separate block: <span class = "smallcaps">Hanns . Leuczellburger . +Furmschnider</span> × 1.5.2.2. An impression of this cut is preserved in +the Public Library at Basle; and an alphabet of Roman capitals, engraved +on wood, is printed on the same folio, below Lutzelburger’s name. In not +one of the other single cuts does this engraver’s name occur, nor in +fact any mark that can be fairly ascribed to him. The seventh cut, +described by Mr. Douce,—a copy of Albert Durer’s Decollation of +John the Baptist,—is ascribed to Lutzelburger on the authority of +Zani. According to this writer,—for I have not seen the cut myself +any more than Mr. Douce,—it has “the mark H. L. reversed,” +which perhaps may prove to be L. H. “In the index of names,” says +Mr. Douce, “he (Zani) finds his name thus written, <span class = +"smallcaps">Hans</span> +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page354" id = "page354"> +354</a></span> +<span class = "smallcaps">Lutzelburger Formschnider genant</span> +(chiamato) <span class = "smallcaps">Franck</span>, and calls him the +true prince of engravers on wood.” In what index Zani found the reversed +mark thus expounded does not appear; I, however, am decidedly of opinion +that there is no wood-cut in existence with the mark H. L. which +can be ascribed with anything like certainty to Lutzelburger; and his +name is only to be found at length <i>under</i> the cut of the Fight +above mentioned, and printed in moveable characters on the sheet +containing the proofs of the alphabet of the Dance of Death.<a class = +"tag" name = "tagVI27" id = "tagVI27" href = "#noteVI27">VI.27</a> The +title of “true prince of engravers on wood,” given by Zani to +Lutzelburger, can only be admitted on the supposition of his being the +engraver of the cuts in the first edition of the Lyons Dance of Death; +but it yet remains to be proved that he ever used the mark <img class = +"middle" src = "images/illus_342b.png" width = "29" height = "21" alt = +"HL"> or the separate letters H. L. on any previous or subsequent +cut. Though, from his name appearing on the page containing the alphabet +of the Dance of Death, and from the correspondence of his initials with +the mark in the cut of the Duchess in the Lyons Dance of Death, +I am inclined to think that he was the engraver of the cuts in the +latter work, yet I have thought it necessary to enter thus fully into +the grounds of his pretensions to the execution of those, and other wood +engravings, in order that the reader may judge for himself.</p> + +<p>Hegner, in his Life of Holbein, treats the claims that have been +advanced on behalf of Lutzelburger too lightly. He not only denies that +he was the engraver of the cuts in the first edition of the Lyons work, +but also that he executed the cuts of the alphabet of the Dance of +Death, although his name with the addition of “wood +engraver”—<i>formschnider</i>—be printed on the sheet of +proofs. If we cannot admit the inscription in question as evidence of +Lutzelburger being the engraver of this alphabet, we may with equal +reason question if any wood engraver actually executed the cut or cuts +under which his name only appears printed in type, or which may be +ascribed to him in the title of a book. Mr. Douce, speaking of the three +alphabets,—of peasants, boys, and a Dance of Death,—all of +which he supposes to have been engraved by Lutzelburger, says that the +proofs “may have been deposited by him in his <i>native</i> city,” +meaning Basle. Hegner, however, says that there is no trace of him to be +found either in registers of baptism or burger-lists of Basle. He +further adds, though I by no means concur with him in this opinion, “It +is indeed likely that, as a travelling dealer in works of art—who, +according to the custom of that period, took up their temporary +residence sometimes in one place, sometimes in another,—he had +obtained possession of those blocks, [of the alphabet of Death’s Dance, +and the Fight, with his name,] and that he sold impressions from them in +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page355" id = "page355"> +355</a></span> +the way of trade.”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI28" id = "tagVI28" href += "#noteVI28">VI.28</a> Mr. Douce says that it may admit of a doubt +whether the alphabets ascribed to Lutzelburger were cut on metal or on +wood. It may admit of a doubt, certainly, with one who knows very little +of the practice of wood engraving, but none with a person who is +accustomed to see cuts executed in a much more delicate style by wood +engravers of very moderate abilities. To engrave them on wood, would be +comparatively easy, so far as relates to the mere delicacy of the lines; +but it would be a task of great difficulty to engrave them in relief in +any metal which should be much harder than that of which types are +composed. To suppose that they might have been executed in type-metal, +on account of the delicacy of the lines, would involve a contradiction; +for not only can finer lines be cut on box-wood than on type-metal, but +also with much greater facility.</p> + +<p>It perhaps may not be unnecessary to give here two instances of the +many vague and absurd conjectures which have been propounded respecting +the designer or the engraver of the cuts in the Lyons editions of the +Dance of Death. In a copy of this work of the edition 1545 now in the +British Museum, but formerly belonging to the Reverend C. M. +Cracherode, a portrait of a painter or engraver named Hans +Ladenspelder is inserted opposite to the cut of the Duchess, as if in +support of the conjecture that <i>he</i> might be the designer of those +cuts, merely from the circumstance of the initial letters of his name +corresponding with the mark <img class = "middle" src = +"images/illus_342b.png" width = "29" height = "21" alt = "HL">. The +portrait is a small oval engraved on copper, with an ornamental border, +round which is the following inscription: “Imago Joannis Ladenspelder, +Essendiensis, Anno ætatis suæ xxviii. 1540.”<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI29" id = "tagVI29" href = "#noteVI29">VI.29</a> The mark <img +class = "middle" src = "images/illus_355a.png" width = "20" height = +"17" alt = "L"> is perceived on this portrait, and underneath is written +the following MS. note, referring to the mark in the cut of the Duchess: +“<img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_342b.png" width = "29" height += "21" alt = "HL"> the mark of the designer of these designs of Death’s +Dance, not H. Holbein. By several persons that have seen Holbein’s +Death Dance at Basil, it is not like these, nor in the same manner.” +This note, so far as relates to the implied conjecture about +Ladenspelder, may be allowed to pass without remark for what it is +worth; but it seems necessary to remind the reader that the painting of +the Dance of Death at Basle, here evidently alluded to, <i>was not</i> +the work of Holbein, and to observe that this note is not in the +handwriting of Mr. Cracherode, but that it has apparently been written +by a former owner of the volume.</p> + +<p>In a copy of the first edition, now lying before me, a former owner +has written on the fly-leaf the following verses from page 158 of the +Nugæ—Lyons, 1540,—of Nicholas Borbonius, a French +poet:</p> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page356" id = "page356"> +356</a></span> +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "open">“Videre qui vult Parrhasium cum Zeuxide,</p> +<p class = "indent">Accersat a Britannia</p> +<p>Hansum Ulbium, et Georgium Reperdium</p> +<p class = "indent">Lugduno ab urbe Galliæ.”</p> +</div> + +<p>The meaning of these verses may be thus expressed in English:</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p>Whoever wishes to behold,</p> +<p>Painters like to those of old,</p> +<p>To England straightway let him <ins class = "correction" title = "‘n’ invisible">send</ins>,</p> +<p>And summon Holbein to attend;</p> +<p>Reperdius,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI30" id = "tagVI30" href = +"#noteVI30">VI.30</a> too, from Lyons bring,</p> +<p>A city of the Gallic King.</p> +</div> + +<p>To the extract from Borbonius,—or Bourbon, as he is more +frequently called, without the Latin termination,—the writer has +added a note: “<i>An Reperdius harum Iconum sculptor fuerit?</i>” That +is: “Query, if Reperdius were the engraver of these cuts?”—meaning +the cuts contained in the Lyons Dance of Death. Mr. Douce also cites the +preceding verses from Nicholas Bourbon; and upon so slight and unstable +a foundation he, <i>more solito</i>, raises a ponderous superstructure. +He, in fact, says, that “it is <i>extremely probable</i> that he might +have begun the work in question [the designs for the Dance of Death], +and have died before he could complete it, and that the Lyons publishers +might have afterwards employed Holbein to finish what was left undone, +as well as to make designs for additional subjects which appeared in the +subsequent editions. Thus would Holbein be so connected with the work as +to obtain in future such notice as would constitute him by general +report the real inventor of it.”</p> + +<p>Perhaps in the whole of the discussion on this subject a more +tortuous piece of argument is not to be found. It strikingly exemplifies +<ins class = "correction" title = ". missing">Mr.</ins> Douce’s +eagerness to avail himself of the most trifling circumstance which +seemed to favour his own views; and his manner of twisting and twining +it is sufficient to excite a suspicion even in the mind of the most +careless inquirer, that the chain of argument which consists of a series +of such links must be little better than a rope of sand. Mr. Douce must +have had singular notions of probability, when, upon the mere mention of +the name of Reperdius, by Bourbon, as a painter then residing at Lyons, +he asserts that it is <i>extremely probable</i> that he, Reperdius, +might have begun the work: it is evident that he does not employ the +term in its usual and proper sense. If for “<i>extremely probable</i>” +the words “<i>barely possible</i>” be substituted, the passage will be +unobjectionable; and will then fairly represent the value of the +conjecture of Reperdius having designed any of the cuts in question. If +it be <i>extremely probable</i> +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page357" id = "page357"> +357</a></span> +that the cuts of the first edition of the Lyons Dance of Death were +designed by Reperdius, from the mere occurrence of his name in Bourbon, +the evidence in favour of their being designed by Holbein ought with +equal reason to be considered as <i>plusquam-perfect</i>; for the voices +of his contemporaries are expressly in his favour, the cuts themselves +bear a strong general resemblance to those which are known to be of his +designing, and some of the figures and details in the cuts of the Dance +of Death correspond so nearly with others in the Bible-cuts designed by +Holbein, and also printed at Lyons by the brothers Trechsel, and in the +same year, that there cannot be a doubt in the mind of any impartial +inquirer who shall compare them, that either both series must have been +designed by the same person, or that Holbein had servilely copied the +works of an unknown artist greater than himself. Upon one of the horns +of this dilemma, Mr. Douce, and all who assert that the cuts of the +Lyons Dance of Death <i>were not designed by Holbein</i>, must +inevitably be fixed.</p> + +<p>One of the earliest evidences in favour of Holbein being the designer +of the cuts in the Lyons Dance of Death is Nicholas Bourbon, the author +of the epigram previously cited. In an edition of his Nugæ, published at +Basle in 1540, are the following verses:<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI31" id = "tagVI31" href = "#noteVI31">VI.31</a></p> + +<div class = "verse w25"> +<h5><i>De morte picta à Hanso pictore nobili.</i></h5> + +<p>Dum mortis Hansus pictor imaginem exprimit,</p> +<p>Tanta arte mortem retulit ut mors vivere</p> +<p>Videatur ipsa: et ipse se immortalibus</p> +<p>Parem Diis fecerit operis hujus gloria.</p> +</div> + +<p>Now,—after premising that the term <i>picta</i> was applied to +designs engraved on wood, as well as to paintings in oil or +water-colours,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI32" id = "tagVI32" href = +"#noteVI32">VI.32</a>—it may be asked to what work of Holbein’s do +these lines refer? The painting in the church-court at Basle was not +executed by Holbein; neither was it ascribed to him by his +contemporaries; for the popular error which assigns it to him appears to +have originated with certain travellers who visited Basle upwards of a +hundred years after Holbein’s decease. It indeed may be answered that +Bourbon might allude to the <i>alphabet</i> of the Dance of Death which +has been ascribed to Holbein. A mere supposition of this kind, +however, would be untenable in this instance; for there is no direct +evidence to show that Holbein was the designer of this alphabet, and the +principal reason for supposing it to +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page358" id = "page358"> +358</a></span> +have been designed by him rests upon the previous assumption of his +being the designer of the cuts of the Lyons Dance of Death. Deny him the +honour of this work, and assert that the last quoted verses of Bourbon +must relate to some other, and the difficulty of showing by anything +like credible evidence, that he was the designer of any other series of +cuts, or even of a single cut, or painting, of the same subject, becomes +increased tenfold. Mr. Douce, with the gross inconsistency that +distinguishes the whole of his arguments on this subject, ascribes the +alphabet of the Dance of Peasants to Holbein, and yet cautiously avoids +mentioning him as the designer of the alphabet of the Dance of Death, +though the reasons for this conclusion are precisely the same as those +on which he rests the former assertion. Nay, so confused and +contradictory are his opinions on this point, that in another part of +his book he actually describes both alphabets as being the work of the +same designer and the same engraver.</p> + +<p>“Some of the writers on engraving,” says Mr. Douce, “have manifested +their usual inaccuracy on the subject of Holbein’s Dance of +Peasants. . . . . . . There is, however, +<i>no doubt</i> that his beautiful pencil was employed on this subject +in various ways, of which the following specimens are worthy of being +recorded. In a set of initial letters frequently used in books printed +at Basle and elsewhere,” &c. After thus having unhesitatingly +ascribed the Dance of Peasants to Holbein, Mr. Douce, in a subsequent +page,—when giving a list of cuts which he ascribes to Hans +Lutzelburger,—writes as follows: “8. An alphabet with a Dance of +Death, the subjects of which, with a few exceptions, are the same as +those in the other Dance; the designs, however, occasionally vary,” +&c. On concluding his description of this alphabet, he thus +notices the alphabet of the Dance of Peasants, having apparently forgot +that he had previously ascribed the latter to Holbein. “9. Another +alphabet <i>by the same artists</i>. It is a Dance of Peasants, +intermixed with other subjects, some of which are not of the most +delicate nature.”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI33" id = "tagVI33" href = +"#noteVI33">VI.33</a></p> + +<p>It is, however, uncertain if Mr. Douce really did believe Holbein to +be the designer of the alphabet of the Dance of Death, though from the +preceding extracts it is plainly, though indirectly asserted, that he +<i>was</i>. In his wish to claim the engraving of the Dance of Peasants +for Lutzelburger, Mr. Douce does not seem to have been aware that from +the words “by the same artists,” coupled with his previous assertion, of +Holbein being the designer of that alphabet, it followed as a direct +consequence that he was also the designer of the alphabet of the Dance +of Death. Putting this charitable construction on Mr. Douce’s words, it +follows that <i>his</i> assertion of Lutzelburger being the engraver of +the Dance of Peasants is purely gratuitous. If Mr. Douce really believed +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page359" id = "page359"> +359</a></span> +that Holbein was the designer of the alphabet of the Dance of Death, he +ought in fairness to have expressly declared his opinion; although such +declaration would have caused his arguments, against Holbein being the +designer of the cuts in the Lyons Dance of Death, to appear more +paradoxical and absurd than they are when unconnected with such an +opinion; for what person, with the slightest pretensions to rationality, +could assert that Holbein was the designer of the alphabet of the Dance +of Death executed in 1530, the subjects, with few exceptions, the same +as those in the Dance of Death published at Lyons in 1538, and yet in +direct opposition to contemporary testimony, and the internal evidence +of the subjects themselves, deny that he was the designer of the cuts in +the latter work, on the sole authority of the nameless writer of a +preface which only appeared in the first edition of the book, and which, +there seems reason to suspect, was addressed to an imaginary personage? +Was Madame Jehanne de Touszele likely to feel herself highly +complimented by having dedicated to her a work which contains undeniable +evidences of the artist’s having been no friend to popery? In one cut a +couple of fiends appear to be ridiculing his “Holiness” the pope; and in +another is a young gallant with a guitar, entertaining a nun in her +bed-chamber. If a pious abbess of St. Peter’s, Lyons, in 1538, should +have considered that such cuts “tended to edification,” she must have +been an extremely liberal woman for her age. It is exceedingly amusing, +in looking over the cuts of the Lyons Dance of Death, to contrast the +drollery and satire of the designer with the endeavours of the textuary +and versifier to give them a devout and spiritual turn.</p> + +<p>As it is certain from the verses of Bourbon, in praise of Holbein as +the painter or designer of a subject, or a series of subjects, +representing “Death as if he were alive,”—ut mors vivere +videatur,—that this celebrated artist <i>had designed</i> a Dance +of Death, Mr. Douce, being unable to deny the evidence thus afforded, +paradoxically proceeds to fit those verses to his own theory; and after +quoting them, at page 139, proceeds as follows: “It has already been +demonstrated that these lines could not refer to the old painting of the +Macaber Dance at the Dominican convent, whilst from the important +dedication to the edition of the wood-cuts first published at Lyons in +1538, it is next to impossible that that work could then have been in +Borbonius’s contemplation. It appears from several places in his Nugæ +that he was in England in 1535, at which time Holbein drew his portrait +in such a manner as to excite his gratitude and admiration in another +copy of verses . . . . . . He returned to Lyons +in 1536, and it is known that he was there in 1538, when he probably +wrote the complimentary lines in Holbein’s Biblical designs a short time +before their publication, either out of friendship to the painter, or at +the instance of the Lyons publisher, with whom he was +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page360" id = "page360"> +360</a></span> +certainly connected.—Now, if Borbonius, during his residence at +Lyons, had been assured that the designs in the wood-cuts of the Dance +of Death were the production of Holbein, would not his before-mentioned +lines on that subject have been likewise introduced into the Lyons +edition of it, or at least into some subsequent editions, in none of +which is any mention whatever made of Holbein, although the work was +continued even after the death of that artist? The application, +therefore, of Borbonius’s lines must be sought for elsewhere; but it is +greatly to be regretted that he has not adverted to the place where the +painting,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI34" id = "tagVI34" href = +"#noteVI34">VI.34</a> as he seems to call it, was made.”</p> + +<p>Mr. Douce next proceeds in his search after the “painting,” and he is +not long in finding what he wishes for. According to his statement, +“<i>very soon after</i> the calamitous fire at Whitehall, 1697, which +consumed nearly the whole of that palace, a person, calling himself +T. Nieuhoff Piccard, probably belonging to the household of William +III, and a man who appears to have been an amateur artist,” made +etchings after nineteen of the cuts in the Lyons Dance of Death. +Impressions of those etchings, accompanied with manuscript dedications, +appear to have been presented by this T. Nieuhoff Piccard to his +friends or patrons, and among others to a Mynheer Heymans, and to “the +high, noble, and well-born Lord William Denting, Lord of Rhoon, +Pendraght,” &c. The address to Mynheer Heymans contains the +following important piece of information respecting a work of Holbein’s, +which appears most singularly to have escaped the notice of every other +writer, whether English or foreign. “Sir,—The costly palace of +Whitehall, erected by Cardinal Wolsey, and the residence of King Henry +VIII, contains, among other performances of art, a Dance of Death, +<i>painted by Holbein</i>, in its galleries, which, through an +unfortunate conflagration, has been reduced to ashes.”<a class = "tag" +name = "tagVI35" id = "tagVI35" href = "#noteVI35">VI.35</a> In the +dedication to the “high, noble, and well-born Lord William Benting,” the +information respecting this curious work of art,—all memory of +which would have perished had it not been for the said T. Nieuhoff +Piccard,—is rather more precise. “Sir, [not My Lord,]—In the +course of my constant love and pursuit of works of art, it has been my +good fortune to meet with that scarce little work of Hans Holbein, +neatly engraved on wood, and which he himself had <i>painted as large as +life</i>, in fresco, on the walls of Whitehall.” Who Mynheer Heymans was +will probably never be discovered, but he seems to have been a person of +some consequence in his day, though unfortunately never mentioned in any +history or memoirs of the period, for it appears that the court thought +proper, in consideration of his singular deserts, to +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page361" id = "page361"> +361</a></span> +cause a dwelling to be built for him at Whitehall. My Lord William +Benting,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI36" id = "tagVI36" href = +"#noteVI36">VI.36</a>—though from his name and titles he might be +mistaken for a member of the Bentinck family,—appears to have been +actually born in the palace. It is, however, very unfortunate that his +name does not occur in the peerage of that time; and as neither Rhoon +nor Pendraght are to be found in Flanders or Holland, it is not unlikely +that these may be the names of two of his lordship’s <i>castles in +Spain</i>.</p> + +<p>T. Nieuhoff Piccard’s express testimony of Holbein having painted a +Dance of Death in fresco, at Whitehall, is, in Mr. Douce’s opinion, +further corroborated by the following circumstances: 1. “In one of +Vanderdort’s manuscript catalogues of the pictures and rarities +transported from St. James’s to Whitehall, and placed there in the newly +erected cabinet room of Charles I, and in which several works by Holbein +are mentioned, there is the following article: ‘A little piece, +where Death with a green garland about his head, stretching both his +arms to apprehend a Pilate in the habit of one of the spiritual +Prince-Electors of Germany. Copied by Isaac Oliver from Holbein.’ There +cannot be a doubt that this refers to the subject of the Elector as +painted by Holbein in the Dance of Death at Whitehall, proving at the +same time the identity of the painting with the wood-cuts, whatever may +be the inference. 2. Sandrart, after noticing a remarkable portrait +of Henry VIII. at Whitehall, states ‘that there yet remains at that +palace <i>another work</i>, by Holbein, that constitutes him the Apelles +of his time.’ This is certainly <i>very like an allusion</i> to a Dance +of Death. 3. It is <i>by no means improbable</i> that Matthew Prior +may have alluded to Holbein’s painting at Whitehall, as it is not likely +that he would be acquainted with any other.</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p>‘Our term of life depends not on our deed,</p> +<p>Before our birth our funeral was decreed;</p> +<p>Nor aw’d by foresight, nor misled by chance,</p> +<p>Imperious Death directs the ebon lance,</p> +<p>Peoples great Henry’s tombs, and leads up Holbein’s Dance.’</p> + +<p class = "author"> +<i>Prior, Ode to the Memory of George Villiers.</i>”<a class = "tag" +name = "tagVI37" id = "tagVI37" href = "#noteVI37">VI.37</a></p> +</div> + +<p>Mr. Douce having previously <i>proved</i> that Holbein was <i>not</i> +the designer of the cuts in the Lyons Dance of Death, thus, in a manner +<i>equally +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page362" id = "page362"> +362</a></span> +satisfactory</i>, accounts for the verses of Bourbon, by showing, on the +<i>unexceptionable</i> evidence of “a person, calling himself +T. Nieuhoff Piccard, <i>probably</i> belonging to the household of +William III,” that the great work of Holbein—by the fame of which +he had made himself equal with the immortal gods—was painted as +large as life, in fresco, on the walls of Whitehall. The ingenuity +displayed in depriving Holbein of the honour of the Lyons cuts is no +less exemplified in proving him to be the painter of a similar subject +in Whitehall. The key-stone is worthy of the arch.</p> + +<p>Though the <i>facts</i> and <i>arguments</i> put forth by Mr. Douce, +in proof of Holbein having painted a Dance of Death on the walls of the +old palace of Whitehall, and of this having been the identical Dance of +Death alluded to by Bourbon, might be summarily dismissed as being of +that kind which no objection could render more absurd, yet it seems +necessary to direct the especial attention of the reader to one or two +points; and first to the assertion that “it is next to impossible that +the Lyons Dance of Death of 1538 could then have been in Borbonius’s +contemplation.” Now, in direct opposition to what is here said, it +appears to me highly probable that <i>this</i> was the very work on +account of which he addressed his epigram to Holbein; and it is moreover +evident that Bourbon expresses in Latin verse almost precisely the same +ideas as those which had previously been expressed in French by the +writer of the address to Madame Jehanne de Touszele, when speaking of +the merits of the nameless artist who is there alluded to as the +designer or engraver of the cuts.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI38" id = +"tagVI38" href = "#noteVI38">VI.38</a> As Holbein is not certainly known +to be the painter or designer of any other Dance of Death which might +merit the high praise conveyed in Bourbon’s verses, to what other work +of his will they apply? Even supposing, as I do, that the alphabet of +the Dance of Death was designed by Holbein, I conceive it “next to +impossible,” to use the words of Mr. Douce, that Bourbon should have +described Holbein as having attained immortality through the fame of +those twenty-four small letters, a perfect set of which I believe +is not to be found in any single volume. +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page363" id = "page363"> +363</a></span> +That Bourbon <i>did</i> know who was the designer of the cuts of the +Lyons Dance of Death there can scarcely be the shadow of a doubt; he was +at Lyons in the year in which the work was published; he was connected +with the printers; and another work, the Icones Historiarum Veteris +Testamenti, also published by them in 1538, has at the commencement a +copy of verses written by Bourbon, from which alone we learn that +Holbein was the designer of the cuts,—the first four of which +cuts, be it observed, being from the same blocks as the first four in +the Dance of Death, published by the same printers, in the same year. +What might be the motives of the printers for not inserting Bourbon’s +epigram in praise of Holbein in the subsequent editions of the Dance of +Death, supposing him to be the designer of the cuts, I cannot tell, +nor will I venture to <i>guess</i>. They certainly must have had some +reason for concealing the designer’s name, for the writer of the +prefatory address to Madame Jehanne de Touszele takes care not to +mention it even when speaking in so laudatory a style of the excellence +of the designs. Among the other unaccountable things connected with this +work, I may mention the fact of the French prefatory address to the +abbess of St. Peter’s appearing only in the first, and being omitted in +every subsequent edition.</p> + +<p>With respect to T. Nieuhoff Piccard, whose manuscript addresses to +“Mynheer Heymans” and “Lord William Benting” are cited to <i>prove</i> +that Bourbon’s verses must relate to a painting of the Dance of Death by +Holbein in the old palace of Whitehall, nothing whatever is known; and +there is not the slightest reason to believe that a Lord William +Benting, born in the old palace of Whitehall, “Lord of Rhoon, +Pendraght,” &c. ever existed. I am of opinion that the +addresses of the person calling himself T. Nieuhoff Piccard are a +clumsy attempt at imposition.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI39" id = +"tagVI39" href = "#noteVI39">VI.39</a> Though Mr. Douce had seen both +those addresses, and also another of the same kind, he does not appear +to have made any attempt to trace their former owners, nor does he +mention the names of the parties in whose possession they were at the +time that he saw them. He had seen the address to “Lord William Benting” +previous to the publication of his +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page364" id = "page364"> +364</a></span> +observations on the Dance of Death in 1794, when, if he had felt +inclined, he might have ascertained from whom the then possessor had +received it, and thus obtained a clue to guide him in his inquiries +respecting the personal identity of the Lord of Rhoon and Pendraght. But +this would not have suited his purpose; for he seems to have been +conscious that any inquiry respecting such a person would only have +tended to confirm the doubts respecting the paper addressed to him by +Piccard. It is also uncertain at what time those pretended addresses +were written, but there are impressions of the etchings which +accompanied them with the date 1720; and I am inclined to think that if +the paper and handwriting were closely examined, it would be found that +those pretended presentation addresses were manufactured about the same, +or perhaps at a later period. Whoever the person calling himself +T. Nieuhoff Piccard may have been, or at whatever time the +addresses to Mynheer Heymans and others may have been written, the only +evidence of there having been a painting of the Dance by Holbein at +Whitehall rests on his unsupported statement. Such a painting is not +mentioned by any foreign traveller who had visited this country, nor is +it noticed by any English writer prior to 1697; it is not alluded to in +any tragedy, comedy, farce, or masque, in which we might expect that +such a painting would have been incidentally mentioned had it ever +existed. Evelyn, who must have frequently been in the old palace of +Whitehall, says not a word of such a painting, though he mentions the +Lyons Dance of Death under the title of Mortis Imago, and ascribes the +cuts to Holbein;<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI40" id = "tagVI40" href = +"#noteVI40">VI.40</a> and not the slightest notice of it is to be found +in Vertue or Walpole.</p> + +<p>The learned Conrad Gesner, who was born at Zurich in 1516, and died +there in 1565, expressly ascribes the Lyons Dance of Death to Holbein;<a +class = "tag" name = "tagVI41" id = "tagVI41" href = +"#noteVI41">VI.41</a> and, notwithstanding the contradictory statement +in the preface to the +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page365" id = "page365"> +365</a></span> +first edition of this work, such appears to have been the general belief +of all the artist’s contemporaries. Van Mander, who was born in 1548, +and who died in 1606, appears to have been the first person who gave any +account of the life of Holbein. His work, entitled Het Schilder Boek, +consisting of biographical notices of painters, chiefly Germans and +Flemings, was first published in 1604; and, when speaking of Holbein, he +mentions the Lyons Dance of Death among his other works. Sandrart, in +common with every other writer on art of the period, also ascribes the +Lyons work to Holbein, and he gives the following account of a +conversation that he had with Rubens respecting those cuts: +“I remember that in the year 1627, when the celebrated Rubens was +proceeding to Utrecht to visit Honthorst, I accompanied him as far +as Amsterdam; and during our passage in the boat I looked into Holbein’s +little book of the Dance of Death, the cuts of which Rubens highly +praised, recommending me, as I was a young man, to copy them, observing, +that he had copied them himself in his youth.” Sandrart, who seems to +have been one of the earliest writers who supposed that Durer, Cranach, +and others engraved their own designs, without any just grounds +describes Holbein as a wood engraver. Patin, in his edition of the +“Stultitiæ Laus” of Erasmus, 1676, repeats the same story; and Papillon +in his decisive manner clenches it by asserting that “most of the +delicate wood-cuts and ornamental letters which are to be found in books +printed at Basle, Zurich, and towns in Switzerland, at Lyons, London, +&c. from 1520 to about 1540, were engraved by Holbein himself.” +Papillon also says that it is believed—<i>on croit</i>—that +Holbein began to engrave in 1511, when he was about sixteen. “What is +extraordinary in this painter,” he further adds, “is, that he painted +and engraved with the left hand, so that he consequently engraved the +lines on the wood from right to left, instead of, as with us, engraving +from left to right.”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI42" id = "tagVI42" +href = "#noteVI42">VI.42</a> Jansen, and a host of other compilers, +without inquiry, repeat the story of Holbein having been a wood +engraver, and that the cuts of the Lyons Dance of Death were engraved by +himself. That he was the designer of those cuts I am thoroughly +convinced, though I consider it “next to impossible” that he should have +been also the engraver.</p> + +<p>Holbein’s Bible Cuts, as they are usually called, were first +published at Lyons, in 1538, the same year, and by the same printers, as +the Dance of Death. The book is a small quarto, and the title is as +follows: “Historiarum Veteris Testamenti Icones ad vivum expressæ. Una +cum brevi, sed quoad fieri potuit, dilucida earundem et Latina et +Gallica +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page366" id = "page366"> +366</a></span> +expositione. Lugduni sub scuto Coloniensi. <span class = +"smallroman">M.D.XXXVIII.