CHAPTER VI THE BEGINNING OF PRINTING

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The germs of the invention which, in spite of Carlyle's somewhat slighting reference, has proved itself hardly less momentous in the world's history than the conception of the idea of writing, are to be found in the stamps with which the ancients impressed patterns or names upon vases or other objects, or in the device and name-bearing seals which were in common use among the nations of antiquity. But these stamps and seals could be used only to impress some plastic material, not to make ink or other marks upon paper; and for the first example of printing, as we understand the word, we must look to China, where, it is said, as early as the sixth century, A.D., engraved wooden plates were used for the production of books. The Chinese, however, kept their invention to themselves, or at any rate it spread no further than Japan, until many years later; and although in the tenth century the knowledge of printing was carried as far as Egypt, Europeans seem to have made the discovery for themselves, quite independently of help from the East, both as regards block-printing and the use of moveable type.

In Europe, as in China, the first printing was done by means of a block, that is, a slab of wood on which the design was carved in relief, and from which, when inked, an impression could be transferred to paper or other material. This process is known as block-printing, and in Europe was principally used for the production of illustrations, the text, which came to be added later, being accessory and subordinate to the picture.

The first European block-prints are pictures of saints, roughly printed on a leaf of paper and usually rudely coloured. Heinecken, whose IdÉe general d'une Collection complette d'Estampes (1771) is still a standard work, is of opinion that pictures of this class were first executed by the old makers of playing-cards, and that the playing-cards themselves were printed from wood and not drawn separately by hand. In this case the cards should rank as the earliest examples of block-printing, or wood-engraving. Heinecken has not been alone in entertaining this opinion, but, on the other hand, there are some who consider that the portraits represent the first woodcuts, and that the early playing-cards were drawn and painted by hand.

The single-leaf portraits of saints were produced chiefly, or perhaps solely, in Germany, and examples are now rare. It is curious that most of those which have survived to the present day have been found in German religious houses, pasted inside the covers of old books, and thus shielded from the destruction to which their fragile nature rendered them liable. One specimen, which has the reputation of being the earliest extant with which a date can be connected, is the well-known St Christopher, which represents the saint carrying the child Christ over a stream, after an old legend. This specimen bears the date 1423, and was discovered pasted in the cover of a mediÆval manuscript in the monastery at Buxheim, in Swabia, and is now in the John Rylands Library at Manchester. The date, however, may be only that of the engraving of the block, and not the year of printing. A theory was put forward by Mr H.F. Holt, at the meeting of the British Archaeological Association in 1868, that this St Christopher, so far from being the earliest known specimen of printing of any sort, belonged to a period subsequent to the invention of typography, and that the date 1423 refers only to the jubilee year of the saint, and not to the execution of the print. He also held that the block-books, to which we refer below, were not the predecessors of type-printed books, as they are usually considered to be, but merely cheap substitutes for the costly works of the early printers. But these theories, though not disproved, do not receive the support of bibliographers in general.

Another early woodcut is the Brussels Print, which is in the Royal Library at Brussels. It is ostensibly dated 1418, but although this date is accepted by some, it has most probably been tampered with, and therefore the position of the print is at least doubtful. It is of Flemish origin, and represents the Virgin and Child, accompanied by SS. Barbara, Catharine, Veronica and Margaret. Other prints exist which are not dated, and it is quite possible that some of these may be older than the St Christopher, though no definite statements as to their date can be made. It is certain, however, that the art of block-printing was known in the closing years of the fourteenth century, and that it was practised thenceforward until about 1510, that is, some years after the invention of typography. In many manuscripts of the period, printed illustrations were inserted by means of blocks, either to save time, or because the scribe's skill did not extend to drawings.

