De Gulden Passer. Jaargang 33

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Calligraphy and its influence in the time of Plantin
by Arnold Bank
Visiting Lecturer at the Royal College of Art, London

We honor in this Congress, a great XVI century printer, Christopher Plantin. The program of celebration activities by means of lectures and special exhibitions has been very well planned. The material exhibited in the Plantin-Moretus Museum and in the Plantin wing of ‘The Golden Age of Antwerp’ in the Meir has provided a generous opportunity for students and visitors to review all the facets of Plantin's work. Especially pleasing it was that the whole exhibit in The Meir was so carefully arranged as to thoroughly illustrate my very subject of XVI century calligraphy and letterings. Beautiful examples were shown in the work from all the various arts and crafts, and business offices, of Antwerp.

Thus far, Professors Saulnier and Delcourt-Curvers and Dr. Van Durme have reviewed the times and background of Plantin in France, in the Netherlands and in Antwerp itself. Dr De Roover has taken us into the counting house for a most interesting survey of the business methods, and the cost accounting and pricing techniques originating in Plantin's printing office: and Prof. de la Fontaine Vervey has surveyed the whole output of books published by Plantin. Now we move into the shop itself and into the art department. Our matters are printing matters: the handwritings of the author or the copyist; the design of the pages to be printed; the typefaces available in the shop or to be specially ordered - all matters of XVI century letter forms and their use - to which will be added the decorations and illustrations. Today we work under three spirited banners:

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‘Vive le burin’
‘Vive la typographie’, and for my part,
‘Vive la plume’

Purposes and methods

For a proper study and summary of XVI century calligraphic resources and influences, three large groups of materials are available: type design, handwritings, and the letterings used in all the other arts and crafts. For our present purpose, our concern will be with the first two.

Plantin's types serve us admirably in charting a study of form. His stock of types and his use of these as the largest and most important publisher-printer of his time summarizes customary contemporary typographic practice of the first order and helps us understand the ideas of use. Plantin himself when he began as a printer in Antwerp could look back on a period of one hundred years of a twin ‘golden age’ of printing and writing, a period full of beautiful work in both the arts of making books, though it was the new art's first century of growth and the older art's last century of existence.

In manuscripts, documents and letters, and especially in the writing masters' manuals, printed and autograph, we have a rich field of sources for a study of the art and ideas of lettering and writing. Here were the calligraphic style-setters and model-makers, the first and last word in the trends of the times. In a short survey we can do no more than touch certain departments of this primary, many-sided source in the study of XVI century calligraphy and its influences. But the interpenetrations and the inter-linkings of forms, ideas and techniques in typographic and calligraphic practice will be evident.

In order to get at ideas of form, we must note the eight scripts common in the XVI century and in order to understand uses and techniques we must follow these scripts through the main groups of users. To accomplish this, our method will be:

-	to show and describe the eight scripts as such, as art facts and historical facts.

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-	to study these scripts in Plantin's types which are, in fact, an excellent summary of one great branch of use in the XVI century
-	to touch lightly, in passing, on the letter forms and their use in the handwriting arts of mss., documents and letters
-	to note and classify the writing masters' copy books and manuals as a contemporary and immediate source of models and ideas.

The Eight Scripts

We may classify the eight scripts of the XVI century into five book hands and three business hands. I list them from the sheets drawn by me at the Plantin Congress. And with each illustration are given: today's terminology; then in brackets some of their various contemporary names; then some description of general and technical characteristics.

Blackletter, or textus quadratus (textura, clipilcana, lettre de forme, lettera francese, Flamande, etc.)

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Blackletter is a set, upright book hand and type face for important liturgical and legal work; the types of the Gutenberg Bible and of the great missals; narrow, angular, severe and black, with large lower-case body and very short ascenders and descenders. The precision of construction in the lower-case is achieved in picket-fence fashion by the rhythmic stroking of straight stems and diamond-shaped heads and feet; the tops of ascenders are either slightly seriffed or cut off straight, or they may be splayed, swallowtail fashion, and even made decorative with little curly hairlines. The capitals in contrast to the lower-case, are round and full, the required blackness managed by adding strokes and thorns on the stems and in the interiors of the letters. Conjoining of what would be rounds in roman, to preceding rounds is an unusual but nevertheless conventional feature of blackletter lower-case construction. This strong, medieval scribal habit is not only commonplace in rotunda and batarde and in all the corresponding type faces, but worked its way into the Renaissance as well. Conjoining is found even in some roman and italic exemples in the great writing masters' manuals of first half of XVI century.