</span>”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI43" id = +"tagVI43" href = "#noteVI43">VI.43</a> On the title-page is an +emblematic cut, with the motto <i>Usus me genuit</i>, similar to that on +the title-page in the first edition of the Dance of Death, but not +precisely the same; and at the end is the imprint of the brothers +Melchior and Caspar Trechsel within an ornamental border, as in the +latter work. I am greatly inclined to think that the brothers were +only the printers of the first editions of the Dance of Death and the +Bible cuts, and that the real proprietors were John and Francis Frellon, +whose names appear as the publishers in subsequent editions.</p> + +<p>This opinion seems to be corroborated by the fact of there being an +address from “<i>Franciscus Frellaeus</i>” to the Christian Reader in +the Bible cuts of 1538 and 1539, which in subsequent editions is altered +to “Franciscus <i>Frellonius</i>.” That the same person is designated by +those names, I think there can be little doubt, as the addresses +are literally the same. From adopting the form “Frellaeus,” however, in +the editions of 1538 and 1539, it would seem that the writer was not +wishful to discover his name. When the work becomes popular he writes it +Frellonius; and in the second edition of the Dance of Death, when the +character of this work is also established, and there seems no longer +reason to apprehend the censures of the church of Rome, we find the +names of John and Francis Frellon on the title-page under the “shield of +Cologne.” Whatever might be their motives, it seems certain that the +first publishers of the Dance of Death were wishful to withhold their +names; and it is likely that the designer of the cuts might have equally +good reasons for concealment. Had the Roman Catholic party considered +the cuts of the Pope, the Nun, and two or three others as the covert +satire of a <i>reformed</i> painter, the publishers and the designer +would have been as likely to incur danger as to reap profit or fame.</p> + +<p>The address of Franciscus Frellaeus is followed by a copy of Latin +verses by Nicholas Bourbon, in which Holbein is mentioned as the +designer; and immediately preceding the cuts is an address “aux +lecteurs,” in French verse, by Gilles Corrozet, who, perhaps, might be +the poet that supplied the French expositions of those cuts, and the +“descriptions severement rithmées” of the Dance of Death. The following +is an extract from Bourbon’s prefatory verses, the whole of which it +appears unnecessary to give.</p> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page367" id = "page367"> +367</a></span> +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "open">“Nuper in Elysio cum fortè erraret Apelles</p> +<p class = "indent">Una aderat Zeuxis, Parrhasiusque comes.</p> +<p>Hi duo multa satis fundebant verba; sed ille</p> +<p class = "indent">Interea mœrens et taciturnus erat.</p> +<p>Mirantur comites, farique hortantur et urgent:</p> +<p class = "indent">Suspirans imo pectore, Coûs ait:</p> +<p>O famæ ignari, superis quæ nuper ab oris</p> +<p class = "indent">(Vana utinam!) Stygias venit ad usque domos:</p> +<p>Scilicet, esse hodie quendam ex mortalibus unum</p> +<p class = "indent">Ostendat qui me vosque fuisse nihil:</p> +<p>Qui nos declaret pictores nomine tantum,</p> +<p class = "indent">Picturæque omneis ante fuisse rudes.</p> +<p>Holbius est homini nomen, qui nomina nostra</p> +<p class = "indent">Obscura ex claris ac prope nulla facit.</p> +<p>Talis apud manes querimonia fertur: et illos</p> +<p class = "indent">Sic equidem merito censeo posse queri,</p> +<p>Nam tabulam siquis videat, quam pinxerit Hansus</p> +<p class = "indent">Holbius, ille artis gloria prima suæ,</p> +<p>Protinus exclamet, Potuit Deus edere monstrum</p> +<p class = "indent">Quod video? humanæ non potuere manus.</p> +<p>Icones hæ sacræ tanti sunt, optime lector,</p> +<p class = "indent">Artificis, dignum quod venereris opus.”</p> +</div> + +<p>Besides those verses there is also a Greek distich by Bourbon, to +which the following translation “pene ad verbum” is appended:</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "open">“Cernere vis, hospes, simulacra simillima vivis?</p> +<p>Hoc opus Holbinæ nobile cerne manus.”</p> +</div> + +<p>When <ins class = "correction" title = ". missing">Mr.</ins> Douce +stated that it was “<i>extremely probable</i> that the anonymous painter +or designer of the Dance might have been employed also by the Frellons +to execute a set of subjects for the Bible previously to his death, and +that Holbein was afterwards employed to complete the work,” he seems to +have forgot that such a testimony of Holbein being the designer was +prefixed to the Bible cuts. In answer to Mr. Douce it may be asked, in +his own style, if the Frellons knew that another artist was the designer +of the cuts of the Dance of Death, and if he also had been originally +employed to design the Bible cuts, how does it happen that they should +allow Bourbon to give all the honour of the latter to Holbein, who, if +the Dance of Death be not his, was certainly much inferior as a designer +to the nameless artist whose unfinished work he was employed to +complete?</p> + +<p>The total number of the Bible cuts in the first edition of the work +is ninety, the first four of which are the same as the first four of the +Dance of Death; the other eighty-six are of a different form to the +first four, as will be perceived from the specimens, which are of the +same size as the originals. Those eighty-six cuts are generally much +inferior in design to those of the Dance of Death, and the style in +which they are engraved is very unequal, some of them being executed +with considerable +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page368" id = "page368"> +368</a></span> +neatness and delicacy, and others in a much coarser manner. The +following cut, Abraham about to sacrifice Isaac, Genesis <span class = +"smallroman">XXII</span>, is one of those which are the best engraved; +but even these, so far as regards the expression of the features and the +delicate marking of the hands, are generally much inferior to the cuts +of the Dance of Death.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_368" id = "illus_368"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_368.png" width = "333" height = "207" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>Though most of the Bible cuts are inferior both in design and +execution to those of the Dance of Death, and though several of them are +rudely drawn and badly engraved, yet many of them afford points of such +perfect identity with those of the Dance of Death, that it seems +impossible to come to any other conclusion than that either the cuts of +both works have been designed by the same person, or that the designer +of the one series has servilely copied from the designer of the other, +and, what is most singular, in many trifling details which seem the +least likely to be imitated, and which usually constitute individual +peculiarities of style. For instance, the small shrubby tree in the +preceding cut is precisely of the same species as that seen in the cut +of the Old Woman in the Dance of Death; and the angel about to stay +Abraham’s hand bears a strong general resemblance to the angel in Adam +and Eve driven out of Paradise.</p> + +<p>The cut on the opposite page—the Fool, Psalm <span class = +"smallroman">LIII</span>—is copied from one of those executed in a +coarser style than the preceding. The children in this cut are evidently +of the same family as those of the Dance of Death.</p> + +<p>In the first cut, the Creation, a crack is perceived running nearly +down the middle from top to bottom, in the edition of the Dance of Death +of 1545. It is also perceptible in all the subsequent Lyons editions of +this work and of the Bible cuts. It is, however, less obvious in the +Bible cuts of the edition 1549 than in some of the preceding, +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page369" id = "page369"> +369</a></span> +probably in consequence of the block having been cramped to remedy the +defect. Mr. Douce speaks, at page 105, as if the crack were not +discernible in the Bible cuts of 1549; it is, however, quite perceptible +in every copy that has come under my notice. Some of the latter editions +of this work contain four additional cuts, which are all coarsely +executed. In the edition of 1547 they form the illustrations to +Ezekiel <span class = "smallroman">XL</span>; Ezekiel <span class = +"smallroman">XLIII</span>; Jonah <span class = "smallroman">I</span>, +<span class = "smallroman">II</span>, and <span class = +"smallroman">III</span>; and Habakkuk. The Bible cuts were also printed +with explanations in English. The title of a copy now before me is as +follows: “The Images of the Old Testament, lately expressed, set forthe +in Ynglishe and Frenche vuith a playn and brief exposition. Printed at +Lyons by Johan Frellon, the yere of our Lord God, 1549,” 4to. In the +latter editions there are wood-cuts of the four Evangelists, each within +an oval border, on the last leaf. They bear no tokens of Holbein’s +style.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_369" id = "illus_369"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_369.png" width = "334" height = "235" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>Among the many instances of resemblance which are to be perceived on +comparing the Dance of Death with the Bible cuts, the following may be +enumerated as the most remarkable. The peculiar manner in which fire +with smoke, and the waves of the sea, are represented in the Dance of +Death can scarcely fail to strike the most heedless observer; for +instance, the fire in the cut of Death seizing the child, and the waves +in the cut of the Seaman. In the Bible cuts we perceive the same +peculiarity; there is the same kind of fire in Moses directing the +manner of burnt offerings, Leviticus <span class = +"smallroman">I</span>; in the burning of Nadab and Abihu, +Leviticus <span class = "smallroman">X</span>; and in every other +one of those cuts where fire is seen. In the destruction of Pharaoh and +his host, Exodus <span class = "smallroman">XIV</span>, are the same +kind of curling waves. Except in the Dance of Death and the Bible cuts, +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page370" id = "page370"> +370</a></span> +I have never seen an instance of fire or water represented in such +a manner. If those cuts were designed by two different artists, it is +certainly singular that in this respect they should display so perfect a +coincidence of idea. The sheep in the cut of the Bishop in the Dance of +Death are the same as those in the Bible cut of Moses seeing God in the +burning bush, Exodus <span class = "smallroman">III</span>; and the +female figure in the cut of the Elector in the former work is perceived +in the Bible cut of the captive Midianites, Numbers <span class = +"smallroman">XXXI</span>. The children introduced in both works are +almost perfectly identical, as will be perceived on comparing the cut of +Little Children mocking Elijah, chapter <span class = +"smallroman">II</span>, Kings <span class = "smallroman">II</span>, +with those of the Elector, and Death seizing the child, in the Dance of +Death. The face of the Duchess in the latter work is the same as that of +Esther in the Bible cut, Esther, chapter <span class = +"smallroman">II</span>; and in this cut ornaments on the tapestry, like +fleurs-de-lis, behind the throne of Ahasuerus, are the same as those on +the tapestry behind the King in the Dance of Death. The latter +coincidence has been noticed by Mr. Douce, who, in direct opposition to +the evidence of the German or Swiss costume of the living characters of +the Dance of Death, considers it as contributing to demonstrate that +both the series of those cuts are of Gallic origin.<a class = "tag" name += "tagVI44" id = "tagVI44" href = "#noteVI44">VI.44</a> It is needless +to enumerate more instances of almost complete identity of figures and +details in the cuts of the Dance of Death and those of the Bible +illustrations; they are too frequent to have originated from a +conventional mode of representing certain objects and persons; and they +are most striking in minor details, where one artist would be least +likely to imitate another, but where the same individual designer would +be most likely to repeat himself. “As to the designs of these truly +elegant prints,” says Mr. Douce, speaking of the cuts of the Dance of +Death, “no one who is at all skilled in the knowledge of Holbein’s style +and manner of grouping his figures would hesitate immediately to ascribe +them to that artist.”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI45" id = "tagVI45" +href = "#noteVI45">VI.45</a> As this opinion is corroborated by a +comparison of the Dance of Death with the Bible cuts, and as the +internal evidence of the cuts of the +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page371" id = "page371"> +371</a></span> +Dance of Death in favour of Holbein is confirmed by the testimony of his +contemporaries, the reader can decide for himself how far Holbein’s +positive claims to the honour of this work ought to be affected by the +passage in the anonymous address to Madame Jehanne de Touszele, which +forms the groundwork of Mr. Douce’s theory.</p> + +<p>Having now examined the principal arguments which have been alleged +to show that Holbein <i>was not</i> the designer of the Dance of Death, +and having endeavoured to justify his claims to that honour by producing +the evidences on which they rest, I shall now take leave of this +subject, feeling thoroughly assured that <span class = +"smallcaps">Holbein was the designer of the cuts of the first edition of +the Lyons Dance of Death</span>; and trusting, though with no +overweening confidence, that the preceding investigation will render it +necessary for the next questioner of his title to produce stronger +objections than the solitary ambiguous passage in the preface to the +first edition of the work, and to support them with more forcible and +consistent arguments than have been put forth by Mr. Douce. M. T. +Nieuhoff Piccard, I am inclined to think, will never again be +called as a witness in this cause; and before the passage in the preface +can be allowed to have any weight, it must be shown that such a +personage as Madame Jehanne de Touszele <i>was</i> prioress of the +convent of St. Peter at Lyons at the time of the first publication of +the work: and even should such a fact be established, the ambiguity of +the passage—whether the pretendedly deceased artist were the +engraver or designer, or both,—and the obvious desire to conceal +his name, remain to be explained.</p> + +<p>In 1538, the year in which the Dance of Death and the Bible cuts were +first published at Lyons, Holbein was residing in England under the +patronage of Henry VIII; though it is also certain that about the +beginning of September in that year he returned to Basle and he remained +there a few weeks.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI46" id = "tagVI46" href += "#noteVI46">VI.46</a></p> + +<p>As the productions of this distinguished painter occupy so large a +portion of this chapter, it perhaps may not be unnecessary to give here +a few particulars of his life, chiefly derived from Hegner’s work, +previous to his coming to England. Hans Holbein, the Younger, as he is +often called by German writers to distinguish him from his father, was +the son of Hans Holbein, a painter of considerable reputation. The +year and place of his birth have not been positively ascertained, but +there seems reason to believe that he was born in 1498, at Augsburg,<a +class = "tag" name = "tagVI47" id = "tagVI47" href = +"#noteVI47">VI.47</a> +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page372" id = "page372"> +372</a></span> +of which city his father was a burgher, and from whence he appears to +have removed with his family to Basle, about the end of the fifteenth or +the beginning of the sixteenth century. Young Holbein was brought up to +his father’s profession, and at an early age displayed the germ of his +future excellence. There is a portrait in oil by young Holbein of the +date of 1513, which, according to Hegner, though rather weak in colour +and somewhat hard in outline, is yet clearly and delicately painted. +From the excellence of his early productions, Patin, in his Life of +Holbein, prefixed to an edition of the Laus Stultitiæ of Erasmus<a class += "tag" name = "tagVI48" id = "tagVI48" href = "#noteVI48">VI.48</a> +thinks that he must have been born in 1495. That he was born in 1498 +there can, however, be little doubt, for Hegner mentions a portrait of +him, at Basle, when in the forty-fifth year of his age, with the date +1543. Several anecdotes are told of Holbein as a jolly fellow, and of +his twice or thrice discharging his account at a tavern by painting a +Dance of Peasants. Though there seems reason to believe that Holbein was +a free liver, and that he did paint such a subject in a house at Basle, +the stories of his thus settling for his liquor are highly improbable. +He appears to have married young, for in a painting of his wife and two +children, executed before he left Basle for England in 1526, the eldest +child, a boy, appears to be between four and five years old.<a +class = "tag" name = "tagVI49" id = "tagVI49" href = +"#noteVI49">VI.49</a></p> + +<p>The name of Holbein’s wife is unknown; but it is said that, like +Durer’s, she was of an unhappy temper, and that he enjoyed no peace with +her. It is not, however, unlikely that his own unsettled disposition and +straitened circumstances also contributed to render his home +uncomfortable. Like most other artists of that period, he appears to +have frequently travelled; but his journeys do not seem to have extended +beyond Switzerland and Suabia, and they were for the most part confined +to the former country. He seems to have travelled rather in search of +employment than to improve himself by studying the works +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page373" id = "page373"> +373</a></span> +of other masters. Perhaps of all the eminent painters of that period +there is no one whose style is more original than Holbein’s, nor one who +owes less to the study of the works of his contemporaries or +predecessors. Though there can be no doubt of his talents being highly +appreciated by his fellow-townsmen, yet his profession during his +residence at Basle appears to have afforded him but a scanty income. The +number of works executed by him between 1517 and 1526 sufficiently +testify that he was not deficient in industry, and the exercise of his +art seems to have been sufficiently varied:—he painted portraits +and historical subjects; decorated the interior walls of houses, +according to the fashion of that period, with fanciful and historical +compositions; and made designs for goldsmiths and wood-engravers. It is +said that so early as 1520, the Earl of Arundel,<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI50" id = "tagVI50" href = "#noteVI50">VI.50</a> an English +nobleman, having seen some of his works in passing through Basle, +advised him to try his fortune in England. If such advice were given to +Holbein at that period, it is certain that it was not adopted until +several years after, for he did not visit this country till 1526.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_374" id = "illus_374"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_374.png" width = "433" height = "582" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +THE SHEATH OF A DAGGER, INTENDED AS A DESIGN FOR A CHASER.<a class = +"tag" name = "tagVI51" id = "tagVI51" href = "#noteVI51">VI.51</a></p> + +<p>Before he left Basle he had painted two or three portraits of +Erasmus, and there is a large wood-cut of that distinguished scholar +which is said not only to have been painted, but also engraved by +Holbein. This cut is of folio size, and the figure of Erasmus is a whole +length. His right arm rests upon a terminus, and from a richly +ornamented arch is suspended a tablet, with the inscription, <span class += "smallcaps">Er. Rot.</span> Some old impressions have two verses +printed underneath, which merely praise the likeness without alluding to +the painter, while others have four which contain a compliment to the +genius of Erasmus and to the art of Holbein.<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI52" id = "tagVI52" href = "#noteVI52">VI.52</a> The original block +is still preserved in the Public Library at Basle; but there is not the +slightest reason for believing that it was engraved by Holbein. In 1526 +Holbein left Basle for England: Patin says, because he could no longer +bear to live with his imperious wife. Though this might not be the chief +cause, it is easy to conceive that a person of Holbein’s character would +feel but little regret at parting from such a helpmate. Van Mander says +that he took with him a portrait which he had painted of Erasmus, with a +letter of recommendation from the latter to Sir Thomas More, wherein it +was observed that this portrait ‘was +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page374" id = "page374"> +374</a></span> +much more like him than any of Albert Durer’s.’ Hegner, however, thinks +that what Van Mander says about the contents of this letter is not +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page375" id = "page375"> +375</a></span> +correct, as no such passage is to be found in the published +correspondence of Erasmus with Sir Thomas More. Erasmus had already sent +two portraits of himself to England;<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI53" id += "tagVI53" href = "#noteVI53">VI.53</a> and as Sir Thomas More was +personally acquainted with him, Hegner is of opinion that it would be +unnecessary to mention that the portrait was a better likeness than any +of those painted by Albert Durer. It is, however, by no means unlikely +that Erasmus in speaking of a portrait of himself by +Holbein—whether forwarded by the latter or not—might give +his own opinion of it in comparison with one from the pencil of +Durer.</p> + +<p>It would appear that in 1525 Erasmus had already mentioned Holbein’s +desire of trying his fortune in England to Sir Thomas More, for in a +letter written by Sir Thomas to Erasmus, dated from the court at +Greenwich, 18th of December 1525, there is a passage to the following +effect: “Your painter, dear Erasmus, is an excellent artist, but I am +apprehensive that he will not find England so fruitful and fertile as he +may expect. I will, however, do all that I can in order that he may +not find it entirely barren.”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI54" id = +"tagVI54" href = "#noteVI54">VI.54</a> From a letter, dated 29th of +August 1526, written by Erasmus to his friend Petrus Aegidius at +Antwerp, it seems reasonable to conclude that Holbein left Basle for +England about the beginning of September. Though Holbein’s name is not +expressly mentioned in this letter, there cannot be a doubt of his being +the artist who is thus introduced to Aegidius: “The bearer of this is he +who painted my portrait. I will not annoy you with his praises, +although he is indeed an excellent artist. Should he wish to see +Quintin, and you not have leisure to go with him, you can let a servant +show him the house. The arts perish here; he proceeds to England to gain +a few angels; if you wish to write [to England] you can send your +letters by him.”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI55" id = "tagVI55" href = +"#noteVI55">VI.55</a> In this extract we discover a trait of the usual +prudence of Erasmus, who, in introducing his humbler friends to persons +of power or influence, seems to have been particularly careful not to +give annoyance +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page376" id = "page376"> +376</a></span> +from the warmth of his recommendations. How gently, yet significantly, +does he hint to Aegidius that the poor painter who brings the letter is +a person about whom he need give himself no trouble: if he has not +<i>leisure</i> to introduce him personally to Quintin—that is, +Quintin Matsys—he can send a servant to show him his house. The +suggestion of the servant was a hint from Erasmus that he did not expect +the master to go with Holbein himself.</p> + +<p>Holbein on his arrival in England appears to have been well received +by Sir Thomas More; and it is certain that he resided for some time with +the learned and witty chancellor in his house at Chelsea. It is indeed +said that he continued with him for three years, but Walpole thinks that +this is very unlikely. Whether he may have resided during the whole of +the intermediate time with Sir Thomas More or not, there seems reason to +believe that Holbein entered the service of Henry VIII. in 1528. About +the autumn of 1529<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI56" id = "tagVI56" href += "#noteVI56">VI.56</a>, he paid a short visit to Basle, probably to see +his family, which he had left in but indifferent circumstances, and to +obtain permission from the magistracy for a further extension of his +leave of absence, for no burgher of the city of Basle was allowed to +enter into the service of a foreign prince without their sanction. +Patin, in his Life of Holbein, says that during his visit he spent most +of his time with his old tavern companions, and that he treated the more +respectable burghers, who wished to cultivate his friendship, with great +disrespect. Hegner, however, considers all those accounts which +represent Holbein as a man of intemperate habits and dissolute +character, as unworthy of credit; in his opinion it seems impossible +that he who was a favourite of Henry VIII, and so long an inmate of Sir +Thomas More’s house, should have been a dissolute person. M. Hegner +throughout his work shows a praiseworthy regard for Holbein’s moral +character, but his presumption in this instance is not sufficient to +counterbalance the unfavourable reports in the opposite scale.</p> + +<p>About the latter end of 1532, or the beginning of 1533, Holbein again +visited Basle; and his return appears to have been chiefly +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page377" id = "page377"> +377</a></span> +influenced by an order of the magistracy, which was to the following +effect: “To M. Hans Holbein, painter, now in England. We Jacob +Meier, burgomaster and councillor, herewith salute you our beloved Hans +Holbein, fellow-burgher, and give you to understand that it is our +desire that you return home forthwith. In order that you may live easier +at home, and provide for your wife and child,<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI57" id = "tagVI57" href = "#noteVI57">VI.57</a> we are pleased to +allow you the yearly sum of thirty guilders, until we can obtain for you +something better. That you may make your arrangements accordingly, we +acquaint you with this resolution. Given, Monday, 2nd September 1532.”<a +class = "tag" name = "tagVI58" id = "tagVI58" href = +"#noteVI58">VI.58</a> It is uncertain how long Holbein remained at Basle +on his second visit, but it was probably of short duration. Though he +obeyed the summons of the magistracy to return, he seems to have had +sufficient interest to obtain a further extension of his leave of +absence. For the third and last time he revisited Basle in 1538; and +from a licence, signed by the burgomaster Jacob Meier, dated 16th +November in that year, it appears that he obtained permission to return +to England and remain there for two years longer. In this licence fifty +guilders per annum are promised to Holbein on his return to Basle, and +till then the magistrates further agree to allow his wife forty guilders +per annum to be paid quarterly, and the first quarter’s payment to +commence on the eve of St. Lucia next ensuing,—that is, on the +12th of December. As the mention of the allowance to Holbein’s wife +would seem to imply that she was not very well provided for by her +husband, Hegner attempts to excuse his apparent neglect by suggesting +“that the great sometimes forget to pay, and will not bear dunning;” and +in illustration of this he refers to the passage in Albert Durer’s +Journal which has been previously given at page 269.</p> + +<p>Holbein’s three visits to Basle have been here especially noticed in +order that the reader might judge for himself as to the probability of +his making the drawings for the Lyons Dance of Death on any of those +occasions. As this work was published in 1538, and as Holbein on his +last visit appears to have arrived at Basle about the beginning of +September in that year, it is impossible that he should have made the +drawings then; for if the forty-one cuts were executed by one +person—as +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page378" id = "page378"> +378</a></span> +from the similarity and excellence of the style there seems every reason +to believe—it would require at the least half a year to engrave +them, supposing that the artist worked as expeditiously as a wood +engraver of modern times. As it is highly probable that Holbein both +made designs and painted on his former visits, in 1529, and in 1532 or +1533, I think it most likely that they were made on the latter +occasion,—that is, supposing them to have been designed on one of +those visits. It is, however, just as probable that the designs were +made in England, and forwarded to a wood engraver at Basle.</p> + +<p>Of the various paintings executed by Holbein during his residence in +England it is not necessary to give any account here; those who wish for +information on this point are referred to Walpole’s Anecdotes of +Painting.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI59" id = "tagVI59" href = +"#noteVI59">VI.59</a> Of his life in England there are few particulars. +“In some household accounts of Henry VIII,” says Mr. Douce, “there are +payments to him in 1538, 1539, 1540, and 1541, on account of his salary, +which appears to have been thirty pounds per annum. From this time +little more is recorded of him till 1553, when he painted Queen Mary’s +portrait, and shortly afterwards died of the plague in 1554.” Thomas +Howard, Earl of Arundel, the great patron of artists, in the time of +Charles I, was desirous of erecting a monument to the memory of Holbein, +but gave up the intention as he was unable to discover the place of the +artist’s interment. As Holbein seems to have left no will, and as his +death appears to have excited no notice, it is likely that he died poor, +and in comparative obscurity. If his satirical drawings<a class = "tag" +name = "tagVI60" id = "tagVI60" href = "#noteVI60">VI.60</a> of Christ’s +Passion, ridiculing the Pope and the popish clergy, were known to Mary, +or any of her spiritual advisers, it could not be expected that he +should find favour at her court.</p> + +<p>Wood engraving in England during the time of Holbein’s residence in +this country appears to have been but little cultivated; but though +there cannot be a doubt that the art was then practised here by native +wood +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page379" id = "page379"> +379</a></span> +engravers, yet I very much question if it were practised by any person +in England as a distinct profession. It is not unlikely that many of the +wood-cuts which appear in books printed in this country about that +period were engraved by the printers themselves. It has indeed been +supposed that most of the wood-cuts in English books printed at that +period were engraved on the continent; but this opinion seems highly +improbable—there could be no occasion to send abroad to have +wood-cuts so rudely executed. Perhaps the difficulty, or rather the +impossibility of finding a wood engraver in England capable of doing +justice to his designs might be one reason why Holbein made so few for +the booksellers of this country during his long residence here. The +following portrait of Sir Thomas Wyatt, the poet, who died in 1541, was +probably drawn on the block by Holbein. It is given on the reverse of +the title of a small work in quarto, printed at London, 1542, and +entitled “Næniæ in mortem Thomæ Viati equitis incomparabilis. Joanne +Lelando antiquario autore.” The verses, which are printed underneath the +cut, seem decisive of the drawing having been made by Holbein. There is +a drawing of Sir Thomas Wyatt by Holbein, in the Royal Collection, which +is engraved in Chamberlain’s work, entitled “Imitations of Original +Drawings by Hans Holbein,” folio, 1792. There is little similarity +between the drawing and the cut, though on comparison it is evident that +both are intended for the same person.</p> + +<div class = "picture w400"> +<a name = "illus_379" id = "illus_379"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_379.png" width = "174" height = "174" +alt = "see text"> + +<div class = "verse"> +<h5>In effigiem Thomæ Viati.</h5> + +<p>Holbenus nitida pingendi maximus arte</p> +<p>Effigiem expressit graphicè: sed nullus Apelles</p> +<p>Exprimet ingenium felix animumque Viati.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p>It has been supposed that the original cut, of which the preceding is +a fac-simile, was engraved by Holbein himself: if this were true, and +the cut itself taken as a specimen of his abilities in this department +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page380" id = "page380"> +380</a></span> +of art, there could not be a doubt of his having been a very indifferent +wood engraver, for though there be considerable expression of character +in the drawing of the head, the cut is executed in a very inferior style +of art.</p> + +<p>The cuts in Cranmer’s Catechism, a small octavo, printed in 1548,<a +class = "tag" name = "tagVI61" id = "tagVI61" href = +"#noteVI61">VI.61</a> have been ascribed to Holbein; but out of the +whole number, twenty-nine, including the cut on the reverse of the +title, there are only two which contain his mark. In the others the +manner of pencilling is so unlike that of these two, and the drawing and +composition bear so little resemblance to Holbein’s usual style, that I +do not believe them to have been of his designing. In the cut on the +reverse of the title, the subject is Cranmer presenting the Bible to +Edward VI.; the others, twenty-eight in number, but containing only +twenty-six different subjects,—as two of them are +repeated,—are illustrative of different passages of Scripture +cited in the work. The following cut is one of those designed by +Holbein. It occurs at folio CL as an illustration of “the fyrst sermon. +A declaration of the fyrst peticion” [of the Lord’s Prayer]. +Holbein’s initials, H. H.—though the cross stroke of the +first H is broken away—are perceived on the edge of what seems to +be a book, to the left of the figure praying.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_380" id = "illus_380"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_380.png" width = "234" height = "169" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>The other cut, designed by Holbein, and which contains his name at +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page381" id = "page381"> +381</a></span> +full length,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI62" id = "tagVI62" href = +"#noteVI62">VI.62</a> occurs at folio CCI. The subject is Christ casting +out Devils, in illustration of the seventh petition of the Lord’s +Prayer,—“Deliver us from evil.” The following is a fac-simile.