These early woodcuts were the forerunners of the better known block-books, which also, according to Heinecken, were at first the work of the card-makers. Block-books consisted of prints accompanied by a descriptive or explanatory text, both text and illustration being printed from the same block. Since they were intended for the moral instruction of those whose education did not fit them for the study of more elaborate works, they generally deal with Scriptural and religious subjects. The earliest of all the block-books was the Biblia Pauperum, or “Bible of the Poor,” so called because it was designed for the edification of persons of unlearned minds and light purses, who could neither have afforded the high prices demanded for ordinary manuscript copies, nor have read such copies had they owned them. The Biblia Pauperum, however, exactly met their want. It is not so much a book to read, as a book to look at. It has a text, it is true, but the text is subordinate to the pictures.

The Biblia Pauperum is on paper, as paper was cheaper than vellum and considered quite good enough for the purpose. One side only of each leaf was printed, two pages being printed from one block, and the sheets folded once and arranged in sequence, not “quired” or “nested.” The resulting order was that of two printed pages face to face, followed by two blank pages face to face. The illustrations are of scenes from sacred history, and portraits of Biblical personages, accompanied by explanatory Latin or German texts in Gothic characters. The original designer and compiler of this favourite block-book is unknown, but he certainly worked on lines laid down by some much older author and artist, for manuscript works of similar nature existed at least as early as the beginning of the fourteenth century. The earliest known instance of a composition of the kind, however, is a series of enamels on an antependium or altar-frontal in the St Leopold Chapel at Klosterneuburg, near Vienna, which originally contained forty-five pictures dealing with Biblical subjects, arranged in the same order as in the Biblia Pauperum, and which were executed by Nicolas de Verdun, in 1181. Some attribute the inception of the Biblia Pauperum to Ansgarius, first Bishop of Hamburg, in the ninth century, others to Wernher, a German monk of the twelfth century, but it seems unlikely that the point will ever be decided. The Biblia Pauperum is usually supposed to have been first printed xylographically in Holland, and type-printed editions were issued later from Bamberg, Paris and Vienna.

To modern eyes the illustrations of this book are strange and wonderful indeed. “The designer certainly had no thought of irreverence,” says De Vinne, “but many of the designs are really ludicrous. Some of the anachronisms are: Gideon arrayed in plate-armour, with mediÆval helmet and visor and Turkish scimitar; David and Solomon in rakish, wide-brimmed hats bearing high, conical crowns; the translation of Elijah in a four-wheeled vehicle resembling the modern farmer's hay-wagon. Slouched hats, puffed doublets, light legged breeches and pointed shoes are seen in the apparel of the Israelites who are not represented as priests or soldiers. Some houses have Italian towers and some have Moorish minarets, but in none of the pictures is there an exhibition of pointed Gothic architecture.”

Our illustration gives a reduced representation of a page from the second edition of the Biblia Pauperum, dating from about 1450. The middle panel shows Christ rising from the tomb, and the wonder and fear of the Roman guards; the left-hand panel shows Samson carrying off the gates of the city of Gaza, and the right-hand panel the disgorging of Jonah by the whale. The upper part of the text shows how that Samson and Jonah were types of Christ, and the four little figures represent David, Jacob, Hosea, and Siphonias (Zephaniah), the texts on the scrolls being quotations from their words.

The accompanying rhymes are as follows:—

Obsessus turbis: Sapson valvas tulit urbis.
Quem saxum texit: ingens tumulum Jesus exit.
De tumulo Christe: surgens te denotat iste.

(In the midst of crowds, Samson removes the gates of the city. The anointed Jesus, whom the stone covered, rises from the tomb. This man [Jonah] rising from the tomb, denotes Thee, O Christ!)