Batarde (lettre batarde, lettera francese, lettera fiammenga, Allemande, letra francesa redouda y tirada, etc.)

Batarde is a flexible, set, upright hand, and type face, dark in color but light in spirit and commonly used in two ways: as a popular, literary script and type for book and jobbing work in the vernacular and in Latin, e.g. poetry and private prayer books; and at the same time, as a formal, stately document hand for important charters and official business. Truly a ‘lettere francese’, yet just as characteristically the typefaces of Caxton's books. The proportions and certain stiff, angular strokings and terminals are of blackletter; but these are combined with peculiar, distinctive curves, looped or free ascenders and daggered descenders into a curious, delightful mixture of pointed forms, the whole accompanied by brilliant capitals, vigorous and broad. Batarde has the unique difficulty in penmanship of ever seeming to be in a state of

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movement. This is kept disciplined in book work and left free in document work.

Rotunda (moderna, lettera formata, lettera ecclesiastica, lettera catolica, lettre de somme, lettera Tedesca, Letra Formada). And some capitals to 3 blackletters.

Rotunda is the ordinary Italian and Spanish book script and type face of XV and early XVI century. A set, upright hand of great importance in the Renaissance. It was the only lower case in all the earliest writing masters' books for which instruction and models were given by means of large outline diagrams, a teaching procedure otherwise reserved only for the stately roman capitals. Rotunda is usually smaller, broader, blunter and less magisterial than blackletter, except of course when used in the large ceremonial music service books. As a type face it tends to some compression and to slightly thinner stems and therefore is not quite as bold as the book script of comparable size. Besides differing in proportion and in scale, rotunda varies from its two brothers in the blackletter group in two technical elements: the junctional angles and wedges are smoothed out and gently rounded with a crisp, sharp turn around

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each corner; and the feet of many of the stems are cut off straight, without quadrate or upturned endings. To balance the apparent roundness of the script, a certain severity is preserved throughout by the straightness of the stems and the plainness of the feet. The capitals however, are surprisingly complicated and difficult. Expected curves in certain letters unexpectedly deviate into breaks and angles or sudden flattenings-out.

These are three distinct letter styles of the blackletter family in common use from the end of the XII century through the XVI century. The curious disorder in naming them is characteristic of my profession in all eras. Even today, in English, the term blackletter is used two ways: specifically, as the name for the basic formal script of this group and generally, as the over-all descriptive term for the whole Gothic group of later medieval scripts.

Besides the three hands named above, there were also many varieties and mixtures of blackletter and batarde, the most popular and important of which are known as fractur and schwabacher. Plantin's Allemande was a schwabacher, while his Flamande was a true blackletter. The Italians on the other hand called all pointed styles of blackletter, whether angular or curved, francese or franchesa and sometimes fiammenga. This jumble of different terms for the same hands is one of the plagues of modern study and must be borne patiently.

Roman (antiqua tonda, lettera antica or antiqua, lettera romain, alphabetum latinorum, litteras antigua, letteras latinas, etc.)

Roman. The second of the ordinary, work-a-day scripts and type faces of the Renaissance: a set, upright, round and full-proportioned letter, medium to light-face in weight, and marked by its unique system of serifs. These are required to be placed at nearly all terminals and junctions of stems and hairlines in capitals and in lower case. Apart from serifs and weight or color, roman differs from rotunda in certain basic technical elements: first, in the length of the ascenders and descenders, the whole blackletter family being shorter and blunter in this detail of anat-

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omy; secondly, in the sharp differences of the basic shapes of a, d, g, short s, x, and z; and finally, in the distinction of the roman capitals, which are clearer and plainer, a world unto themselves.

The grey page of XV century Italian books written or printed in roman letters is a Renaissance invention that became, and still is, the guiding convention of book printing design. And, as for form - the Humanist bookhands and certain scripts of di Mario, Cinicius, Sinibaldi, Pagliarolo and de Gigantibus; the copybook models of Arrighi, Tagliente, Tory, Yciar, Fugger and Cresci; and the type designs of Sweynheym and Pannartz, of Ulrich Han, of the da Spiras, Jenson, Ratdolt and Aldus, of Schoeffer, Du Prè, Garamond, Granjon, du Tour and Hautin - these are the letter forms that guide us in a study of the roman letter in XV and XVI century. Humanist beginnings, scrittura (h)umanistica, were deliberate in breaking from blackletter and its impressive, dark page, but rotunda influences were very strong in many details of rhythm and form during the early development of the book scripts

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and then again in the early days of the types. The standardizing of serifs in the lower case to match and harmonize with the serifs of classical inscriptional capitals was the necessity and the triumph of the first years of roman types; and struggle for good and proper form it was.