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_381" id = "illus_381"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_381.png" width = "237" height = "170" +alt = "see text" title = "HANS.HOLBEN"></p> + +<p>For the purpose of showing the difference of style between those two +cuts and the others contained in the same work, the three given on the +following page have been selected. The first, illustrating the Creation, +occurs at the folio erroneously numbered <span class = +"smallroman">CXCV</span>, properly <span class = +"smallroman">CIX</span>, No. 1; the second, illustrating the sermon +of our redemption, at folio <span class = "smallroman">CXXI</span>, +No. 2; and the third, illustrating the third petition of the Lord’s +Prayer,—“Thy will be done,”—at folio <span class = +"smallroman">CLXVIII</span>, No. 3. The following are the +introductory remarks to the explanation of what the archbishop calls the +third petition: “Ye have herde how in the former petycions, we require +of our Lorde God to gyve us al thinges that perteyne to his glorye and +to the kyngdom of heaven, whereof he hath gyven us commaunde­mente +in the three preceptes written in the first table. Nowe folowethe the +thirde peticyon, wherein we praye God to graūte us that we may fulfyll +the other seven commaūde­mentes also, the whiche intreat of matiers +concerning this worldly kingdome and transitorye lyfe, that is to saye, +to honoure our parentes and gouernours, to kyl no man, to committe none +adulterye, to absteyne from thefte and lyinge, and to behave our selfes +in all thinges obedientlye, honestlye, peaceably, and godly.”</p> + +<div class = "picture w250"> +<p><a name = "illus_382a" id = "illus_382a"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_382a.png" width = "237" height = "176" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +No. 1.</p> +</div> + +<div class = "picture w250"> +<p><a name = "illus_382b" id = "illus_382b"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_382b.png" width = "234" height = "177" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +No. 2.</p> +</div> + +<div class = "picture w250"> +<p><a name = "illus_382c" id = "illus_382c"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_382c.png" width = "241" height = "179" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +No. 3.</p> +</div> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page382" id = "page382"> +382</a></span> +<p>The feebleness of the drawing and the want of distinctness in these +three cuts, are totally unlike the more vigorous delineation of Holbein, +as exemplified, though but imperfectly, in the two which are doubtlessly +of his designing. None of them have the slightest +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page383" id = "page383"> +383</a></span> +pretensions to delicacy or excellence of engraving, though they may be +considered as the best that had been executed in this country up to that +time. Those which, in my opinion, were not designed by Holbein have the +appearance of having been engraved on a <i>frushy</i> kind of wood, of +comparatively coarse grain. It is not, however, unlikely that this +appearance might result from the feebleness of the drawing, conjoined +with want of skill on the part of the engraver.</p> + +<p>The following cut will not perhaps form an inappropriate termination +to the notice of the principal wood engravings which have been ascribed +to Holbein. It occurs as an illustration of the generation of Christ, +Matthew, chapter <span class = "smallroman">I</span>, in an edition +of the New Testament, printed at Zurich, by Froschover, in 1554,<a class += "tag" name = "tagVI63" id = "tagVI63" href = "#noteVI63">VI.63</a> the +year of Holbein’s death. Though there be no name to this cut, yet from +the great resemblance which it bears to Holbein’s style, I have +little doubt of the design being his.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_383" id = "illus_383"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_383.png" width = "263" height = "263" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>The three following specimens of the cuts in Tindale’s Translation of +the New Testament, printed at Antwerp in 1534,<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI64" id = "tagVI64" href = "#noteVI64">VI.64</a> ought, in strict +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page384" id = "page384"> +384</a></span> +chronological order, to have preceded those of the Dance of Death; but +as Holbein holds the same rank in this chapter as Durer in the +preceding, it seemed preferable to give first a connected account of the +principal wood-cuts which are generally ascribed to him, and which +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page385" id = "page385"> +385</a></span> +there is the strongest reason to believe were actually of his designing. +The celebrity of Tindale’s translation, as the earliest English version +of the New Testament which appeared in print, and the place which his +name occupies in the earlier part of the history of the Reformation in +England, will give an interest to those cuts to which they could have no +pretensions as mere works of art. It is probable that they were executed +at Antwerp, where the book was printed; and the drawing and engraving +will afford some idea of the style of most of the small cuts which are +to be found in works printed in Holland and Flanders about that period. +The first of the preceding cuts represents St. Luke employed in painting +a figure of the Virgin, and it occurs at the commencement of the Gospel +of that Evangelist. The second, which occurs at the commencement of the +General Epistle of James, represents that Saint in the character of a +pilgrim. The third, Death on the Pale Horse, is an illustration of the +sixth chapter of Revelations.</p> + +<div class = "picture"> +<div class = "picblock w100"> +<p><a name = "illus_384a" id = "illus_384a"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_384a.png" width = "96" height = "138" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +No. 1.</p> +</div> + +<div class = "picblock w150"> +<p><a name = "illus_384b" id = "illus_384b"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_384b.png" width = "103" height = "142" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +No. 2.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_384c" id = "illus_384c"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_384c.png" width = "240" height = "350" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +No. 3.</p> + +<p>There is a beautiful copy, printed on vellum, of this edition of +Tindale’s Translation of the New Testament in the Library of the British +Museum. It appears to have formerly belonged to Queen Anne Boleyn, and +was probably a presentation copy from the translator. The title-page is +beautifully illuminated; the whole of the ornamental border, which is +seen in the copies on paper, is covered with gilding and colour, and the +wood-cut of the printer’s mark is covered with the blazoning of the +royal arms. On the edges, which are gilt, there is inscribed, in red +letters, <span class = "smallcaps">Anna Regina Angliæ</span>. This +beautiful volume formerly belonged to the Reverend C. M. +Cracherode, by whom it was bequeathed to the Museum.</p> + +<p>The first complete English translation of the Old and New Testaments +was that of Miles Coverdale, which appeared in folio, 1535,<a class = +"tag" name = "tagVI65" id = "tagVI65" href = "#noteVI65">VI.65</a> +without the name or residence of the printer, but supposed to have been +printed at +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page386" id = "page386"> +386</a></span> +Zurich by Christopher Froschover. The dedication is addressed to Henry +VIII, by “his Graces humble subjecte and daylie oratour, Myles +Coverdale;” and in the copy in the British Museum the commencement is as +follows: “Unto the most victorious Prynce and our most gracyous +soveraigne Lorde, kynge Henry the eyght, kynge of Englonde and of +Fraunce, lorde of Irlonde, &c. Defendour of the Fayth, and +under God the chefe and supreme heade of the churche of Englonde. ¶The +ryght and just administracyon of the laws that God gave unto Moses and +unto Josua: the testimonye of faythfulnes that God gave of David: the +plenteous abundance of wysdome that God gave unto Salomon: the lucky and +prosperous age with the multiplicacyon of sede which God gave unto +Abraham and Sara his wyfe, he gevē unto you most Gracyous Prynce, with +your dearest just wyfe and most virtuous Pryncesse, Quene Anne. Amen.” +In most copies, however, “Quene Jane” is substituted for “Quene Anne,” +which proves that the original dedication had been cancelled after the +disgrace and execution of Anne Boleyn, and that, though the colophon is +dated 4th October 1535, the work had not been generally circulated until +subsequent to 20th May 1536, the date of Henry’s marriage with Jane +Seymour.</p> + +<p>This edition contains a number of wood-cuts, all rather coarsely +engraved, though some of them are designed with such spirit as to be not +unworthy of Holbein himself, as will be apparent from two or three of +the following specimens. In the first, Cain killing Abel, the attitude +of Abel, and the action of Cain, sufficiently indicate that the original +designer understood the human figure well, and could draw it with great +force in a position which it is most difficult to represent.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_386" id = "illus_386"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_386.png" width = "277" height = "200" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +No. 1.</p> + +<p>The figure of Abraham in No. 2 bears in some parts considerable +resemblance to that of the same subject given as a specimen of Holbein’s +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page387" id = "page387"> +387</a></span> +Bible cuts at page 368; but there are several others in the work which +are much more like his style; and which, perhaps, might be copied from +earlier cuts of his designing. The two preceding may be considered as +specimens of the best designed cuts in the Old Testament; and the +following, the return of the Two Spies, is given us one of the more +ordinary.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_387a" id = "illus_387a"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_387a.png" width = "283" height = "206" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +No. 2.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_387b" id = "illus_387b"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_387b.png" width = "283" height = "203" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +No. 3.</p> + +<p>The three next cuts are from the New Testament. The first forms the +head-piece to the Gospel of St. Matthew; the second, which occurs on the +title-page, and displays great power of drawing in the figure, is John +the Baptist; and the third represents St. Paul writing, with his sword +before him, and a weaver’s loom to his left: the last incident, +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page388" id = "page388"> +388</a></span> +which is frequently introduced in old wood-cuts of this Saint, is +probably intended to designate his business as a tentmaker, and also to +indicate that, though zealously engaged in disseminating the doctrines +of Christ, he had not ceased to “work with his hands.”</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_388a" id = "illus_388a"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_388a.png" width = "275" height = "197" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +No. 1.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_388b" id = "illus_388b"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_388b.png" width = "120" height = "198" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +No. 2.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_388c" id = "illus_388c"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_388c.png" width = "261" height = "170" +alt = "see text and caption"></p> + +<p class = "caption"> +No. 3.</p> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page389" id = "page389"> +389</a></span> + +<p>Many of the cuts in this work are copied in a subsequent edition, +also in folio, printed in 1537; and some of the copies are so extremely +like the originals—every line being retained—as to induce a +suspicion that the impressions of the latter had been transferred to the +blocks by means of what is technically termed “rubbing down.”</p> + +<p>About 1530 the art of chiaro-scuro engraving on wood, which appears +to have been first introduced into Italy by Ugo da Carpi, was practised +by Antonio Fantuzzi, called also Antonio da Trente. Most of this +engraver’s chiaro-scuros are from the designs of Parmegiano. It is said +that Fantuzzi was employed by Parmegiano for the express purpose of +executing chiaro-scuro engravings from his drawings, and that, when +residing with his employer at Bologna, he took an opportunity of robbing +him of all his blocks, impressions, and designs. Between 1530 and 1540 +Joseph Nicholas Vincentini da Trente engraved several chiaro-scuros, +most of which, like those executed by Fantuzzi, are from the designs of +Parmegiano. From the number of chiaro-scuros engraved after drawings by +this artist, I think it highly probable that the most of them were +executed under his own superintendence and published for his own +benefit. Baldazzar Peruzzi and Domenico Beccafumi, both painters of +repute at that period, are said to have engraved in chiaro-scuro; but +the prints in this style usually ascribed to them are not numerous, and +I consider it doubtful if they were actually of their own engraving.</p> + +<p>From about 1530, the art of wood engraving, in the usual manner, +began to make considerable progress in Italy, and many of the cuts +executed in that country between 1540 and 1580 may vie with the best +wood engravings of the same period executed in Germany. Instead of the +plain and simple style, which is in general characteristic of Italian +wood-cuts previous to 1530, the wood engravers of that country began to +execute their subjects in a more delicate and elaborate manner. In the +period under consideration, we find cross-hatching frequently introduced +with great effect; there is a greater variety of <i>tint</i> in the +cuts; the texture of different substances is indicated more correctly; +the foliage of trees is more natural; and the fur and feathers of +animals are discriminated with considerable ability.</p> + +<p>The following cut will afford perhaps some idea of the best Italian +wood-cuts of the period under consideration. It is a reduced copy of the +frontispiece to Marcolini’s Sorti,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI66" id = +"tagVI66" href = "#noteVI66">VI.66</a> folio, printed at Venice in 1540. +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page390" id = "page390"> +390</a></span> +There is an impression of this cut on paper of a greenish tint in the +Print Room of the British Museum, and from this circumstance it is +placed, though improperly, in a volume, marked I. W. 4, and +lettered “Italian chiaro-scuros.” Underneath this impression the late +Mr. Ottley has written, “Not in Bartsch;” and from his omitting to +mention the work for which it was engraved, I am inclined to think +that he himself was not aware of its forming the frontispiece to +Marcolini’s Sorti. Papillon, speaking of the supposed engraver, Joseph +Porta Garfagninus, whose name is seen on a tablet near the bottom +towards the right, says, “J’ai de lui une fort belle Académie des +Sciences,”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI67" id = "tagVI67" href = +"#noteVI67">VI.67</a> but seems not to have known of the work to which +it belonged. This cut is merely a copy, reversed, of a study by Raffaele +for his celebrated fresco, usually +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page391" id = "page391"> +391</a></span> +called the School of Athens, in the Vatican. It is engraved in a work +entitled “Vies et Oeuvres des Peintres les plus célèbres,” 4to. Paris, +1813; and in the Table des Planches at the commencement of the volume in +which it occurs, the subject is thus described: “Pl. <span class = +"smallroman">CCCCV.</span> Etude pour le tableau de l’Ecole d’Athènes. +Ces différens episodes ne se retrouvant pas dans le tableau qui a été +exécuté des mains de Raphaël, ne doivent être considérées que comme des +essais ou premières pensées. <i>Grav. M. Ravignano.</i>” From this +description it appears that the same subject had been previously +engraved on copper by Marco da Ravenna, who flourished about the year +1530. Though I have never seen an impression of Marco’s engraving of +this subject, and though it is not mentioned in Heineken’s catalogue of +the engraved works of Raffaele,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI68" id = +"tagVI68" href = "#noteVI68">VI.68</a> I have little doubt that +Porta’s wood-cut is copied from it.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_390" id = "illus_390"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_390.png" width = "332" height = "406" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>Joseph Porta, frequently called Joseph Salviati by Italian authors, +was a painter, and he took the surname of Salviati from that of his +master, Francesco Salviati.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI69" id = +"tagVI69" href = "#noteVI69">VI.69</a> There are a few other wood-cuts +which contain his name; but whether he was the designer, or the engraver +only, is extremely uncertain.</p> + +<p>Marcolini’s work contains nearly a hundred wood-cuts besides the +frontispiece, but, though several of them are designed with great +spirit, no one is so well engraved.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI70" id += "tagVI70" href = "#noteVI70">VI.70</a> The following is a fac-simile +of one which occurs at page 35. The relentless-looking old woman is a +personification of <i>Punitione</i>—Punishment—holding in +her right hand a tremendous scourge for the chastisement of evil-doers. +Though this cut be but coarsely engraved, the domestic Nemesis, who here +appears to wield the retributive scourge, is designed with such spirit +that if the figure were executed in marble it might almost pass for one +of Michael +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page392" id = "page392"> +392</a></span> +Angelo’s. The drapery is admirably cast; the figure is good; and the +action and expression are at once simple and severe.</p> + +<div class = "picture"> +<div class = "picblock w350"> +<p><a name = "illus_392a" id = "illus_392a"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_392a.png" width = "317" height = "307" +alt = "see text"></p> +</div> + +<div class = "picblock w300"> +<p><a name = "illus_392b" id = "illus_392b"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_392b.png" width = "297" height = "298" +alt = "see text"></p> +</div> +</div> + +<p>The preceding cut, also a fac-simile, occurs at page 81 as an +illustration of Matrimony. The young man, with his legs already tied, +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page393" id = "page393"> +393</a></span> +seems to be deliberating on the prudence of making a contract which may +possibly add a yoke to his shoulders. The ring which he holds in his +hand appears to have given rise to his cogitations.</p> + +<p>The following small cuts of cards—“Il Re, Fante, Cavallo, e +Sette di denari”—are copied from the instructions in the +preface;<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI71" id = "tagVI71" href = +"#noteVI71">VI.71</a> and the beautiful design of Truth rescued by +Time—<span class = "smallcaps">Veritas Filia +Temporis</span>—occurs as a tail-piece on the last page of the +work. This cut occurs not unfrequently in works published by Giolito, by +whom I believe the Sorti was printed; and two or three of the other cuts +contained in the volume are to be found in a humorous work of Doni’s, +entitled “I Marmi,” printed by Giolito in 1552.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_393a" id = "illus_393a"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_393a.png" width = "305" height = "46" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_393b" id = "illus_393b"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_393b.png" width = "172" height = "233" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>The wood engravers of Venice about the middle of the sixteenth +century appear to have excelled all other Italian wood engravers, and +for the delicacy of their execution they rivalled those of Lyons, who at +that period were chiefly distinguished for the neat and delicate manner +of their engraving small subjects. In the pirated edition of the Lyons +Dance of Death, published at Venice in 1545 by V. Vaugris, the cuts +are more correctly copied and more delicately engraved than +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page394" id = "page394"> +394</a></span> +those in the edition first published at Cologne by the heirs of Arnold +Birkman in 1555. In fact, the wood engravings in books printed at Lyons +and Venice from about 1540 to 1580 are in general more delicately +engraved than those executed in Germany and the Low Countries during the +same period. Among all the Venetian printers of that age, Gabriel +Giolito is entitled to precedence from the number and comparative +excellence of the wood-cuts contained in the numerous illustrated works +which issued from his press. In several of the works printed by him +every cut is surrounded by an ornamental border; and this border, not +being engraved on the same block as the cut, but separately as a kind of +frame, is frequently repeated: sixteen different borders, when the book +is of octavo size and there is a cut on every page, would suffice for +the whole work, however extensive it might be. The practice of +<i>ornamenting</i> cuts in this manner was very prevalent about the +period under consideration, and at the present time some publishers seem +inclined to revive it. I should, however, be sorry to see it again +become prevalent, for though to some subjects, designed in a particular +manner, an ornamental border may be appropriate, yet I consider the +practice of thus <i>framing</i> a series of cuts as indicative of bad +taste, and as likely to check the improvement of the art. Highly +ornamented borders have, in a certain degree, the effect of reducing a +series of cuts, however different their execution, to a standard of +mediocrity; for they frequently conceal the beauty of a well-engraved +subject, and serve as a screen to a bad one. In Ludovico Dolce’s +Transformationi—a translation, or rather paraphrase of Ovid’s +Metamorphoses—first printed by Giolito in 1553, and again +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page395" id = "page395"> +395</a></span> +in 1557, the cuts, instead of having a border all round, have only +ornaments at the two vertical sides. The preceding is a fac-simile of +one of those cuts, divested of its ornaments, from the edition of 1557. +The subject is the difficult labour of Alcmena,—a favourite with +Italian artists. This is the cut previously alluded to at <a href = +"WoodEngraving4.html#illus_217">page 217</a>.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_394" id = "illus_394"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_394.png" width = "330" height = "234" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>A curious book, of which an edition, in quarto, was printed at Rome +in 1561, seems deserving of notice here, not on account of any merit in +the wood-cuts which it contains, but on account of the singularity of +four of them, which are given as a specimen of a “Sonetto figurato,” in +the manner of the cuts in a little work entitled “A curious +Hieroglyphick Bible,” first printed in London, in duodecimo, about 1782. +The Italian work in question was written by “Messer Giovam Battista +Palatino, Cittadino Romano,” and from the date of the Pope’s grant to +the author of the privilege of exclusively printing it for ten years, it +seems likely that the first edition was published about 1540. The work +is a treatise on penmanship; and the title-page of the edition of +1561—which is embellished with a portrait of the author—may +be translated as follows: “The Book of M. Giovam Battista Palatino, +citizen of Rome, in which is taught the manner of writing all kinds of +characters, ancient and modern, of whatever nation, with Rules, +Proportions, and Examples. Together with a short and useful Discourse on +Cyphers. Newly revised and corrected by the Author. With the addition of +fifteen beautiful cuts.”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI72" id = "tagVI72" +href = "#noteVI72">VI.72</a> In Astle’s Origin and Progress of Writing, +page 227, second edition, Palatino’s work is thus noticed: “In 1561, +Valerius Doricus printed at Rome a curious book on all kinds of writing, +ancient and modern. This book contains specimens of a great variety of +writing practised in different ages and countries; some of these +specimens are printed from types to imitate writing, and others from +carved wood-blocks. This book also contains a treatise on the art of +writing in cipher, and is a most curious specimen of early +typography.”</p> + +<p>After his specimens of “Lettere Cifrate,” Palatino devotes a couple +of pages to “Cifre quadrate, et Sonetti figurati,” two modes of +riddle-writing which, it appears, are solely employed for amusement. The +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page396" id = "page396"> +396</a></span> +“Cifro quadrato” is nothing more than a monogram, formed of a cluster of +interwoven capitals, but in which every one of the letters of the name +is to be found. In the following specimen the name thus ingeniously +disguised is <span class = "smallcaps">Lavinia</span>.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_396a" id = "illus_396a"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_396a.png" width = "129" height = "113" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>The following is a slightly reduced copy of the first four lines of +the “Sonetto figurato;” the other ten lines are expressed by figures in +a similar manner. “As to figured sonnets,” says the author, “no better +rule can be given, than merely to observe that the figures should +clearly and distinctly correspond with the matter, and that there should +be as few supplementary letters as possible. Of course, orthography and +pure +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page397" id = "page397"> +397</a></span> +Italian are not to be looked for in such exercises; and it is no +objection that the same figure be used for the beginning of one word, +the middle of another, or the end of a third. It is the chief excellence +of such compositions that there should be few letters to be +supplied.”</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_396b" id = "illus_396b"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_396b.png" width = "329" height = "376" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>The “interpretatio” of the preceding figured text is as follows:</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "open">“Dove son gli occhi, et la serena forma</p> +<p class = "indent">Del santo alegro et amoroso aspetto?</p> +<p class = "indent">Dov’ è la man eburna ov’ e ’l bel petto</p> +<p>Ch’ appensarvi hor’ in fonte mi transforma?”</p> +</div> + +<p>This figured sonnet is a curious specimen of hieroglyphic and +“phonetic” writing combined. For those who do not understand Italian, it +seems necessary to give the following explanation of the words, and +point out their phonetic relation to the things. <i>Dove</i>, where, is +composed of <i>D</i>, and <i>ove</i>, eggs, as seen at the commencement +of the first line. <i>Son</i>, are, is represented by a man’s head and a +trumpet, making a sound, <i>son</i>. The preceding figures are examples +of what is called “phonetic” writing, by modern expounders of Egyptian +antiquities,—that is, the figures of <i>things</i> are not placed +as representatives of the things themselves, but that their names when +pronounced may form a word or part of a word, which has generally not +the least relation to the thing by which it is <i>phonetically</i>, that +is, vocally, expressed. <i>Occhi</i>, eyes, is an instance of +hieroglyphic writing; the figure and the idea to be represented agree. +<i>La</i>, the, is represented by the musical note <i>la</i>; +<i>serena</i>, placid, by a +Siren,—<i>Sirena</i>,—orthography, as the author says, is +not to be expected in figured sonnets; and <i>forma</i>, shape, by a +shoemaker’s last, which is called <i>forma</i> in Italian.</p> + +<p>In the second line, <i>Santo</i>, holy, is represented by a Saint, +<i>Santo</i>; <i>allegro</i>, cheerfulness, by a pair of wings, +<i>ale</i>, and <i>grue</i>, a crane, the superfluous <i>e</i> forming, +with the <span class = "smallroman">T</span> following, the conjunction +<i>et</i>, and. The words <i>amoroso aspetto</i> are formed of +<i>amo</i>, a hook, <i>rosa</i>, a rose, and <i>petto</i>, the breast, +with a supplementary <i>s</i> between the rose and the breast.</p> + +<p>In the third line we have <i>ove</i>, eggs, and the musical <i>la</i> +again; <i>man</i>, the hand, is expressed by its proper figure; +<i>eburna</i>, ivory-like, is composed of the letters <span class = +"smallroman">EB</span> and an urn, <i>urna</i>; and in the latter part +of the line the eggs, <i>ov’</i>, and the breast, <i>petto</i>, are +repeated.</p> + +<p>At the commencement of the fourth line, a couple of cloaks, +<i>cappe</i>, stand for <i>ch’ appe</i> in the compound word <i>ch’ +appe</i>nsarvi; <i>hor’</i>, now, is represented by an hour-glass, +<i>hora</i>, literally, an hour; <i>fonte</i>, a fountain, is expressed +by its proper figure; and the words <i>mi transforma</i>, are +phonetically expressed by a mitre, <i>mitra</i>, the supplementary +letters <span class = "smallroman">NS</span>, and the shoemaker’s last, +<i>forma</i>.</p> + +<p>In the reign of Queen Elizabeth, a taste for inventing devices in +this manner seems to have been fashionable among professed wits; and the +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page398" id = "page398"> +398</a></span> +practice of expressing a name by a rebus was not unfrequent in an +earlier age. It is probable that the old sign of the Bolt-in-Tun in +Fleet Street derives its origin from Bolton, a prior of St. +Bartholomew’s in Smithfield, who gave a bird-<i>bolt</i> in the +bung-hole of a <i>tun</i> as the rebus of his name. The peculiarities of +the Italian figured sonnet are not unaptly illustrated in Camden’s +Remains, in the chapter entitled “<i>Rebus,<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI73" id = "tagVI73" href = "#noteVI73">VI.73</a> or +Name-Devises</i>:” “Did not that amorous youth mystically expresse his +love to <i>Rose Hill</i>, whom he courted, when in a border of his +painted cloth he caused to be painted as rudely as he devised grossely, +a rose, a hill, an eye, a loafe, and a well,—that +is, if you will spell it,</p> + +<p class = "center"> +<i>Rose Hill I love well.</i>”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI74" id = +"tagVI74" href = "#noteVI74">VI.74</a></p> + +<p>Among the wood engravers of Lyons who flourished about the middle of +the sixteenth century, the only one whose name has come down to modern +times is Bernard Solomon; and if he were actually the engraver of the +numerous cuts which are ascribed to him, he must have been extremely +industrious. I am not, however, aware of any cut which contains his +mark; and it is by no means certain whether he were really a wood +engraver, or whether he only made the designs for wood engravers to +execute. Papillon, who has been blindly followed by most persons who +have either incidentally or expressly written on wood engraving, +unhesitatingly claims him as a wood engraver; but looking at the +inequality in the execution of the cuts ascribed to him, and regarding +the sameness of character in the designs, I am inclined to think +that he was not an engraver, but that he merely made the drawings on the +wood. Sir E. L. Bulwer has committed a mistake of this kind in his +England and the English: “This country,” says he in his second volume, +page 205, edition 1833, “may boast of having, in Bewick of Newcastle, +brought wood engraving to perfection; his pupil, Harvey, continues the +profession with reputation.” The writer here evidently speaks of that +which he knows very little about, for at the time that his book was +published, Harvey, though originally a wood engraver, and a pupil of +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page399" id = "page399"> +399</a></span> +Bewick, had abandoned the profession for about eight years, and had +devoted himself entirely to painting and drawing for copper-plate and +wood engravers. Indeed I very much question if Sir Edward Lytton Bulwer +ever saw a cut—except, perhaps, that of Dentatus,—which was +actually engraved by Harvey. With about equal propriety, a writer, +speaking of wood engraving in England twenty years ago, might have +described the late John Thurston as “continuing the profession with +reputation,” merely because he was one of the principal designers of +wood engravings at that period.</p> + +<p>Bernard Solomon, whether a designer or engraver on wood, is justly +entitled to be ranked among the “little masters” in this branch of art. +All the cuts ascribed to him which have come under my notice are of +small size, and most of them are executed in a delicate manner; they +are, however, generally deficient in effect,<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI75" id = "tagVI75" href = "#noteVI75">VI.75</a> and may readily be +distinguished by the tall slim figures which he introduces. He evidently +had not understood the “capabilities” of his art, for in none of his +productions do we find the well-contrasted “black-and-white,” which, +when well managed, materially contributes to the excellence of a +well-engraved wood-cut. The production of a good <i>black</i> is, +indeed, one of the great advantages, in point of conventional colour, +which wood possesses over copper; and the wood engraver who neglects +this advantage, and labours perhaps for a whole day to cut with +mechanical precision a number of delicate but unmeaning lines, which a +copper-plate engraver would execute with facility in an hour, affords a +tolerably convincing proof of his not thoroughly understanding the +principles of his art. In Bernard’s cuts, and in most of those executed +at Lyons about the same period, we find much of this ineffective labour; +we perceive in them many evidences of the pains-taking workman, but few +traits of the talented artist. From the time that a taste for those +little and laboriously executed, but spiritless cuts, began to prevail, +the decline of wood engraving may be dated. Instead of confining +themselves within the legitimate boundaries of their own art, wood +engravers seem to have been desirous of emulating the delicacy of +copper-plate engraving, and, as might naturally be expected by any one +who understands the distinctive peculiarities of the two arts, they +failed. The book-buyers of the period having become sickened with the +glut of tasteless +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page400" id = "page400"> +400</a></span> +and ineffective trifles, wood engraving began to decline: large +well-engraved wood-cuts executed between 1580 and 1600 are comparatively +scarce.