Another very popular block-book, of German origin, was the curious compilation known as Ars Moriendi—the Art of Dying—or, as it is sometimes called, Temptationes Demonis, or Temptation of Demons. It describes how dying persons are beset by all manner of temptations, the final triumph of the good, and the sad end of the wicked, with suitable emotions on the part of the attendant angels, and the hideous demons by which the temptations are personified. This work was greatly in vogue in the fifteenth century, and after the invention of type-printing was reproduced in various parts of France, Italy, Germany and Holland. The only block-book without illustrations was the Donatus de octibus partibus orationis, or Donatus on the Eight Parts of Speech, shortly known as Donatus. It was the Latin grammar of the period, and was the work of Donatus, a famous Roman grammarian of the fourth century. Large numbers were printed both from blocks and from type, but xylographic fragments are scarce, and none are known of any date before the second half of the fifteenth century. Yet it is believed that probably more copies of this work were printed than of any other block-book whatever. Besides its lack of illustrations, the xylographic Donatus is unique among block-books from the fact that it was printed on vellum and not on paper, and (another unusual feature) on both sides of the leaf. Vellum was dear, and had to be made the most of, and no doubt was used only because a paper book would have fared badly at the hands of the schoolboys.

Only one block-book is known to have been printed in France, and that is Les Neuf Preux, or the Nine Champions. The nine champions are divided into three groups: first, classical heroes—Hector, Alexander and Julius CÆsar; next, Biblical heroes—Joshua, David and Judas MaccabÆus; and lastly, heroes of romance—Arthur, Charlemagne and Godefroi of Boulogne. The portraits of these celebrities are accompanied by verses. This block-book dates from about 1455.

Other block-books were the Speculum HumanÆ Salvationis, the Apocalypse of St John, the Book of Canticles, Defensorium InviolatÆ Virginitatis BeatÆ MariÆ Virginis, Mirabilia RomÆ; various German almanacks, and a Planetenbuch, this last representing the heavenly bodies and their influence on human life. The last of the block-books, so far as is known, was the Opera nova contemplativa, which was executed at Venice about 1510.

From one point of view the Speculum HumanÆ Salvationis, or Mirror of Salvation, is the most curious of its kind. It is looked upon as the connecting link between block-books proper and type-printed books. Its purpose seems to have been to afford instruction in the facts and lessons of the Christian religion, beginning with the fall of Satan. It is founded on an old and once popular manuscript work sometimes ascribed to Brother John, a Benedictine monk of the thirteenth or fourteenth century. Four so-called “editions” of the Speculum are known, two of which are in Latin rhyme, and two in Dutch prose, all four having many points in common and standing apart from the later and dated editions afterwards produced in Germany, Holland, and France.

In these early copies the body of the work consists of a text printed from moveable types, with a block-printed illustration at the head of each page. But one of the Latin editions is remarkable for having twenty pages of the text printed from wood blocks. How and why these xylographic pages appear in a book whose remaining forty-two pages are printed from types is a mystery. They are inserted at intervals among the other leaves, and for this and other reasons it is considered improbable that they were printed from blocks originally intended for a block-book, to help to eke out a not very plentiful stock of type. Moreover, no entirely xylographic Speculum exists to lend colour to such a theory.

The time and place of origin of the Speculum are unknown, and bibliographers are not agreed as to the order in which the several “editions” appeared. But such evidence as exists points to Holland as the home of the printed Speculum, and those who believe that Coster of Haarlem invented typography, credit him with having produced it.

Block-books are nearly all of German, Dutch, or Flemish workmanship. As a rule the illustrations are roughly coloured by hand. The method by which they were printed is generally supposed to have been that of laying a dampened sheet of paper on the inked block, and rubbing it with a dabber or frotton until the impression was worked up. But De Vinne, in his History of Printing, says that there are practical reasons against the correctness of this view, and considers it more probable that a rude hand-press was used.

Those who wish to see some modern examples of block-printing may be referred to the books printed by the late William Morris at the celebrated Kelmscott Press at Hammersmith. The title-pages and initial words of these volumes were executed by means of wood blocks, and are as beautiful examples of block-printing as the texts of the works they adorn are of typography. All the Kelmscott printing, whose history, though most interesting, is nevertheless outside the present subject, was done by hand presses.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

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