Interesting mixtures under the influence of rotunda continually turn up for the student, even in early XVI century. Examples may be found where roman and rotunda types are used in the same book. The student must be careful to discern the two kinds of such mixings. One is a problem of layout or page design in which the manifest difference between the two types is employed to vary and to clarify whole sections of text, but where each type is kept distinct and properly formed. The second manner of mixing is a problem of form and fount because rotunda and roman letter forms have been deliberately mixed in the same lower case type face or as frequently occurs, a rotunda lower case design has been sorted with roman capitals. An early instance of the first kind of mixture, simple combination of styles, is Ulrich Han's Cicero, De Oratore, Rome, 1468. Another example of the same kind is specially interesting for this Congress, since it is the Complutensian Polyglot Bible of G. de Brocar, Alcala, 1514-17. In both, the large, round and black rotunda is displayed on a single line at the head of, and to set off, whole pages of text in small, round and gray roman - a very beautiful page-design concept. For two examples of the second kind of mixture, i.e. within the same letter style and size, see the type used for the first Bible printed in France by Freiberger, Gering and Kranz, Paris, 1476; and a Cicero: De Officiis, printed by L. de Soardis, Perugia, 1517. In the former, we find two d's, and three s's in addition to the two r's normal in all the blackletter group. In the latter, a 10 pt rotunda lower case has ordinary roman letters for capitals. That lower case, however, is a curious mix-up for it has a batarde form of ‘a’; four kinds of ‘s’, two long and two short; two d's; and two kinds of ampersand. A good time was certainly had by all at that gathering! In Garamond's time, and in Plantin's of course, all this mixing and struggling was over: and so was rotunda.

But the roman letter as type inspired other brews as well.

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Among ingenious attempts at creating new fonts by mixing additional sorts into a basic roman capital and lower case font is that of the Anglo-Saxon types of John Day, London, 1574. In his edition of Asser, Alfredi Regis res Gestae, four uncial sorts, E, H, M, X, and an unusual S are mixed with the caps; while uncial, half-uncial and Anglo-Saxon letters are sorted with the roman lower-case. The latter comes off very well and almost defies instant detection at first glance, but the caps are not as successful because the uncial sorts are too large and stand out badly by not ranging well. A good try, at any rate, and an early lesson in such experiments.

Italic (corsivo o cancellaresca, cursiv, italique, italick, Gryphius, Grifo, cancellaresca antica, etc.)

Italic as such, i.e. as a set, sloped, slender and graceful book script, is a XVI century typographic invention. As an independent, set ms. hand, i.e. with each letter clearly separated from its neighbor and with a history of its own, examples are not easy to find in Italian XV century mss. Italic has come to be thought of in two ways. Calligraphically, it is associated with handwriting in that it is an alphabet of single, model letters extracted from a given handwriting style in order to provide a learner with the best possible forms in acquiring that kind of handwriting; here italic has the appearance of a more formal and more precise script than the running hand from which it is born. Typographically, italic is unique in that it is both an independent script capable of being used for whole books in its own right, as the history of the first half of XVI century printing amply shows; and as a customary accompaniment to roman, with which it is used in the same body size for gentle emphasis within the text and for secondary matter, before, around and after the main text. When italic was frozen into type, this double role was clearly demonstrated.

Griffo's first cutting for Aldus in 1501 was conceived as a semicurrent script, with many of the 2- and 3-letter joins commonly used in the last quarter of XV century handwriting carried over into the type from the literary cursive known then as antica corsiva

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or corrente and later as corsivo or cancellaresca. The calligraphic influence on the first italic is evident. But in the same Griffo's second cutting, for Soncino in 1503, the thin, joining diagonal strokes were shorn away leaving only the neat hairline heads and feet that are so characteristic of the set italic hand to this day. From this point, italic has a golden history of more than fifty years. Sometimes indeed, one would think no other type existed, so much of Italian literature is printed in italic types. In the 1520's the writing masters Tagliente and Arrighi contributed new subtleties of form and proportion taken from the elegant cancellaresca they were teaching. Now there were two variants of italic, ranging in sizes from 10 pt to 22 pt, not too small and never very large. Within the same metal point size, the Aldine could be considered smaller and rounder, the other a little taller and more pointed. Upright roman capitals, plain or swashed were used with the slightly sloped lower case. Froben and Garamond followed the Aldine model in their italics, but the Arrighi was just as popular in many literary circles as the italics of Blado and de Colines demonstrate. Then in mid-century, Granjon designed the third variation of italic type, uniting the flavor and certain forms of the preceding styles and adding new features of his own. Among these was a greater slope in the lower case, yet more freedom in adherence to that slope; incorporating and standardizing the new Lyons sloped capitals; and above all, instilling into the design a feeling and flavor of drawing and engraving from previous types rather than copying the contemporary writing and calligraphy of even the greatest writing masters.