</p> + +<p>Bernard Solomon, or, as he is frequently called, <i>Little</i> +Solomon, from the smallness of his works, is said to have been born in +1512, and the most of the cuts which are ascribed to him appeared in +works printed at Lyons between 1545 and 1580. Perhaps more books +containing small wood-cuts were printed at Lyons between those years +than in any other city or town in Europe during the corresponding +period. It appears to have been the grand mart for Scripture cuts, +emblems, and devices; but out of the many hundreds which appear to have +been engraved there in the period referred to, it would be difficult to +select twenty that can be considered really excellent both in execution +and design. One of the principal publishers of Lyons at that time was +Jean de Tournes; many of the works which issued from his press display +great typographic excellence, and in almost all the cuts are engraved +with great neatness. The following cut is a fac-simile of one which +appears in the title-page of an edition of Petrarch’s Sonnetti, Canzoni, +e Trionfi, published by him in a small octodecimo volume, 1545.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_400" id = "illus_400"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_400.png" width = "188" height = "206" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>The design of the cut displays something of the taste for emblem and +device<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI76" id = "tagVI76" href = +"#noteVI76">VI.76</a> which was then so prevalent, and which became so +generally diffused by the frequent editions of Alciat’s Emblems, the +first of which was printed about 1531. The portraits of Petrarch and +Laura, looking not unlike “Philip and Mary on a shilling,” are +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page401" id = "page401"> +401</a></span> +seen enclosed within a heart which Cupid has pierced to the very core +with one of his arrows. The volume contains seven other small cuts, +designed and engraved in a style which very much resembles that of the +cuts ascribed to Bernard Solomon; and as there is no mark by which his +productions are to be ascertained, I think they are as likely to be +of his designing as three-fourths of those which are generally supposed +to be of his engraving.</p> + +<p>The work entitled “Quadrins Historiques de la Bible,” with wood-cuts, +ascribed to Bernard Solomon, and printed at Lyons by Jean de Tournes, +was undoubtedly suggested by the “Historiarum Veteris Testamenti +Icones”—Holbein’s Bible-cuts—first published by the brothers +Frellon in 1538. The first edition of the Quadrins Historiques was +published in octavo about 1550, and was several times reprinted within +the succeeding twenty years. The total number of cuts in the edition of +1560 is two hundred and twenty-nine, of which no less than one hundred +and seventy are devoted to the illustration of Exodus and Genesis. At +the top of each is printed the reference to the chapter to which it +relates, and at the bottom is a “Quadrin poëtique, tiré de la Bible, +pour graver en la table des affeccions l’amour des sacrees Histories.” +Those “Quadrins” appear to have been written by Claude Paradin. The +composition of several of the cuts is good, and nearly all display great +<i>neatness</i> of execution. The following is a fac-simile of the +seventh, Adam and Eve driven out of Paradise. It is, however, necessary +to observe that this is by no means one of the best cuts either in point +of design or execution.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_401" id = "illus_401"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_401.png" width = "318" height = "226" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page402" id = "page402"> +402</a></span> +<p>A similar work, entitled “Figures du Nouveau Testament,” with cuts, +evidently designed by the person who had made the drawings for those in +the “Quadrins Historiques de la Bible,” was also published by Jean de +Tournes about 1553, and several editions were subsequently printed. The +cuts are rather less in size than those of the Quadrins, and are, on the +whole, rather better engraved. The total number is a hundred and four, +and under each are six explanatory verses, composed by Charles Fonteine, +who, in a short poetical address at the commencement, dedicates the work +“A Tres-illustre et Treshaute Princesse, Madame Marguerite de +France, Duchesse de Berri.” The following, Christ tempted by Satan, is a +copy of the sixteenth cut, but like that of the expulsion of Adam and +Eve, it is not one of the best in the work.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_402" id = "illus_402"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_402.png" width = "183" height = "234" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>Old engravings and paintings illustrative of manners or of costume +are generally interesting; and on this account a set of large wood-cuts +designed by Peter Coeck of Alost, in Flanders, is deserving of notice. +The subjects of those cuts are the manners and costumes of the Turks; +and the drawings were made on the spot by Coeck himself, who visited +Turkey in 1533. It is said that he brought from the east an important +secret relative to the art of dyeing silk and wool for the fabrication +of tapestries, a branch of manufacture with which he appears to +have been connected, and for which he made a number of designs. He was +also an architect and an author; and published several treatises on +sculpture, geometry, perspective, and architecture. The cuts +illustrative of the manners and costume of the Turks were not published +until 1553, three years after his decease, as we learn from an +inscription +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page403" id = "page403"> +403</a></span> +on the last.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI77" id = "tagVI77" href = +"#noteVI77">VI.77</a> They are oblong, of folio size; and the seven of +which the set consists are intended to be joined together, and thus to +form one continuous subject. The figures, both on foot and horseback, +are designed with great spirit, but they want relief, and the engraving +is coarse. One of the customs which he has illustrated in the cut +No. 3 is singular; and though this <i>orientalism</i> has been +noticed by a Scottish judge—Maclaurin of Dreghorn—Peter +Coeck appears to be the only traveller who has graphically represented +“<i>quo modo Turci mingunt</i>,” i. e. <i>sedentes</i>. Succeeding +artists have availed themselves liberally of those cuts. As the Turks in +the sixteenth century were much more formidable as a nation than at +present, and their manners and customs objects of greater curiosity, +wood engravings illustrative of their costume and mode of living appear +to have been in considerable demand at that period, for both in books +and as single cuts they are comparatively numerous.</p> + +<p>Though chiaro-scuro engraving on wood was, in all probability, first +practised in Germany, yet the art does not appear to have been so much +cultivated nor so highly prized in that country as in Italy. Between +1530 and 1550, when Antonio Fantuzzi, J. N. Vincentini, and other +Italians, were engaged in executing numerous chiaro-scuros after the +designs of such masters as Raffaele, Corregio, Parmegiano, Polidoro, +Beccafumi, and F. Salviati, the art appears to have been +comparatively abandoned by the wood engravers of Germany. The +chiaro-scuros executed in the latter country cannot generally for a +moment bear a comparison, either in point of design or execution, with +those executed in Italy during the same period. I have, however, +seen one German cut executed in this style, with the date 1543, which, +for the number of the blocks from which it is printed, and the delicacy +of the impression in certain parts, is, if genuine, one of the most +remarkable of that period. As the paper, however, seems comparatively +modern, I am induced to suspect that the date may be that of the +painting or drawing, and that this picture-print—for, though +executed by the same process, it would be improper to call it a +chiaro-scuro—may have been the work of Ungher, a German wood +engraver, who executed some chiaro-scuros at Berlin about seventy years +ago. Whatever may be the date, however, or whoever may have been the +artist, it is one of the best executed specimens of coloured block +printing that I have ever seen.</p> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page404" id = "page404"> +404</a></span> +<p>This curious picture-print, including the border, is ten inches and +three quarters high by six inches and three quarters wide. The subject +is a figure of Christ; in his left hand he holds an orb emblematic of +his power, while the right is elevated as in the act of pronouncing a +benediction. His robe is blue, with the folds indicated by a darker +tint, and the border and lighter parts impressed with at least two +lighter colours. Above this robe there is a large red mantle, fastened +in front with what appears to be a jewel of three different colours, +ruby, yellow, and blue; the folds are of a darker colour; and the lights +are expressed by a kind of yellow, which has evidently been either +impressed, or laid on the paper with a brush, before the red colour of +the mantle, and which, from its glistening, seems to have been +compounded with some metallic substance like fine gold-dust. The border +of the print consists of a similar yellow, between plain black lines. +The face is printed in flesh colour of three tints, and the head is +surrounded with rays of glory, which appear like gilding. The engraving +of the face, and of the hair of the head and beard, is extremely well +executed, and much superior to anything that I have seen in wood-cuts +containing Ungher’s mark. The globe is blue, with the lights preserved, +intersected by light red and yellow lines; and the small cross at the +top is also yellow, like the light on the red mantle. The hands and feet +are expressed in their proper colours; the ground on which the Redeemer +stands is something between a lake and a fawn colour; and the ground of +the print, upwards from about an inch above the bottom, is of a lighter +blue than the robe. To the right, near the bottom, are the date and +mark, thus: +<span class = "figfloat"> +<a name = "illus_404" id = "illus_404"> +<img src = "images/illus_404.png" width = "71" height = "57" +alt = "see text"></a></span> +The figure like a winged serpent resembles a mark which was frequently +used by Lucas Cranach, except that the serpent or dragon of the latter +appears less crooked, and usually has a ring in its mouth. The letter +underneath also appears rather more like an I than an L. The +drawing of the figure of Christ, however, is very much in the style of +Lucas Cranach, and I am strongly inclined to think that the original +painting or drawing was executed by him, whoever may have been the +engraver. There must have been at least ten blocks required for this +curious print, which, for clearness and distinctness in the colours, and +for delicacy of impression, more especially in the face, may challenge a +comparison not only with the finest chiaro-scuros of former times, but +also with the best specimens of coloured block-printing of the present +day.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI78" id = "tagVI78" href = +"#noteVI78">VI.78</a></p> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page405" id = "page405"> +405</a></span> +<p>In 1557, Hubert Goltzius, a painter, but better known as an author +than as an artist, published at Antwerp, in folio, a work +containing portraits, executed in chiaro-scuro, of the Roman emperors, +from Julius Cæsar to Ferdinand I.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI79" +id = "tagVI79" href = "#noteVI79">VI.79</a> Descamps, in his work +entitled “La Vie des Peintres Flamands, Allemands et Hollandois,” says +that those portraits, which are all copied from medals, were “engraved +on wood by a painter of Courtrai, named Joseph Gietleughen;”<a class = +"tag" name = "tagVI80" id = "tagVI80" href = "#noteVI80">VI.80</a> and +Papillon, who had examined the work more closely, but not closely +enough, says that the outlines are etched, and that the two +<i>rentrées</i>—the subsequent impressions which give to the whole +the appearance of a chiaro-scuro drawing—are from blocks of wood +engraved in <i>intaglio</i>. What Papillon says about the outlines being +etched is true; but a close inspection of those portraits will afford +any person acquainted with the process ample proof of the “rentrées” +being also printed from plates of metal in the same manner as from +engraved wood-blocks.</p> + +<p>Each of those portraits appears like an enlarged copy of a medal, and +is the result of three separate impressions; the first, containing the +outlines of the head, the ornaments, and the name, has been printed from +an etched plate of copper or some other metal, by means of a +copper-plate printing-press; and the two other impressions, over the +first, have also been from plates of metal, mounted on blocks of wood, +and printed by means of the common typographic printing-press. The +outlines of the head and of the letters forming the legend are black; +the field of the medal is a muddy kind of sepia; and the head and the +border, printed from the same surface and at the same time, are of a +lighter shade. The lights to be preserved have been cut in +<i>intaglio</i> in the plates for the two “rentrées” in the same manner +as on blocks of wood for printing in chiaro-scuro. The marks of the pins +by which the two plates for the “rentrées” have been fastened to blocks +of wood, to raise them to a proper height, are very perceptible; in the +field of the medal they appear like circular points, generally in pairs; +while round the outer margin they are mostly of a square form. It is +difficult to conceive what advantage Goltzius might expect to derive by +printing the “rentrées” from metal plates; for all that he has thus +produced could have been more simply effected by means of wood-blocks, +as practised up to that time by all other chiaro-scuro engravers. Though +those portraits possess but little merit as chiaro-scuros, they are yet +highly interesting in the history of art, as affording the first +instances of +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page406" id = "page406"> +406</a></span> +etching being employed for the outlines of a chiaro-scuro, and of the +substitution, in surface-printing, of a plate of metal for a wood-block. +Goltzius’s manner of etching the outlines of a chiaro-scuro print was +frequently practised both by French and English artists about the middle +of the last century; and about 1722, Edward Kirkall engraved the +principal parts of his chiaro-scuros in mezzo-tint, and afterwards +printed a tint from a metal plate mounted on wood. In the present day +Mr. George Baxter has successfully applied the principle of engraving +the ground and the outlines of his subjects in aqua-tint; and, as in the +case of Hubert Goltzius and Kirkall, he sometimes uses a metal-plate +instead of a wood-block in surface-printing. In the picture-prints +executed by Mr. Baxter for the Pictorial Album, 1837, the tint of the +paper on which each imitative painting appears to be mounted, is +communicated from a smooth plate of copper, which receives the colour, +and is printed in the same manner as a wood-block.</p> + +<p>Among the German artists who made designs for wood engravers from the +time of Durer to about 1590, Erhard Schön, Virgil Solis, Melchior +Lorich, and Jost Amman may be considered as the principal. They are all +frequently described as wood engravers from the circumstance of their +marks being found on the cuts which they undoubtedly designed, but most +certainly did not engrave. Erhard Schön chiefly resided at Nuremberg; +and some of the earliest cuts of his designing are dated 1528. In 1538 +he published at Nuremberg a small treatise, in oblong quarto, on the +proportions of the human figure, for the use of students and young +persons.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI81" id = "tagVI81" href = +"#noteVI81">VI.81</a> This work contains several wood-cuts, all coarsely +engraved, illustrative of the writer’s precepts; two or three of +them—where the heads and bodies are represented by squares and +rhomboidal figures—are extremely curious, though apparently not +very well adapted to improve a learner in the art of design. Another of +the cuts, where the proportions are illustrated by means of a figure +inscribed within a circle, is very like one of the illustrations +contained in Flaxman’s Lectures on Sculpture. Some cuts of +playing-cards, designed by Schön, are in greater request than any of his +other works engraved on wood, which, for the most part, have but little +to recommend them. He died about 1550.</p> + +<p>Virgil Solis, a painter, copper-plate engraver, and designer on wood, +was born at Nuremberg about 1514. The cuts which contain his mark are +extremely numerous; and, from their being mostly of small size, he is +ranked by Heineken with the “Little Masters.” Several of his cuts +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page407" id = "page407"> +407</a></span> +display great fertility of invention; but though his figures are +frequently spirited and the attitudes good, yet his drawing is generally +careless and incorrect. As a considerable number of his cuts are of the +same kind as those of Bernard Solomon, it seems as if there had been a +competition at that time between the booksellers of Nuremberg and those +of Lyons for supplying the European market with illustrations of two +works of widely different character, to wit, the Bible, and Ovid’s +Metamorphoses,—Virgil Solis being retained for the German, and +Bernard Solomon for the French publishers. He designed the cuts in a +German edition of the Bible, printed in 1560; most of the portraits of +the Kings of France in a work published at Nuremberg in 1566; +a series of cuts for Esop’s fables; and the illustrations of an +edition of Reusner’s Emblems. Several cuts with the mark of Virgil Solis +are to be found in the first edition of Archbishop Parker’s Bible, +printed by Richard Jugge, folio, London, 1568. In the second edition, +1572, there are two ornamented initial letters, apparently of his +designing, which seem to show that his sacred and profane subjects were +liable to be confounded, and that cuts originally designed for an +edition of Ovid might by some singular oversight be used in an edition +of the Bible, although printed under the especial superintendence of a +Right Reverend Archbishop. In the letter G, which forms the commencement +of the first chapter of St. Paul’s Epistle to the Hebrews, the subject +represented by the artist is Leda caressed by Jupiter in the form of a +swan; and in the letter T at the commencement of the first chapter of +the Epistle General of St. John, the subject is Venus before Jove, with +Cupid, Juno, Mars, Neptune, and other Heathen deities in attendance.<a +class = "tag" name = "tagVI82" id = "tagVI82" href = +"#noteVI82">VI.82</a></p> + +<p>A series of wood-cuts designed by Virgil Solis, illustrative of +Ovid’s Metamorphoses, was published at Frankfort, in oblong quarto, by +George Corvinus, Sigismund Feyerabend, and the heirs of Wigand Gallus, +in 1569. Each cut is surrounded by a heavy ornamental border; above each +are four verses in Latin, and underneath four in German, composed by +Johannes Posthius, descriptive of the subject. In the title-page,<a +class = "tag" name = "tagVI83" id = "tagVI83" href = +"#noteVI83">VI.83</a> which is both in Latin and in German, it is stated +that they are <i>designed</i>—<i>gerissen</i>—by Virgil +Solis for the use and benefit of painters, goldsmiths, and statuaries. +It is thus evident that they were not engraved by him; and in +corroboration of this opinion it may be observed that several +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page408" id = "page408"> +408</a></span> +of them, in addition to his mark, <img class = "middle" src = +"images/illus_408a.png" width = "27" height = "18" alt = "symbol">, also +contain another, <img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_408b.png" +width = "20" height = "20" alt = "symbol">, which is doubtless that of +the wood engraver. The latter mark occurs frequently in the cuts +designed by Virgil Solis, in the first edition of Archbishop Parker’s +Bible.</p> + +<p>Evelyn, in his Sculptura, has the following notice of this artist: +“Virgilius Solis graved also in wood <i>The story of the Bible</i> and +<i>The mechanic arts</i> in little; but for imitating those vile +postures of Aretine had his eyes put out by the sentence of the +magistrate.” There is scarcely a page of this writer’s works on art +which does not contain similar inaccuracies, and yet he is frequently +quoted and referred to as an authority. The “mechanic arts” to which +Evelyn alludes were probably the series of cuts designed by Jost Amman, +and first published in quarto, at Frankfort, in 1564; and the improbable +story of Virgil Solis having had his eyes put out for copying Julio +Romano’s obscene designs, engraved by Marc Antonio, and illustrated with +sonnets by the scurrilous ribald, Pietro Aretine, is utterly devoid of +foundation. No such copies have ever been mentioned by any well-informed +writer on art, and there is not the slightest evidence of Virgil Solis +ever having been punished in any manner by the magistrates of his native +city, Nuremberg, where he died in 1570.</p> + +<p>Wood-cuts with the mark of Melchior Lorich are comparatively scarce. +He was a native of Flensburg in Holstein, and was born in 1527. He +obtained a knowledge of painting and copper-plate engraving at Leipsic, +and afterwards travelled with his master through some of the northern +countries of Europe. He afterwards visited Vienna, and subsequently +entered into the service of the Palsgrave Otho, in whose suite he +visited Holland, France, and Italy. In 1558 he went with the Imperial +ambassador to Constantinople, where he remained three years. His +principal works engraved on wood consist of a series of illustrations of +the manners and customs of the Turks, published about 1570. There is a +very clever cut, a Lady splendidly dressed, with his mark and the +date 1551; it is printed on what is called a “broadside,” and underneath +is a copy of verses by Hans Sachs, the celebrated shoemaker and +<i>meistersänger</i> of Nuremberg,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI84" id = +"tagVI84" href = "#noteVI84">VI.84</a> entitled “<i>Eer und Lob einer +schön wolgezierten Frawen</i>”—The Honour and Praise of a +beautiful well-dressed woman. A large cut of the Deluge, in two +sheets, is +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page409" id = "page409"> +409</a></span> +considered one of the best of his designing. Among the copper-plates +engraved by Melchior Lorich, a portrait of Albert Durer, and two +others, of the Grand Signior and his favourite Sultana, are among the +most scarce. The time of his death is uncertain, but Bartsch thinks that +he was still living in 1583, as there are wood-cuts with his mark of +that date.</p> + +<p>Jost Amman, one of the best designers on wood of the period in which +he lived, was born at Zurich in 1539, but removed to Nuremberg about +1560.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI85" id = "tagVI85" href = +"#noteVI85">VI.85</a> His designs are more bold, and display more of the +vigour of the older German masters, than those of his contemporary +Virgil Solis. A series of cuts designed by him, illustrative of +professions and trades, was published in 1564, quarto, with the title +“Hans Sachse eigentliche Beschreibung aller Stände auf Erden—aller +Künste und Handwerker,” &c.—that is, Hans Sachs’s correct +Description of all Ranks, Arts, and Trades; and another edition in +duodecimo, with the descriptions in Latin, appeared in the same year.<a +class = "tag" name = "tagVI86" id = "tagVI86" href = +"#noteVI86">VI.86</a> For the correctness of the date of those editions +I am obliged to rely on Heineken, as I have never seen a copy of either; +the earliest edition with Hans Sachs’s descriptions that has come under +my notice is dated 1574. In a duodecimo edition, 1568, and another of +the same size, 1574, the descriptions, by Hartman Schopper, are in Latin +verse.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI87" id = "tagVI87" href = +"#noteVI87">VI.87</a> This is perhaps the most curious and interesting +series of cuts, exhibiting the various ranks and employments of men, +that ever was published. Among the higher orders, constituting what the +Germans call the “<i>Lehre und Wehr Stande</i>”—teachers and +warriors—are the Pope, Emperor, King, Princes, Nobles, Priests, +and Lawyers; while almost every branch of labour or of trade then known +in Germany, from agriculture to pin-making, has its representative. +There are also not a few which it would be difficult to reduce to any +distinct class, as they are neither trades nor honest professions. Of +those heteroclytes is the “Meretricum procurator—der +Hurenweibel”—or, as Captain Dugald Dalgetty says, “the captain of +the Queans.”</p> + +<p>The subject of the following cut, which is of the same size as the +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page410" id = "page410"> +410</a></span> +original, is a <i>Briefmaler</i>,—literally, a card-painter, +the name by which the German wood engravers were known before they +adopted the more appropriate one of <i>Formschneider</i>. It is evident, +that, at the time when the cut was engraved, the two professions were +distinct:<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI88" id = "tagVI88" href = +"#noteVI88">VI.88</a> we here perceive the Briefmaler employed, not in +engraving cuts, but engaged in colouring certain figures by means of a +<i>stencil</i>,—that is, a card or thin plate of metal, out +of which the intended figure is cut. A brush charged with colour +being drawn over the pierced card, as is seen in the cut, the figure is +communicated to the paper placed underneath. The little shallow vessels +perceived on the top of the large box in front are the saucers which +contain his colours. Near the window, immediately to his right, is a +pile of sheets which, from the figure of a man on horseback seen +impressed upon them, appear to be already finished.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_410" id = "illus_410"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_410.png" width = "236" height = "313" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>The subject of the following cut, from the same work, is a +<i>Formschneider</i>, or wood engraver proper. He is apparently at work +on a block which he has before him; but the kind of tool which he +employs is not exactly like those used by English wood engravers +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page411" id = "page411"> +411</a></span> +of the present day. It seems to resemble a small long-handled +desk-knife; while the tool of the modern wood engraver has a handle +which is rounded at the top in order to accommodate it to the palm of +the hand. It is also never held vertically, as it appears in the hand of +the <i>Formschneider</i>. It is, however, certain, from other woodcuts, +which will be subsequently noticed, that the wood engravers of that +period were accustomed to use a tool with a handle rounded at the top, +similar to the graver used in the present day.<a class = "tag" name = +"tagVI89" id = "tagVI89" href = "#noteVI89">VI.89</a>—The verses +descriptive of the annexed cut are translated from Hans Sachs.</p> + +<div class = "picture w250"> +<p><a name = "illus_411" id = "illus_411"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_411.png" width = "236" height = "314" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p>I am a wood-engraver good,</p> +<p>And all designs on blocks of wood</p> +<p>I with my graver cut so neat,</p> +<p>That when they’re printed on a sheet</p> +<p>Of paper white, you plainly view</p> +<p>The very forms the artist drew:</p> +<p>His drawing, whether coarse or fine,</p> +<p>Is truly copied line for line.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p>Jost Amman died in 1591, and from the time of his settling at +Nuremberg to that of his decease he seems to have been chiefly employed +in making designs on wood for the booksellers of Nuremberg and +Frankfort. He also furnished designs for goldsmiths; and +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page412" id = "page412"> +412</a></span> +it is said that he excelled as a painter on glass. The works which +afford the best specimens of his talents as a designer on wood are those +illustrative of the costume of the period, first published between 1580 +and 1585 by S. Feyerabend at Frankfort. One of those works contains +the costumes of men of all ranks, except the clergy, interspersed with +the armorial bearings of the principal families in Germany; another +contains the costume of the different orders of the priesthood of the +church of Rome; and a third, entitled Gynæceum sive Theatrum Mulierum, +is illustrative of the costume of women of all ranks in Europe. +A work on hunting and fowling, edited by J. A. Lonicerus, and +printed in 1582, contains about forty excellent cuts of his designing. +A separate volume, consisting of cuts selected from the four +preceding works, and of a number of other cuts chiefly illustrative of +mythological subjects and of the costume of Turkey, was published by +Feyerabend about 1590. In a subsequent edition of this work, printed in +1599, it is stated that the collection is published for the especial +benefit of painters and amateurs.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI90" id = +"tagVI90" href = "#noteVI90">VI.90</a> Among the numerous other cuts +designed by him, the following may be mentioned: illustrations for a +Bible published at Frankfort 1565; a series of subjects from Roman +History, entitled Icones Livianæ, 1572; and the cuts in an edition of +Reynard the Fox. The works of Jost Amman have proved a mine for +succeeding artists; his figures were frequently copied by wood engravers +in France, Italy and Flanders; and even some modern English paintings +contain evidences of the artist having borrowed something more than a +hint from the figures of Jost Amman.</p> + +<p>Jost Amman was undoubtedly one of the best professional designers on +wood of his time; and his style bears considerable resemblance to that +of Hans Burgmair as exemplified in the Triumphs of Maximilian. Many of +his figures are well drawn; but even in the best of his subjects the +attitudes are somewhat affected and generally too violent; and this, +with an overstrained expression, makes his characters appear more like +actors in a theatre than like real personages. In the cuts of the horse +in the “Kunstbüchlein” the action of the animal is frequently +represented with great spirit: but in points of detail the +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page413" id = "page413"> +413</a></span> +artist is as frequently incorrect. Some of his very best designs are to +be found among his equestrian subjects. His men generally have a good +“seat,” and his ladies seem to manage their heavy long-tailed steeds +with great ease and grace.</p> + +<p>Several of the views of cities, in Sebastian Munster’s +Cosmography—first published in folio, at Basle, 1550—contain +two marks, one of the designer, and the other of the person by whom the +subject was engraved, the latter being frequently accompanied by a +graver, thus: <img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_413a.png" width += "39" height = "23" alt = "H·H">; or with two gravers of different +kinds, thus: <img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_413b.png" width = +"69" height = "42" alt = "·C·S·"> This last mark, which also occurs in +Jost Amman’s Kunstbüchlein, is said to be that of Christopher Stimmer, +a brother of Tobias Stimmer, a Swiss artist, who is generally +described as a designer and engraver on wood. The cuts with the former +mark have been ascribed to Hans Holbein, but they bear not the least +resemblance to his style of design, and they have been assigned to him +solely on account of the letters corresponding with the initials of his +name. Professor Christ’s Dictionary of Monograms, and Papillon’s +Treatise on Wood-engraving, afford numerous instances of marks being +assigned to persons on no better grounds.</p> + +<p>A writer, in discussing the question, “Were Albert Durer, Lucas +Cranach, Hans Burgmair, and other old German artists, the engravers or +only the designers of the cuts which bear their mark?” has been pleased +to assert that the mark of the actual engraver is usually distinguished +by the graver with which it is accompanied. This statement has been +adopted and further disseminated by others; and many persons who have +not an opportunity of judging for themselves, and who receive with +implicit credit whatever they find asserted in a Dictionary of +Engravers, suppose that from the time of Albert Durer, or even earlier, +the figure of a graver generally distinguishes the mark of the +<i>formschneider</i> or engraver on wood. So far, however, from this +being a general rule, I am not aware of any wood-cut which contains +a graver in addition to a mark of an earlier date than those in +Munster’s Cosmography, and the practice which appears to have been first +introduced about that time never became generally prevalent. When the +graver is thus introduced there can be no doubt that it is intended to +distinguish the mark of the engraver; but as at least ninety-nine out of +every hundred marks on cuts executed between 1550 and 1600 are +unaccompanied with a graver, it is exceedingly doubtful in most cases +whether the mark be that of the engraver or the designer.</p> + +<p>The wood-cuts in Munster’s Cosmography are generally poor in design +and coarse in execution. One of the best is that representing an +encounter of two armed men on horseback with the mark <img class = +"middle" src = "images/illus_413c.png" width = "27" height = "24" alt = +"symbol">, which also occurs in some of the cuts in Gesner’s History of +Animals, printed +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page414" id = "page414"> +414</a></span> +at Zurich, 1551-1558. This cut, as well as several others, is repeated +in another part of the book, in the manner of the Nuremberg Chronicle, +where the same portrait or the same view is used to represent several +different persons or places. The cuts are not precisely the same in +every edition of Munster’s work, which was several times reprinted +between 1550 and 1570. Those which are substituted in the later editions +are rather more neatly engraved.</p> + +<p>The present cut is copied from one at page 49 of the first edition, +where it is given as an illustration of a wonderful kind of tree said to +be found in Scotland, and from the fruit of which it was believed that +geese were produced. Munster’s account of this wonderful tree and its +fruit is as follows; “In Scotland are found trees, the fruit of which +appears like a ball of leaves. This fruit, falling at its proper time +into the water below, becomes animated, and turns to a bird which they +call the <i>tree goose</i>. This tree also grows in the island of Pomona +[the largest of the Orkneys], not far distant from Scotland towards the +north. As old cosmographers—especially Saxo +Grammaticus—mention this tree, it is not to be considered as a +fiction of modern authors. Aeneas Sylvius also notices this tree as +follows: ‘We have heard that there was a tree formerly in Scotland, +which, growing by the margin of a stream, produced fruit of the shape of +ducks; that such fruit, when nearly ripe, fell, some into the water and +some on land. Such as fell on land decayed, but such as fell into the +water quickly became animated, swimming below, and then flying into the +air with feathers and wings. +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page415" id = "page415"> +415</a></span> +When in Scotland, having made diligent inquiry concerning this matter of +King James, a square-built man, and very fat,<a class = "tag" name += "tagVI91" id = "tagVI91" href = "#noteVI91">VI.91</a> we found that +miracles always kept receding;—this wonderful tree is not found in +Scotland, but in the Orcades.’”</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_414" id = "illus_414"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_414.png" width = "288" height = "273" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>The bird said to be the produce of this tree is the “Bernacle Goose, +Clakis, or Tree Goose” of Bewick; and the pretended <i>tree</i> from +which it was supposed to be produced was undoubtedly a testaceous +insect, a species of which, frequently found adhering to ships’ +bottoms, is described under the name of “Lepas <i>Anatifera</i>” by +Linnæus, who thus commemorates in the trivial name the old opinion +respecting its winged and feathered fruit. William Turner, a native +of Morpeth in Northumberland, one of the earliest writers on British +Ornithology, notices the story of the Bernacle Goose being produced from +“something like a fungus proceeding from old wood lying in the sea.” He +says it is mentioned by Giraldus Cambrensis in his description of +Ireland, and that the account of its being generated in this wonderful +manner is generally believed by the people inhabiting the sea-coasts of +England, Scotland, and Ireland. “But,” says Turner, “as it seemed not +safe to trust to popular report, and as, on account of the singularity +of the thing, I could not give entire credit to Giraldus, I, when +thinking of the subject of which I now write, asked a certain clergyman, +named Octavianus, by birth an Irishman, whom I knew to be worthy of +credit, if he thought the account of Giraldus was to be believed. He, +swearing by the Gospel, declared that what Giraldus had written about +the generation of this bird was most true; that he himself had seen and +handled the young unformed birds, and that if I should remain in London +a month or two, he would bring me some of the brood.”<a class = "tag" +name = "tagVI92" id = "tagVI92" href = "#noteVI92">VI.92</a> In Lobel +and Pena’s Stirpium Adversaria Nova, folio, London, 1570, there is a cut +of the “Britannica Concha Anatifera,” growing on a stalk from a rock, +with figures of ducks or geese in the water below. In the text the +popular belief of a kind of goose being produced from the shell of this +insect is noticed, but the writer declines pronouncing any opinion till +he shall have had an opportunity of visiting Scotland and judging for +himself. Gerard, in his Herbal, London, 1597, has an article on the +<i>Goose-tree</i>; and he says that its native soil is a small island, +called the Pile of Fouldres, half a mile from the main land of +Lancashire. Ferrer +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page416" id = "page416"> +416</a></span> +de Valcebro, a Spanish writer, in a work entitled “El Gobierno +general hallado en las Aves,” with coarse wood-cuts, quarto, printed +about 1680, repeats, with sundry additions, the story of the Bernacle, +or, as he calls it, the Barliata, being produced from a tree; and he +seems rather displeased that his countrymen are not disposed to yield +much faith to such singularities, merely because they do not occur in +their own country.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_416" id = "illus_416"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_416.png" width = "341" height = "309" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>There are two portraits of Erasmus in the first edition of Munster’s +Cosmography, one at page 130, and the other, with the mark <img class = +"middle" src = "images/illus_416b.png" width = "45" height = "14" alt = +"HRMD">, at page 407. The latter, as the author especially informs the +reader, was engraved after a portrait by Holbein in the possession of +Bonifacius Amerbach. The present is a reduced copy of a cut at page 361 +of Henry Petri’s edition, 1554. On a stone, near the bottom, towards the +left, is seen a mark<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI93" id = "tagVI93" +href = "#noteVI93">VI.93</a>—probably that of the artist who made +the drawing on the block—consisting of the same letters as the +double mark just noticed as occurring in the portrait of Erasmus, +H.R. M.D. A cut +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page417" id = "page417"> +417</a></span> +of the same subject, William Tell about to shoot at the apple on his +son’s head, was given in the first edition, but the design is somewhat +different and the execution more coarse. The cut from which the +preceding is copied may be ranked among the best in the work.</p> + +<p>Though Sebastian Munster, in a letter, probably written in 1538, +addressed to Joachim Vadianus, alludes to an improvement which he and +his printer had made in the mode of printing maps, and to a project for +casting complete words, yet the maps which appear in his Cosmography, +with the outlines, rivers, and mountains engraved on wood, and the names +inserted in type, are certainly not superior to the generality of other +maps executed wholly on wood about the same period.<a class = "tag" name += "tagVI94" id = "tagVI94" href = "#noteVI94">VI.94</a> Joachim +Vadianus, to whom Munster writes, and of whose assistance he wished to +avail himself in a projected edition of Ptolemy, was an eminent scholar +of that period, and had published an edition, in 1522, of Pomponius +Mela, with a commentary and notes. The passage in Munster’s letter, +wherein maps are mentioned, is to the following effect: “I would +have sent you an impression of one of the Swiss maps which I have had +printed here, if Froschover had not informed me of his having sent you +one from Zurich. If this mode of printing should succeed tolerably well, +and when we shall have acquired a certain art of <i>casting whole +words</i>, Henri Petri, Michael Isengrin, and I have thought of printing +Ptolemy’s Cosmography; not of so great a size as it has hitherto been +frequently printed, but in the form in which your Annotations on +Pomponius appear. In the maps we shall insert only the names of the +principal cities, and give the others alphabetically in some blank +space,—for instance, in the margin or any adjoining space beyond +the limits of the map.”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI95" id = "tagVI95" +href = "#noteVI95">VI.95</a> The art of casting whole words, alluded to +in this passage, appears to have been something like an attempt at what +has been called “logographic printing;”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI96" +id = "tagVI96" href = "#noteVI96">VI.96</a> though it is not unlikely +that +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page418" id = "page418"> +418</a></span> +those “whole words” might be the names of countries and places intended +to be inserted in a space cut out of the block on which the map was +engraved. By thus inserting the names, either cast as complete words, or +composed of separate letters, the tedious process of engraving a number +of letters on wood was avoided, and the pressman enabled to print the +maps at one impression. In some of the earlier maps where the names are +printed from types, the letters were not inserted in spaces cut out of +the block, but were printed from a separate form by means of a +“re-iteration” or second impression.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI97" id += "tagVI97" href = "#noteVI97">VI.97</a> In illustration of what Munster +says about a certain art of casting whole words,—“<i>artem aliquam +fundendarum integrarum dictionum</i>,”—the following extract is +given from Dr. Dibdin’s Bibliographical Tour, volume iii. page 102, +second edition. “What think you of undoubted proofs of <span class = +"smallroman">STEREOTYPE PRINTING</span> in the middle of the sixteenth +century? It is even so. What adds to the whimsical puzzle is, that these +pieces of metal, of which the surface is composed of types, fixed and +immovable, are sometimes inserted in wooden blocks, and introduced as +titles, mottoes, or descriptions of the subjects cut upon the blocks. +Professor May [of Augsburg] begged my acceptance of a specimen or two of +the types thus fixed upon plates of the same metal. They rarely exceeded +the height of four or five lines of text, by about four or five inches +in length. I carried away, with his permission, two proofs (not +long ago pulled) of the same block containing this intermixture of +stereotype and wood-block printing.”</p> + +<p>As the engraving of the letters in maps executed on wood—or +indeed on any other material—is, when the names of many places are +given, by far the most tedious and costly part of the process, the plan +of inserting them in type by means of holes pierced in the block, as +adopted +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page419" id = "page419"> +419</a></span> +in Munster’s Cosmography, was certainly a great saving of labour; yet on +comparing the maps in this work with those in Ptolemy’s Cosmography, +printed by Leonard Holl, at Ulm, 1482, and with others engraved in the +early part of the sixteenth century, it is impossible not to perceive +that the art of wood engraving, as applied to the execution of such +works, had undergone no improvement: with the exception of the letters, +the maps in Holl’s Ptolemy—the earliest that were engraved on +wood—are, in point of appearance, equal to those in the work of +Munster, published about eighty years later. Considering that the +earliest printed maps—those in an edition of Ptolemy, printed by +Arnold Bukinck, at Rome, 1478<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI98" id = +"tagVI98" href = "#noteVI98">VI.98</a>—are from copper-plates, it +seems rather surprising that, until about 1570, no further attempt +should have been made to apply the art of engraving on copper to this +purpose. In the latter year a collection of maps, engraved on copper,<a +class = "tag" name = "tagVI99" id = "tagVI99" href = +"#noteVI99">VI.99</a> was published at Antwerp under the superintendence +of Abraham Ortelius; and so great was their excellence when compared +with former maps executed on wood, that the business of map engraving +was within a few years transferred almost exclusively to engravers on +copper. In 1572 a map engraved on copper was printed in England, in the +second edition of Archbishop Parker’s Bible. It is of folio size, and +the country represented is the Holy Land. Within an ornamented tablet is +the following inscription: “Graven bi Humfray Cole, goldsmith, an +English man born in y<sup>e</sup> north, and pertayning to y<sup>e</sup> +mint in the Tower. 1572.” In Walpole’s Catalogue of Engravers the +portraits engraved on copper of Queen Elizabeth, the Earl of Leicester, +and Lord Burleigh, which appear in the first edition of Archbishop +Parker’s Bible, 1568,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI100" id = "tagVI100" +href = "#noteVI100">VI.100</a> are ascribed to Humphrey Cole, apparently +on no better ground than that his name appears as the engraver of the +map, which is given in the second. If Cole were really the engraver of +those portraits, he was certainly entitled to a more favourable notice<a +class = "tag" name = "tagVI101" id = "tagVI101" href = +"#noteVI101">VI.101</a> than he +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page420" id = "page420"> +420</a></span> +receives from the fastidious compiler of the “Catalogue of Engravers who +have been born or resided in England;” for, considering <i>when</i> and +<i>where</i> they were executed, the engraver is entitled to rank at +least as high as George Vertue. In fact, the portrait of Leicester, +considered merely as a specimen of engraving, without regard to the time +and place of its execution, will bear a comparison with more than one of +the portraits engraved by Vertue upwards of a hundred and fifty years +later.</p> + +<p>The advantages of copper-plate engraving for the purpose of executing +maps, as exemplified in the work of Ortelius, appear to have been +immediately appreciated in England, and this country is one of the first +that can boast of a collection of provincial or county maps engraved on +copper. A series of maps of all the counties of England and Wales, +and of the adjacent islands, were engraved, under the superintendence of +Christopher Saxton, between 1573 and 1579, and published at London, in a +folio volume, in the latter year. Though the greater number of those +maps were the work of Flemish engravers, eight, at least, were engraved +by two Englishmen, Augustine Ryther and Nicholas Reynolds.<a class = +"tag" name = "tagVI102" id = "tagVI102" href = "#noteVI102">VI.102</a> +They appear to have been all drawn by Christopher Saxton, who lived at +Tingley, near Leeds. Walpole says, that “he was servant to Thomas +Sekeford, Esq. Master of the Court of Wards,” the gentleman at whose +expense they were engraved. He also states that many of them were +engraved by Saxton himself; but this I consider to be extremely +doubtful. In his account of early English copper-plate engravers, +Walpole is frequently incorrect: he mentions Humphrey Lhuyd—an +author who wrote a short description of Britain, printed at Cologne in +1572<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI103" id = "tagVI103" href = +"#noteVI103">VI.103</a>—as the <i>engraver</i> of the map of +England in the collection of Ortelius; and he includes Dr. William +Cuningham, a physician of Norwich, in his catalogue of engravers, +without the slightest reason beyond the mere fact, that a book entitled +“The Cosmographical +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page421" id = "page421"> +421</a></span> +Glasse,” written by the Doctor, and printed in 1559, contains several +<i>wood-cuts</i>. He might, with equal justice, have placed Archbishop +Parker in his catalogue, and asserted that some of the <i>plates</i> in +the Bible were “engraved by his own hand.”</p> + +<p>In connexion with the preceding account of the earliest maps executed +in England on copper, it perhaps may not be unnecessary to briefly +notice here the introduction of copper-plate engraving into this +country. According to Herbert, in his edition of Ames’s Typographical +Antiquities, the frontispiece of a small work entitled “Galenus de +Temperamentis,” printed at Cambridge, 1521, is the earliest specimen of +copper-plate engraving that is to be found in any book printed in +England. The art, however, supposing that the plate was really engraved +and printed in this country, appears to have received no encouragement +on its first introduction, for after this first essay it seems to have +lain dormant for nearly twenty years. The next earliest specimens appear +in the first edition of a work usually called “Raynalde’s Birth of +Mankind,” printed at London in 1540.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI104" +id = "tagVI104" href = "#noteVI104">VI.104</a> This work, which is a +treatise on the obstetric art, contains, when perfect, three plates, +illustrative of the subject. Not having had an opportunity of seeing any +one of these three plates nor the frontispiece to “Galenus de +Temperamentis,” I am obliged to trust to Herbert for the fact of +their being engraved on copper. In the third volume of his edition of +Ames, page 1411, there is a fac-simile of the frontispiece to the +Cambridge book; and in the Preliminary Disquisition on Early Engraving +and Ornamental Printing, prefixed to Dr. Dibdin’s edition of the +Typographical Antiquities, will be found a fac-simile, engraved on wood, +of one of the plates in Raynalde’s Birth of Mankind. In an edition of +the latter work, printed in 1565, the “byrthe figures” are not engraved +on copper, but on wood.</p> + +<p>A work printed in London by John Hereford, 1545, contains several +unquestionable specimens of copper-plate engraving. It is of folio size, +and the title is as follows: “Compendiosa totius Anatomiæ delineatio ære +exarata, per Thomam Geminum.” The ornamental title-page, with the arms +of Henry VIII. towards the centre, is engraved on copper, and several +anatomical subjects are executed in the same manner. +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page422" id = "page422"> +422</a></span> +Gemini, who is believed to have been the engraver of those plates, was +not a native of this country.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI105" id = +"tagVI105" href = "#noteVI105">VI.105</a> In a dedication to Henry VIII, +he says that in his work he had followed Andrew Vesalius of Brussels; +and he further mentions that in the year before he had received orders +from the King to have the plates printed off [<i>excudendas</i>]. A +second edition, dedicated to Edward VI, appeared in 1553; and a third, +dedicated to Queen Elizabeth, in 1559.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI106" +id = "tagVI106" href = "#noteVI106">VI.106</a> In the last edition the +Royal Arms on the title-page are effaced, and the portrait of Queen +Elizabeth engraved in their stead. Traces of the former subject are, +however, still visible, and the motto, “Dieu et mon Droit,” has been +allowed to remain. One of the engravings in this work affords a curious +instance of the original plate of copper having been either mended or +enlarged by joining another piece to it. Even in the first edition, the +zigzag line where the two pieces are joined, and the forms of the little +<i>cramps</i> which hold them together, are visible, and in the last +they are distinctly apparent.</p> + +<p>The earliest portrait engraved on copper, printed singly, in this +country, and not as an illustration of a book, is that of Archbishop +Parker engraved by Remigius Hogenberg. It is a small print four and a +half inches high by three and a half wide. At the corners are the arms +of Canterbury, impaled with those of Parker; the archbishop’s arms +separately; a plain shield, with a cross and the letters <img class += "middle" src = "images/illus_422.png" width = "8" height = "19" alt = +"IX">; and the arms of Archbishop Cranmer. The portrait is engraved in +an oval, round the border of which is the following inscription: “Mūdus +transit, et cupiscētia ejus. Anno Domini 1572, ætatis suæ Anno 69. Die +mensis Augusti sexto.” In an impression, now before me, from the +original plate, the date and the archbishop’s age are altered to 1573 +and 70, but the marks of the ciphers erased are quite perceptible. The +portrait of the archbishop is a half-length; he is seated at a table, on +which are a bell, a small coffer, and what appears to be a stamp. +A Bible is lying open before him, and on one of the pages is +inscribed in very small letters the following passage from the <span +class = "smallroman">VI.</span> chapter of Micah, verse 8: +“Indicabo tibi, o homo, quid sit bonum, et quid Deus requirat a te, +utique facere judicium, et diligere misericordiam, et solicitum ambulare +cum Deo tuo.” The engraver’s name, “<i>R. Berg f.</i>,” appears at +the bottom of the print to the right: a cross line from the R to +the B indicates the abbreviation of the surname, which, written at +length, was +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page423" id = "page423"> +423</a></span> +<i>Hogenberg</i>. Caulfield, speaking of this engraving in his +Calcographiana, page 4, 1814, says,—“The only impression supposed +to be extant is in the library at Lambeth Palace; but within the last +two years, Mr. Woodburn, of St. Martin’s Lane, purchased a magnificent +collection of portraits, among which was a very fine one of Parker.”</p> + +<p>The number of books, containing copper-plate engravings, published in +England between 1559 and 1600, is extremely limited; and the following +list will perhaps be found to contain one or two more than have been +mentioned by preceding writers: 1. Pena and Lobel’s Stirpium +Adversaria Nova, folio, 1570,—ornamented title-page, with the arms +of England at the top, and a small map towards the bottom:—the +ornaments surrounding the map are very beautifully engraved. +2. Archbishop Parker’s Bible, 1568-1572, with the portraits, +previously noticed at page 419. 3. Saxton’s Maps, with the portrait +of Queen Elizabeth on the title, 1579. 4. Broughton’s Concent of +Scripture, 1591,—engraved title, and four other plates. +5. Translation of Ariosto by Sir John Harrington, +1591,—engraved title-page, containing portraits of the author and +translator, and forty-six other plates. 6. R. Haydock’s Translation +of Lomazzo’s Treatise on Painting and Architecture, Oxford, +1598,—engraved title-page, containing portraits of Lomazzo and +Haydock, and several very indifferent plates, chiefly of architecture +and figures in outline.</p> + +<p>Walpole mentions a plate of the arms of Sir Christopher Hatton on the +title-page of the second part of Wagenar’s Mariner’s Mirrour, printed in +1588, and the plates in a work entitled “A True Report of the +Newfoundland of Virginia,” all engraved by Theodore de Bry. The first of +these works I have not been able to obtain a sight of;<a class = "tag" +name = "tagVI107" id = "tagVI107" href = "#noteVI107">VI.107</a> and the +second cannot properly be included in a list of works containing +copper-plates published in England previous to 1600;<a class = "tag" +name = "tagVI108" id = "tagVI108" href = "#noteVI108">VI.108</a> for +though it appeared in 1591, it was printed at Frankfort. In the reigns +of James and Charles I, copper-plate engraving was warmly patronised in +England, and several foreign engravers, as in the reign of Elizabeth, +were induced to take up their abode in this country. In the first +edition of Chambers’ Cyclopedia, it is stated that the art of +copper-plate engraving was brought +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page424" id = "page424"> +424</a></span> +to this country from Antwerp by Speed the historian,—an error +which is pointed out by Walpole: the writer it seems had not been aware +of any earlier copper-plates printed in England than Speed’s maps, which +were chiefly executed by Flemish engravers.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_424" id = "illus_424"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_424.png" width = "473" height = "647" +alt = "portrait with text Ἡ ΜΕΓΑΛΗ ΕΥΔΑΙΜΟΝΙΑ ΟΥΔΕΝΙ ΦΘΟΝΕΙΝ ÆTATIS 28" +title = "Ἡ ΜΕΓΑΛΗ ΕΥΔΑΙΜΟΝΙΑ ΟΥΔΕΝΙ ΦΘΟΝΕΙΝ ÆTATIS 28"></p> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page425" id = "page425"> +425</a></span> +<p>Dr. William Cuningham, whom Walpole describes as an engraver, was a +physician practising at Norwich; and his book, entitled The +Cosmographical Glasse,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI109" id = "tagVI109" +href = "#noteVI109">VI.109</a> some of the <i>plates</i> of which are +said to have been “engraved by the doctor’s own hand,” was printed at +London by John Day in 1559. It contains no <i>plates</i>, properly +speaking, for the engravings are all from wood-blocks. At the foot of +the ornamental title-page, and in a large bird’s-eye view of Norwich, is +the mark I. B. F, which, from something like a tool for engraving, +between the B. and F in the original, is most likely that of the +engraver. The principal cut is a portrait of the author, +a fac-simile of which is given in the opposite page.</p> + +<div class = "picture"> +<div class = "picblock w250"> +<p><a name = "illus_425" id = "illus_425"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_425.png" width = "249" height = "249" +alt = "see text"></p> +</div> + +<div class = "picblock w250"> +<p><a name = "illus_426a" id = "illus_426a"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_426a.png" width = "245" height = "245" +alt = "see text"></p> +</div> +</div> + +<p>It is much more likely that some of those cuts were engraved by the +printer of the book, John Day, than by the author, Dr. Cuningham; for +the initials I. D. appear on a cut at the end of the book,—a +skeleton extended on a tomb, with a tree growing out of it—and +also on two or three of the large ornamental letters. John Day, in a +book printed +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page426" id = "page426"> +426</a></span> +by him in 1567, says that the Saxon characters used in it were +<i>cut</i> by himself. The cut on page 425 and the three following are +specimens of some of the large ornamental letters which occur in the +Cosmographical Glasse. The first, the letter D, inclosing the arms of +Lord Robert Dudley, afterwards Earl of Leicester, to whom the work is +dedicated. The second, the letter A, Silenus on an ass, accompanied +by satyrs; the mark, a C with a small <span class = +"smallroman">I</span> within the curve, is perceived near the bottom, to +the right.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI110" id = "tagVI110" href = +"#noteVI110">VI.110</a> +The third, the letter I, with a military commander taking the angles +between three churches; and the mark I. D. at the bottom to the +left. +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page427" id = "page427"> +427</a></span> +The fourth, the letter T, a ship with a naked figure as pilot, +preceded by Neptune on a dolphin. A mark, H, is perceived in the +right-hand corner, at the bottom.</p> + +<div class = "picture"> +<div class = "picblock w250"> +<p><a name = "illus_426b" id = "illus_426b"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_426b.png" width = "250" height = "250" +alt = "see text"></p> +</div> + +<div class = "picblock w250"> +<p><a name = "illus_427" id = "illus_427"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_427.png" width = "247" height = "248" +alt = "see text"></p> +</div> +</div> + +<p>Of all the books printed in England in the reigns of Queen Mary and +Queen Elizabeth, those from the press of John Day generally contain the +best executed wood-cuts; and even though he might not be the engraver of +the cuts which contain his initials, yet it cannot be doubted that he +possessed a much better taste in such matters than any other English +printer of his age. Some of the large ornamental letters in works +printed by him are much superior to anything of the kind that had +previously appeared in England. In the “Booke of Christian Prayers” +printed by John Daye 1569, which goes by the name of “Queen Elizabeth’s +Prayer Book,” there is a portrait of her Majesty, kneeling upon a superb +cushion, with elevated hands, in prayer, of which the +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page428" id = "page428"> +428</a></span> +following is a fac-simile. The book is decorated with wood-cut borders +of considerable spirit and beauty, representing, among other things, +some of the subjects of Holbein’s Dance of Death.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_428" id = "illus_428"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_428.png" width = "358" height = "536" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>Our next cut is a copy, slightly reduced, of a large letter, C, at +the commencement of the dedication of Fox’s Acts and Monuments to Queen +Elizabeth, in the edition printed by Day in 1576. The Queen, appearing +more juvenile than she is usually represented, is seen seated on a +throne, attended by three persons, supposed to be intended for one +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page429" id = "page429"> +429</a></span> +of her council, John Day, the printer, and John Fox, the author of the +work. A cherub, with an immense cornucopia over his shoulder, holds +a rose and a lily in one hand, and with the other supports the arms of +England; while underneath a representation of the Pope is introduced, +holding in his hands the broken keys.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI111" +id = "tagVI111" href = "#noteVI111">VI.111</a></p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_429" id = "illus_429"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_429.png" width = "309" height = "339" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>Though it be beyond the plan of the present work to trace the +progress of the various kinds of large ornamental letters engraved on +wood that have been from time to time introduced by the principal +German, French, Italian, and English printers from the invention of +typography, it may not be unnecessary to say a few words on this +subject. In the earliest works of the German printers, as the type was a +close imitation of the handwriting of the period, as used in Bibles and +Missals, the large ornamental letters occasionally introduced are +distinguished by their flourishes and grotesque work extending on the +margin both above and below the body of the letter, as is frequently +seen in illumined manuscripts of the period. Large initial letters of +this kind are not +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page430" id = "page430"> +430</a></span> +unfrequent in early French works; but are comparatively scarce in books +printed in England, where a letter, engraved on a square block, +appearing, with the ornaments, white on a black ground, was adopted +shortly after the introduction of printing by Caxton.<a class = "tag" +name = "tagVI112" id = "tagVI112" href = "#noteVI112">VI.112</a> As the +capitals of the Roman character used in Italy did not admit of the +flourishes which accorded so well with the curves of Gothic or German +capitals, the printers of that country, towards the end of the fifteenth +century, began to introduce flowers, figures of men, birds, and +quadrupeds, as back-grounds to their large initial letters. Between 1520 +and 1530 this mode of ornamenting their large Roman letters was in great +repute with the printers of Basle, Geneva, and Zurich, and to this taste +we owe the small alphabet of the Dance of Death. Subsequently the +Italian wood engravers, employed by the printers, carried this style of +ornament a step further by introducing landscapes as well as figures to +form a back-ground to the letter. The following specimen of letter thus +ornamented is from a work printed by Giolito at Venice about 1550. The +large capitals, in Cuningham’s Cosmographical Glasse, were doubtless +suggested by Italian letters in the same taste.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_430" id = "illus_430"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_430.png" width = "141" height = "145" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>The borders which appear in the title-pages of Italian books of this +period, and more especially in those printed at Venice, frequently +display considerable excellence both in design and execution. They are +generally much lighter and more varied in design than the borders in +German books; and cross-hatching, which is seldom seen in Italian +wood-cuts executed previous to 1520, is so frequently introduced that it +would seem that this mode of producing a certain effect—which +might often have been accomplished by simpler means—was then +considered as a proof of the engraver’s talent. Some of the Italian +printers’ marks and devices, on the title-page, or at the end of a work, +are drawn and engraved with great spirit. The following devices occur in +a folio +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page431" id = "page431"> +431</a></span> +edition of Dante—known to bibliographers as the <i>cat +edition</i>—published by the brothers Sessa, at Venice, in 1578. +The smaller cut—with ornamental work on each side, occupying +nearly the width of a page, but omitted in the copy—is several +times repeated; the larger—where Grimalkin “sits like an eastern +monarch upon his throne”<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI113" id = +"tagVI113" href = "#noteVI113">VI.113</a>—forms the <ins class = +"correction" title = "text reads ‘tailpiece’">tail-piece</ins> at the +end of the volume.</p> + +<div class = "picture"> +<div class = "picblock w300"> +<p><a name = "illus_431" id = "illus_431"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_431a.png" width = "289" height = "324" +alt = "see text"></p> +</div> + +<div class = "picblock w200"> +<p><img src = "images/illus_431b.png" width = "176" height = "161" +alt = "see text"></p> +</div> +</div> + +<p>In the latter part of the sixteenth and the beginning of the +seventeenth century, an Italian artist named Andrea Andreani executed a +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page432" id = "page432"> +432</a></span> +considerable number of chiaro-scuros on wood. He was born at Mantua in +1540, and one of his earliest and largest works in this style is dated +1586. The subject is the History of Abraham, from the pavement of the +cathedral of Siena;<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI114" id = "tagVI114" +href = "#noteVI114">VI.114</a> the first compartment consists of twelve +pieces, printed in three colours, forming, when joined together, +a large composition about five feet six inches wide by about two +feet six inches high. The second compartment, Moses breaking the Tables +of the Law, is not properly a chiaro-scuro, but a large wood-cut, +consisting of several pieces, printed in ink in the usual manner. It is +about six feet wide by about four feet high. Another large work of +Andreani’s is the Triumphs of Julius Cæsar, from the designs of Andrea +Mantegna, dedicated to Vincentius Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua, and published +in a folio volume in 1598. Andreani having obtained the blocks of +several of the chiaro-scuros executed by Ugo da Carpi, Antonio da +Trente, Nicholas da Vincenza, and others, reprinted them with the +addition of his own mark; and from this circumstance he frequently +obtains the credit of having engraved many pieces which were really +executed by his predecessors and superiors in the art. The chiaro-scuros +which he reprinted are generally superior to those pieces which were +engraved by himself from original designs, and in the execution of which +he had to depend on his own judgment and taste. He continued to engrave +in this manner till he was upwards of seventy years old, for there are +one or two subjects by him dated 1612. Bartsch says that he died in +1623, but observes that some writers place his death in 1626.</p> + +<p>Henry Goltzius, a painter and engraver, born in 1558, near Venloo, in +Flanders, executed several chiaro-scuros, chiefly from his own designs. +The most of them are from three blocks; and among the best executed are +Hercules and Cacus, and four separate pieces representing the four +elements. Like most of the other productions of this artist, whether +paintings or copper-plate engravings, his chiaro-scuros are designed +with great spirit, though the action of the figures is frequently +extravagant. He imitated Michael Angelo, but not with success; he too +frequently mistakes violence of action for the expression of +intellectual grandeur, and displays the “contortions of the pythoness +without her inspiration.” The cut in the opposite page is a reduced copy +of the subject intended +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page433" id = "page433"> +433</a></span> +to represent the element of water. In the original the impression is +from four blocks; one with the outlines and shaded parts black, as in +the copy here given; the other three communicating different tints of +sepia. Henry Goltzius died in 1617. His mark, an H combined with a G, is +seen at the bottom of the cut.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_433" id = "illus_433"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_433.png" width = "314" height = "414" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>The cuts contained in a work on ancient and modern costume, printed +at Venice in 1590,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI115" id = "tagVI115" +href = "#noteVI115">VI.115</a> are frequently described as having been +drawn by Titian and engraved by his <i>brother</i>, Cesare Vecellio. +That this person might have been a relation of Titian, whose family name +was Vecelli, is not unlikely, but it is highly improbable that he was +his brother; for +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page434" id = "page434"> +434</a></span> +Titian died in 1576, aged ninety-nine, and the dedication of the work to +Pietro Montalbano by Cesare Vecellio is dated October, 1589. In the +title it is stated that the costumes in question were +“done”—<i>fatti</i>—by Vecellio himself; but whether this +word relates to the drawing or the engraving, or to both, it would be +exceedingly difficult to ascertain. Those cuts have the appearance of +having been drawn on the block with pen-and-ink; and some of the best +display so much “character” that they look like portraits of individuals +freely sketched by the hand of a master. It was first stated in an +edition of the work, printed in 1664, that the cuts were drawn by Titian +and engraved by Cesare Vecellio, his brother. The improbable assertion +was merely a bookseller’s trick to attract purchasers. It has also been +frequently asserted, that the cuts in Vesalius’s Anatomy, printed at +Basle in 1548, were drawn by Titian. The Abbé Morelli has, however, +shown that they were not drawn by him, but by John Calcar, +a Flemish painter, who had been one of his pupils.</p> + +<p>Papillon, who in his desire to dignify his art claims almost every +eminent painter as a wood engraver, pretends that Titian executed +several large cuts from his own designs. He says that Titian began to +engrave on wood when he was twenty-five years old [in 1502], and he +mentions a cut of the Virgin and the infant Christ, with other +figures,—probably intended to represent the marriage of St. +Catherine,—as one of the earliest specimens of his talents as a +wood engraver. Papillon also informs us that Titian engraved a large cut +of the Triumph of Christ, or of Faith, in 1508; and in another part of +his work he describes several others as engraved by Titian himself.</p> + +<p>Several of the cuts after designs by Titian, but which were certainly +not of his engraving, are of large size, and executed in a free, coarse +manner, as if they were rather intended to paste against a wall than to +be inserted in a portfolio. One of the largest is the destruction of +Pharaoh and his host; it consists of several pieces, which, when united, +form a complete subject about four and a half feet wide by about three +feet high. A dog, which the painter has introduced in a peculiar +attitude,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI116" id = "tagVI116" href = +"#noteVI116">VI.116</a> gives to the whole the air of burlesque. The +person by whom it was engraved styles himself “depintore,” a word +perhaps intended to imply that he was a brother of the guild, or society +of painter-stainers, stencillers, and wood engravers.<a class = "tag" +name = "tagVI117" id = "tagVI117" href = "#noteVI117">VI.117</a> His +name, with the date, is engraved thus at the bottom of the cut, which is +one of those which Papillon says +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page435" id = "page435"> +435</a></span> +were executed by Titian himself: “In Venetia p. dominico dalle +greche depintore venetiano. <span class = +"smallroman">M.DXLIX.</span>”</p> + +<p>The following is a reduced copy of a cut designed by Titian, and said +to have been intended by him to ridicule those painters who, not being +able to succeed in colouring, recommended ancient sculptures, on account +of the correctness of the forms, as most deserving of a painter’s +diligent study. The subject is a caricature of the Laocoon; and the +professed admirers of antiquity, who, above all, insisted on correct +drawing, and thought slightly of colouring, are represented by the old +ape wanting a tail, seen in the distance, attended by three of her young +ones. The original cut is fifteen inches and seven-eighths wide by ten +inches and a half high. It is coarsely engraved, and contains neither +name nor date.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI118" id = "tagVI118" href = +"#noteVI118">VI.118</a> There are several chiaro-scuros after designs by +Titian, engraved by Boldrini, Andreani, and others.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_435" id = "illus_435"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_435.png" width = "342" height = "229" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>Wood engraving in Germany at the close of the sixteenth century +appears to have greatly declined; the old race of artists who furnished +designs for the wood engraver had become extinct, and their places were +not supplied by others. The more expensive works were now illustrated +with copper-plates; and the wood-cuts which appeared in the commoner +kinds of books were in general very indifferent both in design and +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page436" id = "page436"> +436</a></span> +execution. As Germany was the country in which wood engraving was first +encouraged and fostered, so was it also the country in which the art +earliest declined and subsequently became most thoroughly neglected. In +France and Italy, wood engraving had also by this time experienced a +considerable decline, but not to such an extent as in Germany.</p> + +<p>Between 1590 and 1610, when the art was rapidly declining in other +countries, the wood-cuts which are to be met with in English books are +generally better executed than at any preceding period. Engraved +title-pages were then frequent, and several of them are executed with +considerable skill. A large wood-cut, with the date 1607, in +particular displays great merit both in design and engraving. The +following is a reduced copy of an impression preserved in the Print Room +of the British Museum.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI119" id = "tagVI119" +href = "#noteVI119">VI.119</a> The original, exclusive of the verses, +and the ornaments at each side of them, is about fourteen inches high by +about fourteen and a half wide.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_437" id = "illus_437"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_437.png" width = "329" height = "430" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p class = "right"> +<a class = "mynote" href = "#note_6h">Text within illustration</a></p> + +<p>The following are the six concluding lines of the sonnet underneath +the cut: in the original they are printed in smaller type than the +others, and in a double column. In the copy they are merely indicated to +show the relative size of the type to that of the first eight lines.</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "indent">And (thus) to these to stand still open wide,</p> +<p>He neither wrings with Wrongs nor racks his Rents;</p> +<p class = "indent">But saves the charge of wanton Waste & +Pride:</p> +<p>For, Thrift’s right Fuel of Magnificence:</p> +<p class = "indent">As Protean Fashions of new Prodigalitie</p> +<p class = "indent">Have quight worn out all ancient Hospitalitie.</p> +</div> + +<p>The flowers at each side of the verses are, in the original, very +coarsely executed. They are merely printers’ ornaments, engraved +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page437" id = "page437"> +437</a></span> +on separate pieces of wood, and not on the same block as the cut above +them.</p> + +<p>From one or two worm-holes, which have been in the block when it was +printed in 1607, and which are apparent in the impression, it seems +probable that this cut had been engraved some time previous to the date +which appears at the bottom. As it is, however, very likely that the +block was of pear-tree, which is extremely liable to the attacks of the +worm, it is possible that it might have been injured in this manner +within a year or two of its being finished. The bold, <i>cleanly cut</i> +lines of the original are very much like the work of Christopher Jegher, +one of the best wood engravers of that period. He resided at Antwerp, +but he is said to have been born in Germany in 1578. His best works are +several large cuts which he engraved for Rubens from drawings made on +the block by Rubens himself, who appears to have originally +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page438" id = "page438"> +438</a></span> +published them on his own account. From the manner in which the great +painter’s name is introduced at the bottom of each—“<i>P. P. +Rub. delin. & excud.</i>”—it would appear that they were both +designed and printed by him. Impressions of those cuts sometimes occur +with a tint printed over them, in sepia, from a second block, in the +manner of chiaro-scuros. We here give a reduced copy of one of the +largest.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI120" id = "tagVI120" href = +"#noteVI120">VI.120</a></p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_438" id = "illus_438"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_438.png" width = "333" height = "258" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>As profit could not have been Rubens’s motive for having these cuts +engraved, it is not unlikely that his object was to compare his designs +when executed in this manner with those of the older German +masters—Durer, Burgmair, and Cranach. The best, however, differ +considerably in the manner of their execution from the best old German +wood-cuts, for the lines are too uniform and display too much of art; in +looking at those which consist chiefly of figures, attention is first +called to the <i>means</i> by which an effect is produced, rather than +to the effect itself in connexion with the entire subject. This +objection applies most forcibly to the cut which represents the Virgin +crowned by the Almighty and Jesus Christ. The design displays much of +Rubens’s grandeur, with not less of his extravagance in the attitude of +the figures; but he seems to have studied less the effect of the whole, +than to have endeavoured to express certain parts by a peculiar +arrangement of lines und hatchings. The subject does not produce that +feeling, which it is the great object of art to excite, in consequence +of the attention being diverted from the contemplation of the whole to +the means by which it is executed. In such impressions, however, as have +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page439" id = "page439"> +439</a></span> +a tint of sepia printed over them from a second block, the hardness of +the lines and heaviness in the hatchings are less apparent. The +following is a reduced copy of another of those cuts, which, for the +beautiful simplicity of the design, is perhaps the most pleasing of the +whole. The execution of the original is, however, coarse, a defect +which is not so apparent in the copy in consequence of the small scale +on which it is engraved.<a class = "tag error" name = "tagVI121" id = +"tagVI121" href = "#noteVI121" title = "missing tag">VI.121</a></p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_439" id = "illus_439"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_439.png" width = "329" height = "246" +alt = "see text" title = "CUM PRIVILEGIIS"></p> + +<p>Cornelius van Sichem,<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI122" id = +"tagVI122" href = "#noteVI122">VI.122</a> a contemporary of Christopher +Jegher, appears to have been one of the most industrious wood engravers +of his time. He was a native of Holland, and is supposed to have resided +at Amsterdam. One of his best cuts is a large head, engraved from a +drawing by Henry Goltzius, with the date 1607. This and several other +large cuts, which he probably engraved about the same time, are so much +superior to the smaller cuts, with his mark, which appear in books, that +I am inclined to think that most of the latter must have been engraved +by his pupils; they are indeed so numerous that it seems almost +impossible that he should have engraved them all himself. He seems at +first to have worked for fame, and afterwards to have turned a +manufacturer of wood-cuts for money. The cuts with his mark contained in +a quarto book entitled “Bibels Tresoor,” printed at Amsterdam +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page440" id = "page440"> +440</a></span> +in 1646, by no means afford an idea of his ability as a wood-engraver; +many of them are wretched copies of old wood-cuts designed by Albert +Durer and other old masters, discreditable alike to the engraver and to +the originals. The following is a slightly reduced copy of a cut, +engraved by Van Sichem, from a design by Henry Goltzius. The original, +which was probably engraved about 1607, may be considered as an average +specimen of the engraver’s talents; it is not so well executed as some +of his best large cuts, while it is much superior to the greater number +of the small cuts which contain his mark. The subject is Judith with the +head of Holofernes.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_440" id = "illus_440"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_440.png" width = "337" height = "444" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<p>About 1625 a French wood engraver of the name of Businck executed +several chiaro-scuros chiefly from designs by Lalleman and Bloemart; and +between 1630 and 1647, Bartolomeo Coriolano, who sometimes styles +himself “Romanus Eques,” practised the same art +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page441" id = "page441"> +441</a></span> +at Bologna with great reputation.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI123" id = +"tagVI123" href = "#noteVI123">VI.123</a> In an edition of Hubert +Goltzius’s Lives of the Roman Emperors, enlarged by Casper Gevartius, +folio, printed at Antwerp in 1645, the portraits, in the manner of +chiaro-scuros, from two blocks, are executed with great spirit. The name +of the engraver is not mentioned, but from the mark I. C. +I. on a tail-piece at the end of the work, I am inclined to +think that he was the same person who engraved the cuts in a little book +of devotion, first printed in Latin, French, Spanish, and Flemish, at +Antwerp, about 1646.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI124" id = "tagVI124" +href = "#noteVI124">VI.124</a> The number of cuts in this little work is +forty, and most of them contain the mark of the designer, <img class = +"middle" src = "images/illus_441.png" width = "22" height = "22" alt = +"AS">, as well as that of the engraver. From the drawing of these cuts +it would seem that the designer was either a pupil of Rubens, or had +closely copied his manner. In Professor Christ’s Dictionary of Monograms +the mark <img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_441.png" width = "22" +height = "22" alt = "AS"> is ascribed to Andrea Salmincio, “an engraver +and pupil of Valesius.” Papillon, Traité de la Gravure en Bois, tom. +i. p. 274, adopting Professor Christ’s explanation of the +mark, mentions “Andrea Salmincio” as the designer of those cuts; but in +page 461 of the same volume, he says, referring to his former statement, +that he had since been informed by M. Eisen, a painter, and a +native of Valenciennes, that they were designed by “a famous +Flemish painter and engraver on wood, named Sallarte, +a contemporary of Rubens, and who is supposed to have assisted the +latter in some of his great works.” Those cuts may perhaps be considered +as the last series that were expressly designed by an artist of talent +in the seventeenth century, for the purpose of being engraved on wood. +The style in which they are executed is not worthy of the designs, +though, considering the period, they are not without merit. The engraver +appears to have been extremely partial to a kind of cross-hatching, in +which the interstices are more like squares than acute-angled lozenges, +thus giving to the figures and draperies a hard and unpliable +appearance.</p> + +<p>Though several English wood engravings of the reigns of James I. +and Charles I. have evidently been executed by professed wood +engravers, yet a great proportion of those contained in English books +and pamphlets printed in this country during the seventeenth century +appear to have been the work of persons who had not learnt and did not +regularly practise the art. The cuts of those occasional wood engravers, +who were +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page442" id = "page442"> +442</a></span> +most likely printers, are as rude in design as they are coarse in +execution, frequently displaying something like the fac-simile of a +boy’s drawing in his first attempts to sketch “the human <i>form</i> +divine.” Such cuts, evidently executed on the spur of the moment, are of +frequent occurrence in tracts and pamphlets published during the time of +the war between Charles I. and the Parliament. Evelyn, in the first +edition of his Sculptura, published in 1662, thus mentions Switzer as a +wood engraver of that period: “We have likewise Switzer for cutting in +wood, the son of a father<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI125" id = +"tagVI125" href = "#noteVI125">VI.125</a> who sufficiently discovered +his dexterity in the <i>Herbals</i> set forth by Mr. Parkinson, Lobel, +and divers other works.” The cuts of plants in the work, usually called +Lobel’s Botany, were most certainly not engraved by the elder Switzer; +they are much superior to the cuts of the same kind which are +undoubtedly of his engraving, and the work in which they first appeared +was printed in London in 1571. He engraved the cuts in Speed’s History +of Britain, folio, 1611; and, though the author calls him “the most +exquisite and curious hand of that age,” they abundantly testify that he +was a very ordinary workman. They are executed in a meagre, spiritless +manner; the best are those which represent the portraitures of the +ancient Britons. The cuts in Parkinson’s Paradisus Terrestris, folio, +1629, were also undoubtedly engraved by him; his name, +“<i>A. Switzer</i>,” with a graver underneath, occurs at the bottom +of the very indifferent cut which forms the title-page. The portrait of +the author is scarcely superior to the title-page; and the cuts of +plants are the most worthless that are to be found in any work of the +kind. It is not unlikely that the cuts in Topsell’s History of +Four-footed Beasts, 1607, and in Moffet’s Theatre of Insects, 1634, were +also engraved by the elder Switzer. The taste for wood-cuts must have +been low indeed when such an engraver was considered one of the best of +his age. Of the younger Switzer’s abilities I have had no means of +judging, never having seen a single cut which was known to be of his +engraving.</p> + +<p>Between 1650 and 1700 wood engraving, as a means of multiplying +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page443" id = "page443"> +443</a></span> +the designs of eminent artists, either as illustrations of books or as +separate cuts, may be considered as having reached its lowest ebb. +A few tolerably well executed cuts of ornaments are occasionally to +be found in Italian, French, and Dutch books of this period; but though +they sufficiently attest that the race <i>of workmen</i> was not wholly +extinct, they also afford ample proof that <i>artists</i> like those of +former times had ceased to furnish designs for the wood engraver. The +art of design was then, however, in a languishing condition throughout +Europe; and even supposing that wood engraving had been as much in +fashion as copper-plate printing then was for the purpose of +illustrating books, it would be vain to expect in wood-cuts that +excellence of composition and drawing which is not to be found in the +works of the best painters of the time. Wood engravings to please must +possess <i>some</i> merit in the design—must show some trait of +feeling for his subject on the part of the designer. Deficiency in this +respect can never be compensated by dexterity of execution: in anything +that approaches to fine art, mere workmanship, the result of laborious +application, can never atone for want of mind. The man who drew a +portrait of Queen Anne with a pen, and wrote the Psalms in the lines of +the face, and in the curls of the hair, in characters so small that it +required a glass to read them, does not rank with a Vandyke or a +Reynolds, nor even with a Lely or a Kneller. At the period of the +greatest decline of wood engraving, the want that was felt was not of +working engravers to execute cuts, but of talented artists to design +them.</p> + +<p>The principal French wood engravers about the end of the seventeenth +century were: Peter Le Sueur,—born in 1636, died 1716; his two +sons, Peter and Vincent; John Papillon the elder—who died in 1710; +and his son, of the same name, who was born in 1661, and died in 1723. +Though John Michael Papillon, son of John Papillon the younger, and +author of the Traité de la Gravure en Bois, speaks highly of the talents +of the aforesaid members of the families of Le Sueur and Papillon as +wood engravers, yet, from his account of their productions, it would +seem that they were chiefly employed in engraving subjects which +scarcely allowed of any display of excellence either in design or +execution. Their fine works were ornamental letters, flowered vignettes, +and tail-pieces for the booksellers; while their staple productions +appear to have been blocks for card-makers and paper-stainers, with +patterns for embroiderers, lace-workers, and ribbon-manufacturers. In +the succeeding century, J. M. Papillon, grandson of the first John +Papillon, and Nicholas le Sueur, grandson of the elder Peter Le Sueur, +fully supported the character of their respective families as wood +engravers. Some account of their works will be given in the proper +place.</p> + +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page444" id = "page444"> +444</a></span> +<p>The tail-piece at the conclusion of this chapter will afford some +idea of the primitive style of the wood-cuts previously mentioned as +occurring in tracts and pamphlets printed in England during the civil +war. It is a fac-simile of a cut which originally appeared on the +title-page to the first known edition of Robin Hood’s Garland, printed +in 1670.<a class = "tag" name = "tagVI126" id = "tagVI126" href = +"#noteVI126">VI.126</a> The original block is now in the possession of +Mr. William Garret of Newcastle-on-Tyne, and was frequently used by the +late Mr. George Angus of that town, as it had also been by his +predecessors in the same business, to decorate the title-pages of the +penny histories and garlands, which they supplied in such abundance for +the winter-evenings’ entertainment of the good folks of Northumberland +and the “Bishoprick.” Mr. Douce, in the second volume of his +Illustrations of Shakspeare, also gives a fac-simile of this cut; and +the following is his explanation of the subject.</p> + +<p>“Mr. Ritson has taken notice of an old wooden cut ‘preserved on the +title-page of a penny history (<i>Adam Bell, &c.</i>), printed at +Newcastle in 1772,’ and which represents, in his opinion, a morris +dance, consisting of the following personages: 1. A bishop. +2. Robin Hood. 3. The potter or beggar. 4. Little John. +5. Friar Tuck. 6. Maid Marian. He remarks that the whole is +too rude to merit a copy, a position that is not meant to be +controverted; but it is necessary to introduce the cut in this place for +the purpose of correcting an error into which the above ingenious writer +has fallen. It is proper to mention that it originally appeared on the +title-page to the first known edition of Robin Hood’s Garland, printed +in 1670, 18mo. Now, this cut is certainly not the representation of a +morris dance, but merely of the principal characters belonging to the +Garland. These are Robin Hood, Little John, <i>Queen Catherine</i>, the +bishop, the <i>curtal frier</i>, (not Tuck,) and the beggar. Even though +it were admitted that Maid Marian and Friar Tuck were intended to be +given, it could not be maintained that either the bishop or the beggar +made part of a morris.”</p> + +<p>To give more specimens of wood engraving when in its lowest state of +declension has not been thought necessary; for even at this period it +would not be difficult to produce cuts which in point of mere execution +are superior to many which appeared when the art was at its height. It +is sufficient to have stated that, towards the end of the seventeenth +century, wood engraving for the higher purposes of the art had sunk into +utter neglect; that the best productions of the +<span class = "pagenum"><a name = "page445" id = "page445"> +445</a></span> +regular wood engravers of the period mostly consist of unmeaning +ornaments which neither excite feeling nor suggest a thought; and that +the wood-cuts which appear to have been engraved by persons not +instructed in the business partake generally of the character of the +following tail-piece. Having now brought down the history of the art of +wood engraving to the end of the seventeenth century, its revival in the +eighteenth, with some account of the works of Thomas Bewick and the +principal English wood engravers of his time, will form the subject of +the next chapter.</p> + +<p class = "illustration"> +<a name = "illus_445" id = "illus_445"> </a> +<img src = "images/illus_445.png" width = "297" height = "295" +alt = "see text"></p> + +<div class = "footnote"> + +<p><a name = "noteVI1" id = "noteVI1" href = "#tagVI1">VI.1</a> +Besides those above mentioned, there is said to have been a “Death’s +Dance” at the following places: in Hungerford’s Chapel, Salisbury +Cathedral; Hexham Church; at Fescamp in Normandy, carved in stone; at +Dresden; Leipsic; Annaberg; and Berne in Switzerland. The last, painted +on the walls of the cloisters of the Dominican friars, was the work of +Nicholas Emanuel Deutsch, previously mentioned at page 314. So early as +1560 this painting was destroyed in consequence of the cloisters being +pulled down to widen a street. There are two copies of it in +water-colours preserved at Berne. From one of them a series of +lithographic engravings has been made. An ample list of old paintings of +this subject will be found in Mr. Douce’s Dance of Death, chapters iii. +and iv, published by Pickering, 1833, and republished, with additions, +by H. G. Bohn, 1858.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI2" id = "noteVI2" href = "#tagVI2">VI.2</a> +Mr. Douce says, “Macaber was not a German or any other poet, but a +nonentity.” He supposes that the name <i>Macaber</i> is only a slight +and obvious corruption of <i>Macarius</i>, a Saint who lived as a hermit +in Egypt, and of whom there is a story of his showing to three kings or +noblemen an emblem of mortality in the shape of three skeletons. “The +word <i>Macabre</i>,” observes Mr. Douce, “is found only in French +authorities; and the Saint’s name, which in the modern orthography is +<i>Macaire</i>, would in many ancient manuscripts be written +<i>Macabre</i> instead of <i>Macaure</i>, the letter <i>b</i> being +substituted for that of <i>u</i> from the caprice, ignorance, or +carelessness of transcribers.” Mr. Douce’s conjecture would have been +more feasible had he produced a single instance from any ancient +manuscript of the name having been written <i>Macabre</i> instead of +<i>Macaure</i> or <i>Macarius</i>. By a similar process of reasoning, it +would not be difficult to prove a hundred old writers and poets +non-entities. In the earliest French editions, the work is intitled “La +Danse Macabre;” and in a Parisian edition, “Per Magistrum Guidonem +Mercatorem pro Godefrido de Marnef,” folio, 1490, the title is as +follows: “Chorea ab eximio Macabro versibus Alemanicis edita, et à Petro +Desrey emendata.” This seems to prove that Peter Desrey knew something +of a person named Macaber who had written a description of the Dance in +German.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI3" id = "noteVI3" href = "#tagVI3">VI.3</a> +Hans Holbein der Jüngere. Von Ulrich Hegner, S. 309. Berlin, +1827.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI4" id = "noteVI4" href = "#tagVI4">VI.4</a> +All the persons introduced were of the size of life. Death, in only one +instance, was represented as a perfect skeleton, and that was in the +subject of the Doctor, whom he was supposed to address as follows:</p> + +<div class = "verse blackletter"> +<p>“Herr Doctor b’schaw die Anatomey</p> +<p>An mir, ob sie recht g’macht sey.”</p> +</div> + +<p>that is:</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "open">“Doctor, take of me a sight,</p> +<p>Say if the skeleton be right.”</p> +</div> + +<p>It has been said that the Pope, the Emperor, and the King, were +intended respectively for portraits of Pope Felix V, the Emperor +Sigismund, and Albert II, his successor, as King of the Romans. This, +however, is merely a conjecture, and not a very probable one. Sigismund +died before the commencement of the plague which is said to have been +the occasion of the painting.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI5" id = "noteVI5" href = "#tagVI5">VI.5</a> +Those verses, as they appeared in later times, are as follows:</p> + +<div class = "verse blackletter"> +<p>“Heilig war ich auff Erd genan</p> +<p>Ohn Gott der höchst führt ich mein stand.</p> +<p>Der Ablass that mir gar wol lohnen</p> +<p>Doch will der tod mein nicht verschonen.”</p> +</div> + +<p>Their meaning may be thus expressed in English:</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "open">“His Holiness, on earth my name;</p> +<p>From God my power never came;</p> +<p>Although by pardons wealth I got,</p> +<p>Death, alas, will pardon not!”</p> +</div> + +<p><a name = "noteVI6" id = "noteVI6" href = "#tagVI6">VI.6</a> +Several characters are to be found in those Dances of Death which do not +occur in the Simulachres et Historiées Faces de la Mort of Lyons, 1538. +In the preface to the Emblems of Mortality,—with wood-cuts by John +Bewick, 1789,—written by John Sidney Hawkins, Esq., the following +list is given of the cuts in an edition of “La grande Danse de Macabre +des Hommes et Femmes,” 4to. printed at Troyes for John Garnier, but +without a date. “The Pope, Emperor, Cardinal, King, Legate, Duke, +Patriarch, Constable, Archbishop, Knight, Bishop, Squire, Abbot, +Bailiff, Astrologer, Burgess, Canon, Merchant, Schoolmaster, Man of +Arms, Chartreux, Serjeant, Monk, Usurer, Physician, Lover, Advocate, +Minstrel, Curate, Labourer, Proctor, Gaoler, Pilgrim, Shepherd, +Cordelier, Child, Clerk, Hermit, Adventurer, Fool. The women are the +Queen, Duchess, Regent’s Wife, Knight’s Wife, Abbess, Squire’s Wife, +Shepherdess, Cripple, Burgess’s Wife, Widow, Merchant’s Wife, Bailiff’s +Wife, Young Wife, Dainty Dame, Female Philosopher, New-married Wife, +Woman with Child, Old Maid, Female Cordelier, Chambermaid, +Intelligence-Woman, Hostess, Nurse, Prioress, Damsel, Country Girl, Old +Chambermaid, Huckstress, Strumpet, Nurse for Lying-in-Woman, Young Girl, +Religious, Sorceress, Bigot, Fool.” Nearly the same characters occur in +borders of the old Dutch Prayer Book mentioned at page 318, though in +the latter they are yet more numerous; among the men there is a +fowler—<i>vogelaer</i>—and among the women, the +beauty—<i>scone</i>—and the old woman—<i>alde +vrou</i>—which do not occur in the preceding list.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI7" id = "noteVI7" href = "#tagVI7">VI.7</a> +It has been thought necessary to be thus particular in describing the +title-page of this rare edition, as it is incorrectly described by Mr. +Douce. In the copy in the British Museum the title-page is wanting.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI8" id = "noteVI8" href = "#tagVI8">VI.8</a> +This “vray Zele” having said in the first page of the preface that the +name and surname of the revered abbess had the same sound as his own, +with the exception of the letter T, the editor of the Emblems +conjectures “that his name was <span class = "smallcaps">Jean</span>, +or, as it was anciently written, <span class = "smallcaps">Jehan de +Ouszell</span>, or <span class = "smallcaps">Ozell</span> as it is now +usually spelt.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI9" id = "noteVI9" href = "#tagVI9">VI.9</a> +In the original, “avancantes autāt les patronées jusques ici.” The word +<i>patronées</i>, I conceive to refer to cuts printed from wood-blocks. +The editor of the Emblems, 1688, who is followed by Mr. Ottley, +translated the passage, “exceeding all the <i>examples</i> hitherto.” +Works executed by means of a stencil were in old French said to be +<i>patronées</i>, and the word also appears to have been applied to +impressions printed from wood-blocks. The verb <i>patroner</i> is thus +explained in Noel and Chapsal’s Nouveau Dictionnaire de la Langue +Française, Paris, 1828: “Terme de cartier: enduire de couleur, au moyen +du patron évidé, les endroits où cette couleur doit paraître.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI10" id = "noteVI10" href = "#tagVI10">VI.10</a> +Mr. Douce supposes that the rainbow here alluded to was that which +appears in the cut of the Last Judgment, the last but one in the first +edition. The writer evidently means the natural rainbow which is mostly +seen imperfect.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI11" id = "noteVI11" href = "#tagVI11">VI.11</a> +Traité de la Gravure en Bois, tom. i. p. 168. Papillon in a preceding +page had observed: “These cuts must have been engraved about 1530, for +we find the four first among the little figures of the Old Testament +printed in 1539, from which it is easy to perceive that many thousand +impressions had already been taken from the blocks.”—Those four +cuts in the first edition of the Dance of Death, have not the slightest +appearance of having been from blocks that had already furnished many +thousand impressions. In the copy now before me, I cannot perceive +a break or an imperfection in the most delicate lines. The first edition +of the “Historiarum Veteris Testamenti Icones,” to which Papillon +alludes, first appeared in the same year as the Simulachres, 1538, and +from the office of the same publishers, the brothers Melchior and Gaspar +Trechsel.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI12" id = "noteVI12" href = "#tagVI12">VI.12</a> +Inquiry into the Origin and Early History of Engraving, vol. ii. +p. 762.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI13" id = "noteVI13" href = "#tagVI13">VI.13</a> +Those cuts, with that of the astrologer and five others, supplied from a +later edition, were bought, at the sale of Mr. Ottley’s prints, in 1837, +for the British Museum, for £37 10<i>s.</i> In the catalogue, which, +I understand, was chiefly drawn up from his own memoranda, they are +thus described, under the head “<span class = "smallcaps">Hans +Holbein</span>,” No. 458: “<span class = "smallcaps">The celebrated +Dance of Death</span>, first impressions, printed (probably at Basle, +about 1530,) upon one side only, with German titles at the top in type; +supposed to be <span class = "smallroman">UNIQUE</span>.” That they were +printed in 1530 is highly <i>improbable</i>, and they certainly are +<span class = "smallroman">NOT</span> <i>unique</i>.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI14" id = "noteVI14" href = "#tagVI14">VI.14</a> +The French verses were translated into Latin by George Æmylius, “an +eminent German divine of Mansfelt,” says Mr. Douce, “and the author of +many pious works.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI15" id = "noteVI15" href = "#tagVI15">VI.15</a> +Some copies have the title “Icones Mortis;” and though they correspond +in every other respect with those of the same year, intitled Imagines +Mortis, Mr. Douce seems to consider that this trifling variation is a +sufficient ground for describing them as different editions.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI16" id = "noteVI16" href = "#tagVI16">VI.16</a> +Dance of Death, p. 107, edit. 1833 (Bohn’s edition, p. 95). It is +stated in the Italian piracy that it was printed “<i>Con gratia e +privilegio de l’Illustriss. Senato Vinitiano, per anni dieci. Appresso +Vincenzo Vaugris, al Segno d’Erasmo.</i> <span class = +"smallroman">MDXLV.</span>”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI17" id = "noteVI17" href = "#tagVI17">VI.17</a> +Author of the work intitled, “Recherches sur les Danses des Morts.” +Dijon et Paris, 1826.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI18" id = "noteVI18" href = "#tagVI18">VI.18</a> +Dance of Death, p. 118. Edit. 1833.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI19" id = "noteVI19" href = "#tagVI19">VI.19</a> +Mr. Douce gives another amusing instance of Papillon’s sagacity in +assigning marks and names to their proper owners. “He (Papillon) had +seen an edition of the Emblems of Sambucus with cuts, bearing the mark +<img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_337a.png" width = "28" height += "21" alt = "SA">, in which there is a fine portrait of the author with +his favourite dog, and under the latter the word <span class = +"smallcaps">Bombo</span>, which Papillon gravely states to be the name +of the engraver; and finding the same word on another of the emblems, +which has also the dog, he concludes that all the cuts which have not +the <img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_337a.png" width = "28" +height = "21" alt = "SA"> were engraved by the same <span class = +"smallcaps">Bombo</span>.”—Dance of Death, p. 114, 1833. +Those blunders of Papillon are to be found in his Traité Historique et +Pratique de la Gravure en Bois, tom. i. pp. 238 et 525.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI20" id = "noteVI20" href = "#tagVI20">VI.20</a> +Mr. Douce himself says, “about 1794.” A copy in the British Museum, +formerly belonging to the late Reverend C. M. Cracherode, has, +however, that gentleman’s usual mark, and the date 1793.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI21" id = "noteVI21" href = "#tagVI21">VI.21</a> +Mr. Douce, when correcting the mistake of the writer of the address, +commits an error himself. He says that “Death is in the act of +untwisting the <i>fastening to one of the hoops</i>.” Now, it is very +evident that he is undoing the rope or chain that steadies the cask and +confines it to the waggon. He has hold of the stake or piece of wood, +which serves as a <span class = "blackletter">twitch</span> to tighten +the rope or chain, in the manner in which large timber is secured to the +waggon in the present day.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI22" id = "noteVI22" href = "#tagVI22">VI.22</a> +Dance of Death, p. 88. Edit. 1833 (Bohn’s edit. 1858, p. 77.)</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI23" id = "noteVI23" href = "#tagVI23">VI.23</a> +The words “<i>jà par luy trassées</i>” will apply more properly to +drawings already made on the block, but unengraved, than to unfinished +drawings on paper. It is indeed almost certain that the writer meant the +former, for their “<i>audacieux traicts, perspectives, et umbrages</i>” +are mentioned; they were moreover “<i>gracieusement deliniées</i>.” +These expressions will apply correctly to a finished, though unengraved +design on the block, but scarcely to an unfinished drawing on paper.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI24" id = "noteVI24" href = "#tagVI24">VI.24</a> +I am very much inclined to think that Madame Jehanne de Touszele is a +fictitious character. I have had no opportunities of learning if +such a person were really abbess of the Convent of St. Peter at Lyons in +1538, and must therefore leave this point to be decided by some other +enquirer.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI25" id = "noteVI25" href = "#tagVI25">VI.25</a> +Mechel’s work is in folio, with four subjects on each full page, and is +entitled “Oeuvre de Jean Holbein, ou Receuil de Gravures d’après ses +plus beaux ouvrages, &c. Première Partie. La Triomphe de Mort.” +It is dedicated to George III, and the presentation copy is in the +King’s Library at the British Museum. The first part contains, besides +forty-five subjects of the Dance of Death, the design for the sheath of +a dagger from a drawing ascribed to Holbein, which has been re-engraved +in the work of Mr. Douce. It is extremely doubtful if the drawings of +the Dance, from which Mechel’s engravings are copied, be really by +Holbein. They were purchased by M. Fleischmann of Strasburg, at +Crozat’s sale at Paris in 1741. It was stated in the catalogue that they +had formed part of the Arundelian collection, and that they had +afterwards come into the possession of Jan Bockhorst, commonly called +Lang Jan, a contemporary of Vandyke. This piece of information, +however, can only be received as an auctioneer’s puff. M. Mechel +himself, according to Mr. Douce, had not been able to trace those +drawings previously to their falling into the hands of Monsieur Crozat. +They were purchased of M. Fleischmann by Prince Gallitzin, +a Russian nobleman, by whom they were lent to M. Mechel. They +are now in the Imperial Library at Petersburg. According to Mr. Coxe, +who saw them when in M. Mechel’s possession, they were drawn with a +pen, and slightly shaded with Indian ink. Hegner, in his Life of +Holbein, speaks slightingly of Mechel’s engravings, which he says were +executed by one of his workmen from copies of the pretended original +drawings made by an artist named Rudolph Schellenburg of Winterthur. +Those copper-plates certainly appear feeble when compared with the +wood-cut in the Lyons work, and Hegner’s criticism on the figure of Eve +seems just, though Mr. Douce does not approve of it. Hegner says, “Let +any one compare the figure of Eve under the tree in Mechel’s second +plate with the second wood-cut; in the former she is sitting in as +elegant an attitude as if she belonged to a French family by +Boucher.”—Boucher, a French painter, who died in 1770, was +famous in his time for the pretty women introduced into his +landscapes.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI26" id = "noteVI26" href = "#tagVI26">VI.26</a> +Mr. Douce in every instance spells the name thus. In the proofs of the +alphabet of the Dance of Death it is <i>Lützelburger</i>, and below the +cut with the date 1522, <i>Leuczellburger</i>.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI27" id = "noteVI27" href = "#tagVI27">VI.27</a> +There are proofs of this alphabet in the Royal Collection at Dresden, as +well as in the Public Library at Basle.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI28" id = "noteVI28" href = "#tagVI28">VI.28</a> +Hans Holbein der Jüngere, S. 332.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI29" id = "noteVI29" href = "#tagVI29">VI.29</a> +Hans Ladenspelder was a native of Essen, a frontier town in the duchy of +Berg. The following mark is to be found on his engravings <img class = +"middle" src = "images/illus_355b.png" width = "29" height = "29" alt = +"symbol">, which Bartsch thinks may be intended for the single letters +I. L. V. E. S.,—representing the words <i>Joannes +Ladenspelder Von Essen Sculpsit</i>.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI30" id = "noteVI30" href = "#tagVI30">VI.30</a> +Of this George Reperdius, or his works, nothing, I believe, is +known beyond the brief mention of his name in conjunction with that of +Holbein in the verses of Bourbon.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI31" id = "noteVI31" href = "#tagVI31">VI.31</a> +Neither these verses, nor those previously cited, occur in the first +edition of the Nugæ, Paris, 1533.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI32" id = "noteVI32" href = "#tagVI32">VI.32</a> +At that period a wood-cut, as well as a painting, was termed +<i>pictura</i>.—On the title-page of an edition of the New +Testament, with wood-cuts, Zurich, 1554, by Froschover, we find the +following: “Novi Testamenti Editio postrema per Des. Erasmum +Roterodamum. Omnia <i>picturis</i> illustrata.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI33" id = "noteVI33" href = "#tagVI33">VI.33</a> +Douce’s Dance of Death, pp. 80, 100, and 101.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI34" id = "noteVI34" href = "#tagVI34">VI.34</a> +Mr. Douce here seems to lay some weight on the word <i>picta</i>, which, +as has been previously observed, was applied equally to wood engravings +and paintings.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI35" id = "noteVI35" href = "#tagVI35">VI.35</a> +Douce, Dance of Death, p. 141.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI36" id = "noteVI36" href = "#tagVI36">VI.36</a> +“The identification of William Benting,” says Mr. Douce with exquisite +bon-hommie, “must be left to the sagacity of others. He <i>could not +have been</i> the Earl of Portland created in 1689, or he would have +been addressed accordingly. He is, moreover, described as a youth born +at Whitehall, and then residing there, and whose dwelling consisted of +nearly the whole of the palace that remained after the +fire.”—Dance of Death, p. 244. It appears that these +addresses of Piccard were written in a foreign language, though, whether +Dutch, French, German, or Latin, Mr. Douce most unaccountably neglects +to say: he merely mentions that his extracts are translated.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI37" id = "noteVI37" href = "#tagVI37">VI.37</a> +Douce’s Dance of Death, pp. 144, 145.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI38" id = "noteVI38" href = "#tagVI38">VI.38</a> +That the reader may judge for himself of the similarity of thought in +the passages referred to, they are here given in juxta-position.</p> + +<p class = "continue"> +“Car ses histoires funebres, avec leurs descriptions severement +rithmées, aux advisans donnent telle admiration, qu’ilz en <i>jugent les +mortz y apparoistre tresvivement</i>, et les vifs tresmortement +representer. Qui me faict penser, que la Mort craignant que ce excellent +painctre ne la paignist tant vifve qu’elle ne fut plus crainte pour +Mort, <i>et que pour cela luy mesme n’en devint immortel</i>, que a +ceste cause,” &c.—<i>Epistre des Faces de la Mort.</i></p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "open">“Dum mortis Hansus pictor imaginem exprimit,</p> +<p>Tanta arte mortem retulit, ut mors vivere</p> +<p>Videatur ipsa: et ipse se immortalibus</p> +<p>Parem Diis fecerit, operis hujus gloria.”</p> +<p class = "author"><i>Borbonius.</i></p> +</div> + +<p><a name = "noteVI39" id = "noteVI39" href = "#tagVI39">VI.39</a> +Hegner, in his Life of Holbein, speaking of the Nieuhoff discovery, +says: “Of this fable no notice would have been taken here had not Mr. +Douce ascribed undeserved authority to it, and had not his superficial +investigations found undeserved credit with English and other +compilers.” Hans Holbein der Jüngere, S. 338.</p> + +<p class = "continue"> +Mr. Douce, at page 240 of his Dance of Death, complains of Hegner’s want +of urbanity and politeness; and in return calls his account of Holbein’s +works <i>superficial</i>, and moreover says that “his arguments, if +worthy of the name, are, generally speaking, of a most weak and flimsy +texture.” He also gives him a sharp rebuff by alluding to him as the +“above <i>gentleman</i>,” the last word, to give it point, being printed +in Italics. Mr. Douce, when he was thus pelting Hegner, does not seem to +have been aware that his own anti-Holbenian superstructure was a house +of glass.</p> + +<p class = "center"> +“Cedimus, inque vicem dedimus crura sagittis.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI40" id = "noteVI40" href = "#tagVI40">VI.40</a> +Evelyn is only referred to here on account of his <i>silence</i> with +respect to the pretended painting at Whitehall. What he says of Holbein +cannot be relied on, as will be seen from the following passage, which +is a fair specimen of his general knowledge and accuracy. “We have seen +some few things cut in wood by the incomparable Hans Holbein the Dane, +but they are rare and exceedingly difficult to come by; as his +<i>Licentiousness of the Friars and Nuns</i>; <i>Erasmus</i>; <i>The +Dance Macchabre</i>; the <i>Mortis Imago</i>, which he painted in great +in the Church of Basil, and afterwards graved with no less +art.”—Evelyn’s Sculpture, p. 69. Edition 1769.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI41" id = "noteVI41" href = "#tagVI41">VI.41</a> +“Imagines Mortis expressæ ab optimo pictore Johanne Holbein cum +epigrammatibus Georgii Æmylii, excusæ Francofurti et Lugduni apud +Frellonios, quorum editio plures habet picturas. Vidi etiam cum metris +Gallicis et Germanicis, si bene memini.” Mr. Douce cites this passage +from Gesner’s Pandectæ, “a supplemental volume of great rarity to +his well-known Bibliotheca.” The correct title of the volume in which it +occurs is “Partitiones Theologicæ, Pandectarum Universalium Conradi +Gesneri Liber Ultimus.” Folio, printed by Christopher Froschover, Zurich +(Tiguri) 1549. The notice of the Dance of Death is in folio 86, +<i>a</i>.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI42" id = "noteVI42" href = "#tagVI42">VI.42</a> +Traité de la Gravure en Bois, tom. i. p. 165. Van Mander asserts that +Holbein painted with his left hand; but Horace Walpole, however, in +opposition to this, refers to a portrait of Holbein, formerly in the +Arundelian collection, where he appears holding the pencil in his +<i>right</i> hand.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI43" id = "noteVI43" href = "#tagVI43">VI.43</a> +A copy of this edition is preserved in the Public Library at Basle, and +there is another copy in the Royal Collection at Dresden. Another +edition, in every respect similar to the first, was also printed by the +brothers Trechsel in 1539. Hegner, in his Life of Holbein, does not seem +to have known of this edition; speaking of that of 1538, he says, “It is +probably the same as that to which Papillon gives the date 1539.” There +is a copy of the edition of 1539 in the British Museum.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI44" id = "noteVI44" href = "#tagVI44">VI.44</a> +“A comparison of the 8th subject of the Simulachres,” says Mr. Douce, +“with that of the Bible for Esther <span class = "smallroman">I</span>, +<span class = "smallroman">II</span>, where the canopy ornamented with +fleurs-de-lis is the same in both, will contribute to strengthen the +above conjecture, as will both the cuts to demonstrate their Gallic +origin. It is most certain that the King sitting at table in the +Simulachres is intended for Francis I, which if any one should doubt, +let him look upon the miniature of that king, copied at p. 214, in +Clarke’s ‘Repertorium Bibliographicum.’” The “above conjecture” referred +to in this extract is that previously cited at page 367, where Mr. Douce +conjectures that Holbein <i>might have been</i> employed to complete the +Bible cuts which <i>might have been</i> left unfinished in consequence +of the death of Mr. Douce’s “great unknown” designer of the Dance of +Death.—Dance of Death, p. 96. Mr. Douce, not being able to +deny the similarity of many of the cuts, says it is highly probable that +Holbein was merely employed to finish the Bible cuts, without ever +considering that it is <i>primâ facie</i> much more probable that +Holbein was the designer of the cuts in both works.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI45" id = "noteVI45" href = "#tagVI45">VI.45</a> +Dance of Death, p. 82.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI46" id = "noteVI46" href = "#tagVI46">VI.46</a> +“Venit nuper Basileam ex Anglia Ioannes Holbein, adeo felicem ejus regni +statum prædicans, qui aliquot septimanis exactis rursum eo migraturus +est.” From a letter written by Rudolph Gualter to Henry Bullinger, of +Zurich, about the middle of September 1538.—Quoted by Hegner, +S. 246.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI47" id = "noteVI47" href = "#tagVI47">VI.47</a> +Dr. Dibdin, in his Bibliographical Tour vol. iii. pp. 80, 81, Edit. +1829, mentions two paintings at Augsburg by the elder Holbein, one dated +1499 and the other 1501. The elder Holbein had a brother named +Sigismund, who was also a painter, and who appears to have established +himself at Berne. Papillon, in his usual manner, makes Sigismund Holbein +a wood engraver. By his will, dated 1540, he appoints his nephew Hans +the heir of all his property in Berne.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI48" id = "noteVI48" href = "#tagVI48">VI.48</a> +Patin’s edition of this work was published in octavo, at Basle, in 1676. +It contains eighty-three copper-plate engravings, from pen-and-ink +sketches, drawn by Holbein, in the margin of a copy of an edition +printed by Frobenius, in 1514, and still preserved (1860) in the Public +Library at Basle. It is said that Erasmus, when looking over those +sketches, exclaimed, when he came to that intended for himself, “Oho, if +Erasmus were now as he appears here, he would certainly take a wife.” +Above another of the sketches, representing a man with one of his arms +about a woman’s neck, and at the same time drinking out of a bottle, +Erasmus is said to have written the name “<i>Holbein.</i>” In an edition +of the Laus Stultitiæ, edited by G. G. Becker, Basle, 1780, 8vo. +those sketches are engraved (very indifferently) on wood.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI49" id = "noteVI49" href = "#tagVI49">VI.49</a> +Hegner, Hans Holbein der Jüngere, S. 110.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI50" id = "noteVI50" href = "#tagVI50">VI.50</a> +It is conjectured by Walpole that this might be Henry Fitz-Alan, Earl of +Arundel.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI51" id = "noteVI51" href = "#tagVI51">VI.51</a> +It is impossible to exceed the beauty and skill that are manifested in +this fine piece of art. The figures are, a king, queen, and a +warrior; a young woman, a monk, and an infant; all of whom +most unwillingly accompany Death in the Dance. The despair of the king, +the dejection of the queen, accompanied by her little dog, the terror of +the soldier who hears the drum of Death, the struggling of the female, +the reluctance of the monk, and the sorrow of the poor infant, are +depicted with equal spirit and veracity. The original drawing is in the +public library at Basle, and ascribed to Holbein.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI52" id = "noteVI52" href = "#tagVI52">VI.52</a> +The verses underneath the impressions which are supposed to be the +earliest, are as follows:</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "open">“Corporis effigiem si quis non vidit Erasmi,</p> +<p>Hunc scite ad vivum picta tabella dabit.”</p> +</div> + +<p>The others:</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "open">“Pallas Apellæam nuper mirata tabellam,</p> +<p>Hanc, ait, æternum Bibliotheca colat.</p> +<p>Dædaleam monstrat musis Holbeinnius artem,</p> +<p>Et summi ingenii Magnus Erasmus opes.”</p> +</div> + +<p><a name = "noteVI53" id = "noteVI53" href = "#tagVI53">VI.53</a> +Erasmus, writing to Bilibald Pirkheimer, in 1524, says, “Rursus nuper +misi in Angliam Erasmum bis pictum ab artifice satis eleganti.” Hegner +thinks that this artist was Holbein. In 1517 a portrait of Erasmus, with +that of his friend Petrus Aegidius, was painted at Antwerp by Quintin +Matsys. It was intended by Erasmus as a present to Sir Thomas More. This +painting came subsequently into the possession of Dr. Mead, at whose +sale it was purchased, as the production of Holbein, by Lord Radnor, for +£110.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI54" id = "noteVI54" href = "#tagVI54">VI.54</a> +“Pictor tuus, Erasme carissime, mirus est artifex, sed vereor ne non +sensurus sit Angliam tam fœcundam ac fertilem quam sperarat. Quanquam ne +reperiat omnino sterilem, quoad per me fieri potest, efficiam. Ex aula +Grenwici. 18 Dec. 1525.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI55" id = "noteVI55" href = "#tagVI55">VI.55</a> +“Qui has reddit, est is qui me pinxit. Ejus commendatione te non +gravabo, quanquam est insignis artifex. Si cupiet visere Quintinum, nec +tibi vacabit hominem adducere, poteris per famulum commonstrare domum. +Hic frigent artes: petit Angliam ut corradat aliquot angelatos: per eum +poteris quæ voles scribere.”—Erasmi Epist.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI56" id = "noteVI56" href = "#tagVI56">VI.56</a> +Erasmus, in a letter to Sir Thomas More, written from Freyburg in +Brisgau, 5th September, 1529, alludes to a picture of More and his +family which had been brought over by Holbein; and Margaret Roper, the +eldest daughter of Sir Thomas More, writing to Erasmus in the following +November, says, that she is pleased to hear of the painter’s arrival +with the family picture,—“utriusque mei parentis nostrumque omnium +effigiem depictam.” Hegner thinks that those portraits of Sir Thomas +More and his family was only a drawing in pen-and-ink, which is now in +the Public Library at Basle. The figures in this drawing are: Sir Thomas +and his wife, his father, his son, and a young lady, three daughters, +a servant, and Sir Thomas’s jester. Over and under the figures are +written the name and age of each. The drawing is free and light; and the +faces and hands are very distinctly expressed.—Hans Holbein der +Jüngere, S. 202-235-237. The drawing in the Public Library at Basle +was probably a sketch of Holbein’s large picture of the family of Sir +Thomas More.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI57" id = "noteVI57" href = "#tagVI57">VI.57</a> +Holbein’s wife and <i>child</i> only, not children, are mentioned in +this licence. It is not known what became of Holbein’s children, as +there are no traces of his descendants to be found at Basle. Merian, +a clergyman of Basle, in a letter to Mechel on this subject, in +1779, writes to this effect: “According to a pedigree of the Merian +family, printed at Regensburg in 1727, Christina Syf, daughter of +Rodolph Syf and Judith Weissin, and grand-daughter of Hans Holbein the +unequalled painter, (born 1597,) was married on the 17th of November +1616 to Frederick Merian.” Perhaps it is meant that Judith Weissin was +Holbein’s grand-daughter: there is evidently an error in the pedigree; +and if it be wrong in this respect, it is not entitled to much credit in +another.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI58" id = "noteVI58" href = "#tagVI58">VI.58</a> +Hegner, S. 242.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI59" id = "noteVI59" href = "#tagVI59">VI.59</a> +See Dallaway’s edition, revised by R. N. Wornum. London, Bohn, 1849, +3 vols. 8vo. Vol. i. pp. 66 et seq.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI60" id = "noteVI60" href = "#tagVI60">VI.60</a> +Those designs were engraved on sixteen small plates by Hollar, but +without his name. The enemies of Christ are represented in the dress of +monks and friars, and instead of weapons they bear croziers, large +candlesticks, and other church ornaments; Judas appears as a capucin, +Annas as a cardinal, and Caiaphas as a bishop. In the subject of +Christ’s Descent to Hades, the gates are hung with papal bulls and +dispensations; above them are the Pope’s arms, and the devil as keeper +of the gate wears a triple crown. Underneath this engraving are the +following verses, which are certainly not of the period of Holbein:</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "open">“Lo! the Pope’s kitchin, where his soles are +fried,</p> +<p>Called Purgatorie; see his pardons tied</p> +<p>On strings; his triple crown the Divell weares,</p> +<p>And o’er the door the Pope’s own arms he beares.”</p> +</div> + +<p>In the subject of Christ before Caiaphas is the following inscription +in German: “<i>Wer wider die Römischen, der soll +sterben</i>,”—that is, “He who is against the Romans shall +die.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI61" id = "noteVI61" href = "#tagVI61">VI.61</a> +The following is the title of this scarce little volume. “Catechismus, +that is to say, a shorte instruction into Christian religion for +the singuler commoditie and profyte of childrē and yong people. Set +forth by the mooste reverende father in God, Thomas Archbyshop of +Canterbury, primate of all Englande and Metropolitane.—Gualterus +Lynne excudebat, 1548.” At the end of the book, under a cut of Christ +with a child before him, is the colophon: “Imprynted at London, in +S. Jhones Streete, by Nycolas Hyll, for Gwalter Lynne dwellyng on +Somers kaye, by Byllynges gate.” Mr. Douce, at page 96, mentions a cut +with the name <i>Hans Holbein</i> at the bottom, as occurring in the +title-page of “A lytle treatise after the manner of an Epystle +wryten by the famous clerk Doctor Urbanus Regius,” &c. also +published by Walter Lynne, 1548.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI62" id = "noteVI62" href = "#tagVI62">VI.62</a> +Mr. Douce, in his observations prefixed to Hollar’s etchings of the +Dance of Death, published by Edwards in 1794, says, “A <i>set</i> +of cuts with the latter mark [<i>Hans Holben</i>] occurs in Archbishop +Cranmer’s Catechism, printed by Walter Lyne, in 1548;” and in the same +page he commits another mistake by describing the mark on the cut of the +Duchess in the Lyons Dance of Death as <img class = "middle" src = +"images/illus_441.png" width = "22" height = "22" alt = "HB">, instead +of <img class = "middle" src = "images/illus_381b.png" width = "28" +height = "20" alt = "HL">. It has been considered necessary to notice +these errors, as it is probable that many persons who possess the work +in which they occur, but who never may have seen a copy of the Lyons +Dance of Death, nor of Cranmer’s Catechism, may have been misled in +those matters by implicitly relying on Mr. Douce’s authority. +A certain class of compilers are also extremely liable to transmit +such mistakes, and, to borrow an expression of Hegner’s, to give +currency to them, as if they stood ready for use “in +<i>stereotype</i>.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI63" id = "noteVI63" href = "#tagVI63">VI.63</a> +The title-page of this book—which has previously been referred to +at page 357, in illustration of the word <i>picta</i>—is as +follows: “Novi Testamenti Editio postrema per Des. Erasmum Roterodamum. +Omnia picturis illustrata. Accesserunt Capitum argumenta Elegiaco +carmine, Rudolpho Gualtero authore, conscripta. Tiguri, in Officina +Froschoviana. Anno <span class = "smallroman">M.D.LIIII.</span>” +8vo.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI64" id = "noteVI64" href = "#tagVI64">VI.64</a> +The volume is of octavo size, and the title is as follows: “The Newe +Testament. Imprinted at Antwerp by Marten Emperour. Anno <span class = +"smallroman">M.D.XXXIIII.</span>” The letters on the wood-cut of the +printer’s device, seen in the copies on paper, are <span class = +"smallroman">M. K.</span> The first edition of Tindale’s +Translation was printed in 1526. William Tindale, otherwise Hitchins, +was born on the borders of Wales, but was of a Northumberland family, +being descended from Adam de Tindale of Langley, near Haydon Bridge, in +that county. He was strangled, and his body was afterwards burnt as that +of a heretic by the popish party, at Vilvorde, near Brussels, in +1536.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI65" id = "noteVI65" href = "#tagVI65">VI.65</a> +The title of this edition is as follows: “<span class = +"smallcaps">Biblia.</span> The Bible, that is, the holy Scripture of the +Olde and Newe Testaments, faithfully translated out of Douche and Latyn +in to Englishe. <span class = "smallroman">M.D.XXXV.</span>” This title +is surrounded with an ornamental wood-cut border of ten compartments: +1. Adam and Eve. 2. The name of Jehovah in Hebrew characters +in the centre at the top. 3. Christ with the banner of the cross +trampling on the serpent, sin, and death. 4. Moses receiving the +tables of the law. 5. Jewish High Priest,—Esdras. +6. Christ sending his disciples to preach the Gospel. 7. Paul +preaching. 8. David playing on the harp. 9. In the centre at +the bottom, King Henry VIII. on his throne giving a book—probably +intended for the Bible—to certain abbots and bishops. 10. St. +Paul with a sword. The day of the month mentioned in the colophon was +probably the date of the last sheet being sent to press: “Prynted in the +yeare of our Lorde <span class = "smallroman">M.D.XXXV</span>, and +fynished the fourth daye of October.” Copies of this edition with the +title-page are extremely rare. Some copies have a modern lithographed +title prefixed, which is not exactly correct, though professedly a +fac-simile: in one of the scrolls it has “<i>telius meus</i>” for +“filius meus.” In the corresponding scroll in a copy in the British +Museum the words are in English: “This is my deare Son in whom I delyte, +heare him,”—above the figure of Christ with the banner of the +cross. I have not the least doubt of this title-page having been +designed by Holbein.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI66" id = "noteVI66" href = "#tagVI66">VI.66</a> +The following is the title of this curious and scarce work: “Le Sorti di +Francesco Marcolini da Forli, intitolate Giardino di Pensieri.” +Dedicated, “Allo Illustrissimo Signore Hercole Estense, Duca di +Ferrara.” At the conclusion is the colophon: “In Venetia per Francesco +Marcolini da Forli, ne gli anni del Signore <span class = +"smallroman">MDXXXX.</span> Del mese di Ottobre.” In a <i>proemio</i>, +or preface, the author explains the manner of applying his “<i>piacevole +inventione</i>,” which is nothing more than a mode of resolving +questions by cards, and was probably suggested by Fanti’s Triompho di +Fortuna, of which some account is given at page 315.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI67" id = "noteVI67" href = "#tagVI67">VI.67</a> +Papillon, Traité de la Gravure en Bois, tom. i. p. 137.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI68" id = "noteVI68" href = "#tagVI68">VI.68</a> +This catalogue is printed in the second volume of Heineken’s Nachrichten +von Künstlern und Kunst-Sachen, 8vo. Leipzig, 1768-1769. This work, +which appeared two years before his Idée Générale d’une Collection +complette d’Estampes, contains much information on the early history of +art, which is not to be found in the latter. All the fac-similes of old +engravings in the Idée Générale originally appeared in the Nachrichten. +Heineken, in the first volume of this work, p. 340, mentions +Porta’s cut, but says nothing of its being copied from a design by +Raffaele.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI69" id = "noteVI69" href = "#tagVI69">VI.69</a> +Heineken, in his Nachrichten, 1er. Theil, S. 340, says that Joseph +Porta “was a pupil of <i>Cecchino</i> Salviati, who is not to be +confounded with <i>Francesco</i> Salviati;” and yet in his Idée +Générale, published subsequently, page 134, we find “Francesco del +Salviati, autrement Rossi, de Florence, et son disciple Giuseppe Porta, +appellé communément Giuseppe Salviati.” Heineken, in his first work, +committed the mistake of supposing that Francesco Salviati’s to-name was +the Christian name of another person. In Huber’s Notice Générale des +Graveurs et Peintres, Francis Salviati appears as “François Cecchini, +dit Salviati.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI70" id = "noteVI70" href = "#tagVI70">VI.70</a> +The first forty-six cuts are the best, generally, both in design and +execution. The others, commencing at page 108, are illustrative of the +sayings and doctrines of ancient philosophers and moralists, and one or +two of the cuts are repeated. In this portion of the work, each page, +except what is occupied by the cut, is filled with explanatory or +illustrative verses arranged in triplets.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI71" id = "noteVI71" href = "#tagVI71">VI.71</a> +The first hundred and seven pages of the work are chiefly filled with +similar figures of cards variously combined, with short references. How +Marcolini’s pleasant invention is to be applied to discover the secrets +of Fate, I have not been able to comprehend.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI72" id = "noteVI72" href = "#tagVI72">VI.72</a> +The following is a literal copy of the title: “Libro di M. Giovam +Battista Palatino, Cittadino Romano, Nelqual s’insegna à Scriver ogni +sorte lettera, Antica & Moderna, di qualunque natione, con le sue +regole, & misure, & essempi: Et con un breve, et util Discorso +de le Cifre: Riveduto novamente, & corretto dal proprio Autore. Con +la giunta di quindici tavole bellissime.” At the end of the work is the +imprint: “In Roma per Valerio Dorico alla Chiavica de Santa Lucia. Ad +Instantia de M. Giovan della Gatta. L’Anno <span class = +"smallroman">M.D.LXI.</span>” 4to. Papillon says that the work first +appeared in 1540, and was reprinted in 1545, 1547, 1548, 1550, 1553, and +1556. An edition was also published at Venice in 1588.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI73" id = "noteVI73" href = "#tagVI73">VI.73</a> +There is a curious allusion to a <i>Rebus</i> in Horace, Satyr. Lib. +I. Sat. V., Vers. 88, which has escaped the notice of all his +commentators:</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p class = "open">“Quatuor hinc rapimur viginti et millia rhedis,</p> +<p>Mansuri oppidulo, quod versu dicere non est,</p> +<p><i>Signis perfacile est.</i>”</p> +</div> + +<p class = "continue"> +The place which he did not think proper to name was undoubtedly Asculum, +whose situation exactly corresponds with the distance from +<i>Trivicum</i>, where he rested the preceding night. From the manner in +which Horace alludes to the <i>signa</i>—<i>as</i> and +<i>culum</i>—of which the name is composed, it seems likely that a +certain vulgar benison was not unknown at Rome in the age of +Augustus.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI74" id = "noteVI74" href = "#tagVI74">VI.74</a> +Remaines concerning Britaine, with additions by John Philpot, Somerset +Herald, p. 164. Edit. 1636.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI75" id = "noteVI75" href = "#tagVI75">VI.75</a> +Papillon, who speaks highly of the execution of the cuts ascribed to +Bernard Solomon, admits that they want effect. “La gravure,” says he, +speaking of the cuts contained in ‘Quadrins Historiques de la Bible,’ +“est fort belle, excepté qu’elle manque de clair obscur, parce que les +tailles sont presque toutes de la même teinte, ce qui fait que les +lointains ne fuyent pas assez. C’est le seul defaut des gravures de +Bernard Salomon; ce qui lui a été commun avec plus de quarante autres +graveurs en bois de son temps.”—Traité de la Gravure en Bois, tom. +i. p. 209.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI76" id = "noteVI76" href = "#tagVI76">VI.76</a> +Several editions of Alciat’s Emblems and Claude Paradin’s Devises +Heroïques were published at Lyons in the sixteenth century. The first +edition of the latter work was printed there by Jean de Tournes, in +1557, 8vo.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI77" id = "noteVI77" href = "#tagVI77">VI.77</a> +The following explanatory title occurs on the first cut: “Ces moeurs et +fachons de faire de Turcz avecq’ les Regions y appartenantes, ont este +au vif contrefactez par Pierre Coeck d’Alost, luy estant en Turquie, +l’an de Jesu Christ <span class = "smallroman">M.D.</span> 33. Lequel +assy de sa main propre a pourtraict ces figures duysantes à l’impression +d’ycelles.” From another of the cuts we thus learn the time of his +death: “Marie Verhulst vefue du dict Pierre d’Alost, trespasse en l’anne +<span class = "smallroman">MDL</span>, a faict imprimer les dicts +figures soubz Grace et Privilege de l’Imperialle Maiestie. En l’Ann +<span class = "smallroman">MCCCCCLIII</span>.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI78" id = "noteVI78" href = "#tagVI78">VI.78</a> +This interesting specimen of the combined arts of wood engraving and +printing formerly belonged to the late Mr. Robert Branston, wood +engraver, who executed several of the chiaro-scuros, and imitations of +coloured drawings, in Savage’s work on Decorative Printing. It is now in +the possession of his son, Mr. Frederick Branston, who is of the same +profession as his father.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI79" id = "noteVI79" href = "#tagVI79">VI.79</a> +The title-page of this work is printed in three colours,—black, +sepia, and green. The black ornamental outlines are from an etched +plate; the sepia and green colours are printed from wood-blocks. An +edition of this work, enlarged by Gevartius, with portraits in two +colours, and entirely engraved on wood, was printed at Antwerp in +1645.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI80" id = "noteVI80" href = "#tagVI80">VI.80</a> +Tom. i. p. 129. Paris, 1753.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI81" id = "noteVI81" href = "#tagVI81">VI.81</a> +The following is a copy of the title: “Underweisung der Proportzion und +Stellung der Possen, liegent und stehent; abgestochen wie man das vor +augen sieht, in dem puchlein, durch Erhart Schon von Norrenberg; für die +Jungen gesellen und Jungen zu unterrichtung die zu der Kunst lieb +tragen. In den druck gepracht, 1538.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI82" id = "noteVI82" href = "#tagVI82">VI.82</a> +This last letter contains the mark <img class = "middle" src = +"images/illus_337a.png" width = "28" height = "21" alt = "SA">, which is +to be found on some of the cuts in the editions of the Dance of Death +printed at Cologne, 1555-1572.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI83" id = "noteVI83" href = "#tagVI83">VI.83</a> +The title is as follows: “Johan. Posthii Germershemii Tetrasticha in +Ovidii Metam. Lib. xv. Quibus accesserunt Vergilii Solis figuræ +elegantissimæ, primum in lucem editæ.—Schöne Figuren, auss dem +fürtrefflichen Poeten Ovidio, allen Malern, Goldtschmiden, und +Bildthauern, zu nutz und gutem mit fleiss gerissen durch Vergilium +Solis, und mit Teutschen Reimen kürtzlich erkläret, dergleichein vormals +im Druck nie aussgangen, Durch Johan. Posthium von Germerssheim. <span +class = "smallroman">M.D.LXIX.</span>”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI84" id = "noteVI84" href = "#tagVI84">VI.84</a> +Hans Sachs, whose poetical works might vie in quantity with those of +Lope Vega, was born at Nuremberg in 1494. Notwithstanding the immense +number of verses which he composed, he did not trust to his profession +of Meistersänger for the means of living, but continued to carry on his +business as a shoemaker till his death, which happened in 1576. His +verses were much admired by his contemporaries; and between 1570 and +1579, a collection of his works was published in five volumes +folio. Several short pieces by him were originally printed as +“broadsides,” with an ornamental or illustrative cut at the top.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI85" id = "noteVI85" href = "#tagVI85">VI.85</a> +Papillon, who appears to have been extremely wishful to swell his +catalogue of wood engravers, describes Jost Amman of Zurich and Jost +Amman of Nuremberg as two different persons.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI86" id = "noteVI86" href = "#tagVI86">VI.86</a> +Heineken, Idée Générale, p. 244.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI87" id = "noteVI87" href = "#tagVI87">VI.87</a> +The following is the title of the edition of 1568;—that of 1574 is +somewhat different. “<span class = "smallroman greek" lang = "el" title += "(Greek) PANOPLIA">ΠΑΝΟΠΛΙΑ</span> omnium Illiberalium mechanicarum +aut sedentariarum artium, continens quotquot unquam vel a veteribus, aut +nostri etiam seculi celebritate excogitari potuerunt, breviter et +dilucide confecta: carminum liber primus, tum mira varietate rerum +vocabulorumque novo more excogitatorum copia perquam utilis, lectuque +jucundus. Accesserunt etiam venustissimæ Imagines omnes omnium artificum +negociantes ad vivum lectori representantes, antehac nec visæ nec unquam +æditæ: per Hartman Schopperum, Novoforens. Noricum.—Frankofurti ad +Moenum, cum privelegio Cæsario, <span class = +"smallroman">M.D.LXVIII.</span>”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI88" id = "noteVI88" href = "#tagVI88">VI.88</a> +The <i>Briefmalers</i>, though at that time evidently distinct from the +<i>Formschneiders</i>, still continued to <i>print</i> wood-cuts. On +several large wood-cuts with the dates 1553 and 1554 we find the words, +“Gedrukt zu Nürnberg durch Hanns Glaser, <i>Brieffmaler</i>.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI89" id = "noteVI89" href = "#tagVI89">VI.89</a> +See the mark C. S. at page 413.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI90" id = "noteVI90" href = "#tagVI90">VI.90</a> +This work is entitled “Kunstbüchlein,” and consists entirely of cuts +without any explanatory letter-press. The first cut consists of a group +of heads, drawn and engraved with great spirit. On what appears +something like a slab of stone or wood—most unmeaningly and +awkwardly introduced—are Jost Amman’s initials, I.A., towards the +top, and lower down the mark, <img class = "middle" src = +"images/illus_412.png" width = "36" height = "20" alt = "MF"> which is +doubtless that of the engraver. This mark, with a figure of a graver +underneath, occurs on several of the other cuts. The three following +marks, with a graver underneath each, also occur: L. F. +C.S. G. H. These facts are sufficient to prove that Jost Amman +was not the engraver of the cuts which he designed. In the edition of +1599 the cuts are said to have been <i>drawn</i> by “the late most +excellent and celebrated artist, Jost Amman of Nuremberg.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI91" id = "noteVI91" href = "#tagVI91">VI.91</a> +It is uncertain if James I. or James II. be meant. According to Sir +Walter Scott, Aeneas Sylvius, afterwards Pope Pius II, visited Scotland +in 1448, when James II.—if Chalmers be correct, Caledonia, vol. +i. p. 831,—was scarcely nineteen, and when his +appearance was not likely to correspond with the learned prelate’s +description,—“hominem quadratum et multa pinguedine gravem.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI92" id = "noteVI92" href = "#tagVI92">VI.92</a> +“Avium præcipuarum, quarum apud Plinium et Aristotelem mentio est, +brevis et succincta historia. Per Dn. Gulielmum Turnerum, artium et +medicinæ doctorem,” 8vo. Coloniæ, <span class = +"smallroman">M.D.XLIIII</span>, fol. 9 <i>b</i>.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI93" id = "noteVI93" href = "#tagVI93">VI.93</a> +In Professor Christ’s Dictionary of Monograms this mark is ascribed, +though doubtfully, to “Manuel Deutsch.” It is certainly not the mark of +Nicholas Emanuel Deutsch of Bern, for he died several years before 1548, +the date on several of the cuts with the mark H.R. M.D. in +Munster’s Cosmography, and which date evidently relates to the year in +which the artist made the drawing. There can be no doubt that those four +letters belong to a single name, for some of the cuts in which they +occur also contain the mark of an engraver.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI94" id = "noteVI94" href = "#tagVI94">VI.94</a> +A map of Russia, engraved wholly on wood, in a work entitled “Commentari +della Moscovia e parimente della Russia,” &c. translated from +the Latin of Sigmund, Baron von Herberstein, printed at Venice, 4to. +1550, is much superior in point of appearance to the best in the work of +Munster. This map, which is of folio size, appears to have been +constructed by “Giacomo Gastaldo, Piamontese, Cosmographo in Venetia.” +The work also contains six wood-cuts, which afford some curious +specimens of Russian and Tartar arms and costume.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI95" id = "noteVI95" href = "#tagVI95">VI.95</a> +Philologicarum Epistolarum Centuria una, ex Bibliotheca M. H. +Goldasti, p. 165. 8vo. Francofurti, 1610.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI96" id = "noteVI96" href = "#tagVI96">VI.96</a> +According to this method, certain words, together with radices and +terminations of frequent occurrence, were cast entire, and not in +separate letters, and placed in cases in such an order that the +compositor could as “readily possess himself of the Type of a word as of +the Type of a single letter.” This method, for which a patent was +obtained, is explained in a pamphlet entitled “An Introduction to +Logography: or the Art of Arranging and Composing for Printing with +Words entire, their Radices and Terminations, instead of single Letters. +By Henry Johnson: London, printed Logographically, and sold by +J. Walter, bookseller, Charing Cross, and J. Sewell, Cornhill, +<span class = "smallroman">M.DCC.LXXXIII.</span>” Several works were +printed in this manner, and among others an edition of Anderson’s +History of Commerce, 4 vols. 4to. 1787-1789, by John Walter, at the +Logographic Press, Printing-House-Square, Blackfriars. Logography has +long been abandoned. The following account of this art is given in +H. G. Bohn’s Lecture on Printing, pp. 88, 89. “Something akin to +stereotyping is another mode of printing called Logography, invented by +the late Mr. Walter, of the <i>Times</i>, in 1783, and for which he took +out a patent. This means a system of printing from type cast in words +instead of single letters, which it was thought would save time and +corrections when applied to newspapers, but it was not found to answer. +A joke of the time was a supposed order to the typefounder for some +words of frequent occurrence, which ran thus:—‘Please send me a +hundred-weight, sorted, of murder, fire, dreadful robbery, atrocious +outrage, fearful calamity, alarming explosion, melancholy accident; an +assortment of honourable member, whig, tory, hot, cold, wet, dry; +half-a-hundred weight, made up in pounds, of butter, cheese, beef, +mutton, tripe, mustard, soap, rain, &c.; and a few devils, angels, +women, groans, hisses, &c.’ This method of printing did not succeed: +for if twenty-four letters will give six hundred sextillions of +combinations, no printing office could keep a sufficient assortment of +even popular words.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI97" id = "noteVI97" href = "#tagVI97">VI.97</a> +See an edition of Ptolemy, printed at Venice by Jacobus Pentius de +Leucho, in 1511, previously noticed at page 203.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI98" id = "noteVI98" href = "#tagVI98">VI.98</a> +Some account of this work is given at page 200.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI99" id = "noteVI99" href = "#tagVI99">VI.99</a> +At page 204 it is stated, on the authority of Breitkopf, that those maps +were engraved by Ægidius Diest. Ortelius himself says in the preface +that they were engraved by “Francis Hogenberg, Ferdinand and Ambrose +Arsens, and others.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI100" id = "noteVI100" href = "#tagVI100">VI.100</a> +The portrait of Queen Elizabeth appears on the title; the Earl of +Leicester’s is prefixed to the Book of Joshua; and Lord Burleigh’s is +given, with a large initial B, at the beginning of the first psalm. In +the second edition, 1572, the portrait of Lord Burleigh is omitted, and +the impressions of the other two are much inferior to those in the first +edition in consequence of the plates being worn. Many of the cuts in the +second edition are quite different from those in the first, and +generally inferior to the cuts for which they are substituted.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI101" id = "noteVI101" href = "#tagVI101">VI.101</a> +“Humphrey Cole, as he says himself, was born in the North of England, +and <i>pertayned to the mint in the Tower</i>, 1572. I suppose he +was one of the engravers that <i>pertayned</i> to Archbishop Parker, for +this edition was called Matthew Parker’s Bible. I hope the flattery +of the favourites was the incense of the engraver!” Catalogue of +Engravers, p. 16. Edit. 1794.—Walpole does not appear to have +paid the least attention to the engraver’s merits—supposing, as he +does, the portraits to have been executed by him:—he sneers at him +because he had engraved certain portraits for a <i>Bible</i>, and +because he was supposed to have been patronised by a <i>bishop</i>. A +more liberal writer on art would have praised Parker, although he were +an <i>archbishop</i>, for his patronage of a native engraver.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI102" id = "noteVI102" href = "#tagVI102">VI.102</a> +“Augustinus Ryther, <i>Anglus</i>,” occurs on the maps of Cumberland and +Westmorland, Gloucester, and Yorkshire. Ryther afterwards kept a +bookseller’s shop in Leadenhall-street. He engraved some maps and +charts, which were published about 1588. On the map of the county of +Hertford, Reynolds’s name occurs thus: “Nicholas Reynoldus, Londinensis, +sculpsit.” Several of those maps were engraved by Remigius Hogenberg, +one of the engravers who are said to have been employed by Archbishop +Parker in his palace at Lambeth.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI103" id = "noteVI103" href = "#tagVI103">VI.103</a> +This little work, entitled “Commentarioli Britannicæ Descriptionis +Fragmentum,” was sent by the author to Ortelius, and the prefatory +address is dated Denbigh, in North Wales, 30th August 1568. +A translation of it, under the title of a “Breviary of Britain,” +was printed at London in 1573.—Lhuyd had only furnished Ortelius +with materials for the construction of the map of England.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI104" id = "noteVI104" href = "#tagVI104">VI.104</a> +The name of “Thomas Raynalde, Physition,” is not to be found in the +edition of 1540. The title of the work is, “The byrth of Mankynd, newly +translated out of Latin into Englysshe. In the which is entreated of all +suche thynges the which chaunce to women in theyr labor,” +&c. At folio vi. there is an address from Richard Jonas, “Unto +the most gracious, and in all goodnesse most excellent vertuous Lady +Quene Katheryne, wyfe and most derely belovyd spouse unto the moste +myghty sapient Christen prynce, Kynge Henry the VIII.”—This “most +excellent vertuous lady” was <i>Catherine Howard</i>. The imprint at the +end of the work is as follows: “Imprynted at London, by T. R, Anno +Domini, <span class = "smallroman">M.CCCCC.XL.</span>” Raynalde’s name +first appears in the second edition, 1545. Between 1540 and 1600 there +were at least eight editions of this work printed in London.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI105" id = "noteVI105" href = "#tagVI105">VI.105</a> +At the end of the dedication to Henry VIII. he signs himself “Thomas +Geminus, Lysiensis.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI106" id = "noteVI106" href = "#tagVI106">VI.106</a> +In the edition of 1559 there is a large wood-cut—“Interiorum +corporis humani partium viva delineatio”—with the mark R. S. +and a graver underneath. In this cut the interior parts of the body are +impressed on separate slips, which are pasted, by one edge, at the side +of the figure. Those slips on being raised show the different parts as +they occur on dissection.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI107" id = "noteVI107" href = "#tagVI107">VI.107</a> +In Herbert’s edition of the Typographical Antiquities, vol. iii. +p. 1681, both parts of this work are said to have engraved titles, +and the arms of Sir C. Hatton are said to occur at the back of the +title to the first part. The work contains twenty-two maps and charts, +probably copied from the original Dutch edition of Wagenar, who was a +native of Enchuysen. There is no printer’s name in the English +edition.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI108" id = "noteVI108" href = "#tagVI108">VI.108</a> +Walpole erroneously states that “Broughton’s book was not printed till +1600,” and he says that “the <i>cuts</i> were probably engraved by an +English artist named William Rogers.” The mark <img class = "middle" src += "images/illus_423.png" width = "29" height = "22" alt = "WR"> is to be +found on some of the plates of the edition of 1600, but it is to be +observed that they are not the same as those in the edition of 1591. The +<i>first</i> edition of the work was printed in 1588.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI109" id = "noteVI109" href = "#tagVI109">VI.109</a> +The following is the title of this work: “The Cosmographical Glasse, +conteinyng the pleasant Principles of Cosmographie, Geographie, +Hydrographie or Navigation. Compiled by William Cuningham, Doctor in +Physicke. Excussum Londini in officina Joan. Daii, Anno 1559.</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p>In this Glasse, if you will beholde</p> +<p class = "indent">The starry skie and yearth so wide,</p> +<p>The seas also, with the windes so colde,</p> +<p class = "indent">Yea, and thy selfe all these to guide:</p> +<p>What this Type mean first learne a right,</p> +<p class = "indent">So shall the gayne thy travaill quight.”</p> +</div> + +<p class = "continue"> +The “<i>Type</i>” mentioned in these verses relates to the various +allegorical and other figures in the engraved title-page.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI110" id = "noteVI110" href = "#tagVI110">VI.110</a> +This mark, which occurs in two other cuts of large letters in the +Cosmographical Glasse, is also to be found on a large ornamented letter +in Robert Record’s Castle of Knowledge, folio, printed at London, by +Reginald Wolfe, 1556. This work, like that of Cuningham, is a treatise +on Geography. A mark, I. C., with a graver between the +letters, occurs frequently in cuts which ornament the margins of a work +entitled “A Book of Christian Prayers,” &c. 4to. first printed +by John Day in 1569. It is usually called “Queen Elizabeth’s Prayer +Book.” In Herbert’s edition of the Typographical Antiquities it is +erroneously stated that such of the cuts as relate to the History of +Christ are “after Albert Durer and his wife, <i>Agnes Frey</i>.” They +are <i>not</i> copied from any cuts designed by Albert Durer, and his +wife most certainly neither drew nor engraved on wood. It is also +incorrectly stated “that a Dance of Death, in the same work, is after +Hans Holbein.”—The cuts in this work are very unequal in point of +execution. The best are those of the Senses—without any +mark—Sight, Hearing, Taste, Smelling, and Touch. A mark not +unlike that in the letter A, from Cuningham’s Cosmographical Glass, +occurs on several of the smaller cuts.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI111" id = "noteVI111" href = "#tagVI111">VI.111</a> +This work contains a considerable number of wood-cuts, all undoubtedly +designed and engraved in England. Two of the best are Henry VIII, +attended by his council, giving his sanction to the publication of the +Bible in English, with the mark I. F.; and a view of Windsor +Castle, with the mark M. D. Both these cuts are in the second +volume of the edition of 1576.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI112" id = "noteVI112" href = "#tagVI112">VI.112</a> +Dr. Dibdin, in his Preliminary Disquisition on Early Engraving and +Ornamental Printing, in his edition of Ames and Herbert’s Typographical +Antiquities, has given several curious specimens of large ornamented +capitals.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI113" id = "noteVI113" href = "#tagVI113">VI.113</a> +Bibliographical Decameron, vol. i. p. 289.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI114" id = "noteVI114" href = "#tagVI114">VI.114</a> +“The pavement of this cathedral is the work of a succession of artists +from Duccio down to Meccarino, who have produced the effect of the +richest mosaic, merely by inserting grey marble into white, and hatching +both with black mastic. The grandest composition is the History of +Abraham, a figure which is unfortunately multiplied in the same +compartments; but, when grasping the knife, the patriarch is truly +sublime. These works lay exposed at least for a hundred years to the +general tread, and have been rather improved than defaced by the +attrition; for one female figure which had never been trodden looks +harsher than the rest. Those of the choir were opportunely covered two +centuries ago.”—Forsyth’s Italy, p. 102, 2nd Edit.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI115" id = "noteVI115" href = "#tagVI115">VI.115</a> +The following is the title of this work, which is a large octavo: “De +gli Habiti Antichi et Moderni di diverse Parti del Mondo Libri due, +fatti da Caesare Vecellio, & con Discorsi da lui dichiriati. In +Venetia, <span class = "smallroman">MD.XC.</span>” This work is thus +mentioned in the notes to Rogers’s Italy: “Among the Habiti Antichi, in +that admirable book of wood-cuts ascribed to Titian, (A. D. 1590,) +there is one entitled Sposa Venetiana à Castello. It was taken from an +old painting in the Scuola di S. Giovanni Evangelista, and by the +writer is believed to represent one of the brides here +described.”—Italy, p. 257, note. Edit. 1830.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI116" id = "noteVI116" href = "#tagVI116">VI.116</a> +A dog performing the same act occurs as a tail-piece in the first +edition of Bewick’s Quadrupeds, 1790, page 310.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI117" id = "noteVI117" href = "#tagVI117">VI.117</a> +I have seen a large head, which at first sight might be mistaken for an +impression from a wood-block, executed by means of a stencil after a +design of Correggio. It was unquestionably old, and was about three feet +high by two and a half wide.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI118" id = "noteVI118" href = "#tagVI118">VI.118</a> +The following is Papillon’s description of this cut: “Une Estampe que je +possede, et que l’on regarde assez indifférement, est le Laocoon gravé +en bois par le Titien, représenté sous la figure d’un singe et ses deux +petits entourés de serpens. Il fit ce morceau pour railler les Peintres +de son temps qui étudoient cette figure et les Statues antiques; et il +prétendit démontrer par cette Estampe qu’ils ressembloient aux singes, +lesquels ne font qu’imiter ce qu’ils voyent, sans rien inventer d’eux +mêmes.”—Traité de la Gravure en Bois, tom. +i. p. 160.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI119" id = "noteVI119" href = "#tagVI119">VI.119</a> +There is also in the Print Room of the British Museum a curious +wood-cut, of large size, engraved on several blocks, apparently of the +time of James I. The title at the top, in Latin and English, is as +follows: “<span class = "smallcaps">Humanæ vitæ imago olim ab Apelle in +tabula quadam depicta</span>. The image of the lyfe of man that was +painted in a table by Apelles.” The subject, however, is not so much a +general representation of the life of man in its several stages, as an +allegorical representation of the evils attendant on sensual indulgence. +Several of the figures are designed with great spirit, and the +explanations underneath the principal are engraved on the same block, in +Latin and English. It seems likely that this cut was engraved for the +purpose of being pasted or hung against a wall. It is about five feet +four inches wide by about three feet high. Some of the figures are +engraved with considerable spirit, but the groups want that +well-contrasted light and shade which give such effect to the large cuts +of Durer and Burgmair. It is likely that large cuts of this kind were +intended to be pasted on the walls of rooms, to serve at once for +instruction and ornament, like “King Charles’s Golden Rules and the +Royal Game of Goose” in later times.—<i>To this note Mr. Jackson +adds in his annotated copy</i>: “The drawing appears to have been +executed by an artist who was rather partial to cross-hatching, and the +engraving by one who knew how to render every line before him with a +degree of sharpness and delicacy by no means common at that period.”</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI120" id = "noteVI120" href = "#tagVI120">VI.120</a> +The original cut is twenty-three inches and a half wide by eighteen +inches high.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI121" id = "noteVI121" href = "#tagVI121">VI.121</a> +The original is eighteen inches wide by thirteen inches and a half high, +including the margin with the inscription “Cum privilegiis,” which is +engraved on the same block.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI122" id = "noteVI122" href = "#tagVI122">VI.122</a> +Papillon, tom. i. p. 274-276, calls this engraver <i>C. S. +Vichem</i>; and charges Professor Christ with confounding three +<i>Sichems</i> with three <i>Vichems</i>. The name at the bottom of the +cut, in the following page, is most certainly intended for <i>C. V. +Sichem</i>.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI123" id = "noteVI123" href = "#tagVI123">VI.123</a> +The twelfth volume of Bartsch’s Peintre-Graveur contains an ample list +of Italian chiaro-scuros, together with the names of the painters and +engravers.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI124" id = "noteVI124" href = "#tagVI124">VI.124</a> +The only perfect copy which I have seen of this little work is in +Spanish. The title is as follows: “La Perpetua Cruz, o Passion de +Jesu Christo Nuestro Señor, desde el principio de su encarnacion hasta +su muerte. Representada en quarenta estampas que se reparten de balde, +y explicada con differentes razones y oraciones de devocion. En +Amberes, en la emprenta de Cornelio Woons, 1650.” The cuts were engraved +at the instance of the Archbishop of Malines. Before the Spanish edition +appeared, thirty thousand copies of the work in Flemish and Latin had +already been circulated.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI125" id = "noteVI125" href = "#tagVI125">VI.125</a> +In Walpole’s Catalogue of Engravers there is the following notice of the +elder Switzer: “In the Harleian Library was a set of wooden cuts, +representing the broad seals of England from the conquest to +James I. inclusive, neatly executed. Vertue says this was the sole +impression he had seen, and believed that they were cut by Chr. Switzer, +and that these plates were copied by Hollar for Sandford. Switzer also +cut the coins and seals in Speed’s History of Britain, 1614 [1611], from +the originals in the Cottonian Collection. Speed calls him <i>the most +exquisite and curious hand of that age</i>. He probably engraved the +botanic figures for Lobel’s Observations, and the plates [cuts] for +Parkinson’s Paradisus Terrestris, 1629. Chr. Switzer’s works have +sometimes been confounded with his son’s, who was of both his +names.”—Catalogue of Engravers, p. 18 note, Edit. 1794. It is +doubtful if the elder Switzer’s Christian name were Christopher. The +initial in Parkinson’s Paradisus Terrestris is an A. It is, +however, possible that this letter may be intended for a Latin +preposition, and not for the first letter of the engraver’s Christian +name.</p> + +<p><a name = "noteVI126" id = "noteVI126" href = "#tagVI126">VI.126</a> +The cuts in an edition of “The most Delightful History of Reynard the +Fox,” 4to. London, printed for Thomas Passinger, 1681, are scarcely +superior to this cut in point of execution, though it must be confessed +that the figures are generally in better “keeping.”</p> + +</div> +</div> + +<div class = "endnote"> + +<h4>Illustrations with Text (pages 339-346, 437)</h4> + +<p><a name = "note_6a" id = "note_6a" href = "#illus_339"> +Page 339</a>:</p> + +<div class = "w25"> +<p class = "hanging"> +Quia audiſti vocem vxoris tuæ, & comediſti<br> +de ligno ex quo preceperam tibi ne come-<br> +deres &c.</p> + +<p class = "center extended"> +GENESIS III</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p><span class = "extended">ADAM</span> fut par <span class = +"extended">EVE</span> deceu</p> +<p>Et contre <span class = "extended">DIEV</span> mangea la pomm</p> +<p>Dont tous deux out la Mort receu,</p> +<p>Et depuis fut mortel tout homme.</p> +<p class = "author">C</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p><a name = "note_6b" id = "note_6b" href = "#illus_341"> +Page 341</a>:</p> + +<div class = "w25"> +<p class = "hanging"> +Spiritus meus attenuabitur, dies mihi bre-<br> +viabuntur, & ſolum mihi ſupereſt ſepul-<br> +chrum.</p> + +<p class = "center extended"> +IOB XVII</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p>Mes eſperitz ſont attendriz,</p> +<p>Et ma uie ſ’en ua tout beau.</p> +<p>Las mes longz iours ſont amoindriz</p> +<p>Plus ne me reſte qu’un tombeau.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p><a name = "note_6c" id = "note_6c" href = "#illus_342"> +Page 342</a>:</p> + +<div class = "w25"> +<p class = "hanging"> +De lectulo ſuper quem aſcendi-<br> +ſti non deſcendes, ſed morte<br> +morieris.</p> + +<p class = "center extended"> +III REG. I</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p>Du lict ſus lequel as monté</p> +<p>Ne deſcendras a ton plaiſir.</p> +<p>Car Mort t’aura tantoſt dompté,</p> +<p>Et en brief te uiendra ſaiſir.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p><a name = "note_6d" id = "note_6d" href = "#illus_343"> +Page 343</a>:</p> + +<div class = "w25"> +<p class = "hanging"> +Homo natus de muliere, brevi vivens tempore<br> +repletur multis miſeriis, qui quaſi flos egre-<br> +ditur, & conteritur, & fugit velut umbra.</p> + +<p class = "center extended"> +IOB XIIII</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p>Tout homme de la femme yſſant</p> +<p>Remply de miſere, & d’encombre,</p> +<p>Ainſi que fleur toſt finiſſant,</p> +<p>Sort & puis fuyt comme faict l’umbre.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p><a name = "note_6e" id = "note_6e" href = "#illus_344"> +Page 344</a>:</p> + +<div class = "w25"> +<p>Il cheut en son chariot.</p> + +<p class = "center extended"> +I. ROIS IX.</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p>Au passage de MORT perverse</p> +<p>Raison, Chartier tout esperdu,</p> +<p>Du corps le char, & chevaux verse,</p> +<p>Le vin (sang de vie) esperdu.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p><a name = "note_6f" id = "note_6f" href = "#illus_345"> +Page 345</a>:</p> + +<div class = "w25"> +<p>Il sera percé de sagettes.</p> + +<p class = "center extended"> +EXOD. XIX.</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p>L’eage du sens, du sang l’ardeur</p> +<p>Est legier dard, & foible escu</p> +<p>Contre MORT, qui un tel dardeur</p> +<p>De son propre dard rend vaincu.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p><a name = "note_6g" id = "note_6g" href = "#illus_346"> +Page 346</a>:</p> + +<div class = "w25"> +<p>Il partira les despoilles avec les puissans.</p> + +<p class = "center extended">ISAIE LIII.</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p>Pour les victoires triumphées</p> +<p>Sur les plus forts des humains cœurs,</p> +<p>Les despoilles dresse en trophées</p> +<p>La MORT vaincresse des vainqueurs.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p><a name = "note_6h" id = "note_6h" href = "#illus_437"> +Page 437</a> (see body text for final six lines of sonnet):</p> + +<div class = "w30"> +<p>The good | Howſ-holder</p> + +<div class = "verse"> +<p>The good Howſ-holder, that his Howſe may hold,</p> +<p class = "indent">Firſt builds it on the Rock, not on the Sand.</p> +<p class = "indent">Then, with a warie head and charie hand</p> +<p class = "indent">Pro[v]ides (in tyme) for Hunger and for Cold:</p> +<p>Not daintie Fare and Furniture of Gold,</p> +<p class = "indent">But handſom-holſom (as with Health dooth ſtand).</p> +<p class = "indent">Not for the Rich that can as much command</p> +<p class = "indent">But the poor Stranger, th’Orfan & the Old.</p> +</div> + +<p>PRINTED AT LON<br> +DON IN THE<br> +BLACKE<br> +FRIERS.<br> +1607</p> +</div> +</div> +<!-- end div endnote --> + +<div class = "correction"> +<h5>Errors in Chapter VI</h5> + +<p><span class = "citation"> +10. <i>Die Keyserinn.</i>—The Empress.</span><br> +<i>anomalous . in original</i></p> +<p><span class = "citation"> +To England straightway let him send,</span><br> +<i>n in “send” invisible</i></p> +<p><span class = "citation"> +When Mr. Douce stated that it was</span><br> +Mr Douce</p> +<p><span class = "citation"> +It strikingly exemplifies Mr. Douce’s eagerness</span><br> +Mr Douce’s</p> +<p><span class = "citation"> +forms the tail-piece at the end of the volume.</span><br> +tailpiece</p> +<p><span class = "citation"> +[VI-121]</span><br> +<i>footnote tag missing: best guess</i></p> +</div> + +<div class = "mynote"> +<p class = "center"> +<a href = "WoodEngraving.html">Introduction</a> (separate file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving.html#illus">List of Illustrations</a> (separate +file)</p> + +<p class = "center"> +<a href = "WoodEngraving1.html">Chapter I</a> (separate file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving1.html#chap_II">Chapter II</a> (separate +file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving1.html#chap_III">Chapter III</a> (separate +file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving4.html">Chapter IV</a> (separate file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving4.html#chap_V">Chapter V</a> (separate file)<br> +<a href = "#chap_VI">Chapter VI</a><br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving7.html">Chapter VII</a> (separate file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving8.html">Chapter VIII</a> (separate file)<br> +<a href = "WoodEngraving9.html">Chapter IX</a> (separate file)</p> + +<p class = "center"> +<a href = "WoodEngraving.html#index">Index</a> (separate file)</p> +</div> + + +</body> +</html> |