Actually, in basic letter shapes, italic differs from roman in only a few letters; a, looped g and k, and long-tailed f and s; and in the absence of a system of serifs in the lower case. It is rather in the larger technical elements of form and rhythm that italic presents such a simple difference in appearance: in its slope, in the graceful swing, the slender proportions, the lighter weight, and in the freedom and elegance of ascenders, descenders and swash capitals. All these derive from cursive ideas, from handwriting needs rather than from book-writing precisions.

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These two Renaissance scripts, roman and italic, descendants of certain forms of Humanist bookhands and research, are ordinary typefaces today. But it was in the XVI century that their supremacy was established as types in general printing shop use beyond their specialized origins of use in classical texts. This universal use extended over all classes of book printing, except those legal and liturgical works still required to be set in blackletter even into the XVIII century. Although it is a commonplace to think of rotunda, roman and italic as Italian scripts and types, and to think of blackletter and batarde as products of Northern Europe, all five letter styles, nevertheless, were known and required in every big printing center of Europe. Plantin's books often summarize this available contemporary repertoire by skilful mixtures of the five set hands as printing types.

The secretary group (notula, mercantile, mercantesca, secretary, kanzlei, lettre francois, lettre commune ou courante, lettre ronde, lettre secretarienne ou financiere, currente allemande, currente nederlandische, and many other national and regional terms, e.g. letra Aragonesa tirada.)

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Secretary is the oldest and the most versatile of the three handwritings and business writings of the XVI century. It is generally an upright hand: small in size, squat and square in proportions, bold and dark in weight and color, as befits a charter member of the blackletter family of scripts and types. In its essential letter forms it is related directly to batarde, whose letters seem to have been pushed down and flattened out to make secretary. From early XIII century, it was the common legal, administrative and mercantile office and correspondence hand. At the same time it was the script of professional scribes in certain vernacular book work and the notebook hand of students and lecturers. It was a hardy, useful script; the ordinary, everyday handwriting, for example, of Plantin, Mercator, da Vinci, Cosimo the Elder and Petrarch; and in its model forms, the basis for the Civilité types of Granjon and others.

At its best and clearest, secretary is written with a pronounced, small finger-tip movement, but even beyond this economy of pen movement between waist and base lines it is the extremely complicated looping system of the projectors that catches the eye at first glance. All the ascenders are looped with a strong horizontal axis, almost like the top half of a circle, in one sweeping yet tiny movement: h, m and n are often looped or ribboned at the bottom as well, while d, v, and w have strong diagonal slashes for exits and entrances. The descenders to p, q, j, f, and s are long, daggered stems, while the tails of g, y, x, and z tuck under very flat and close in a characteristic undulation. To our eyes, accustomed to the clarity of italic types and distinct line spacing, secretary is difficult to read. Letters like c, e, r, and t are not easy to distinguish while the embroidery of the loops clouds the line spaces. Yet what an extraordinary permanship! with instructions for writing it given in every important comprehensive manual of the XVI century.

There were three kinds of construction rhythms in writing the smalls. First, a close affinity to batarde, with the same prescribed

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mixtures of broken curves and straight stems. Then, perhaps for greater speed, a rather familiar rounded variant, as in very early French charter hands and in Tudor documents. Then there is a completely contrasted version marked by a sharp, sawtoothed rhythm of writing. All of these basic variants of secretary are usually upright, but in free-style from XVI century on, sloping secretary may often be seen.

The capitals are unique and instantly recognizable, though not always legible. They are free forms of batarde, sweeping and flourished.

The cancellaresca group (the hands known as cancellaresca bastarda, cancellaresca corsiva, Amphiareo's bastarda, cancellaresca formata, and cancellaresca romana; the first is also known as cancellaresca commune, cancellaresca commune tonde, lettre Italique ronde et commune, lettre ronde Venecienne, canc. circonflessa, etc. and the second as litterarum latinarum, letra cancilleresca, lettre carrée commune, lettre Chancelaresque, etc.)

Cancellaresca. The slender, sloped, medium-weight handwriting of XV century Italian origins and XV/XVI century European use. It is a plain and orderly script, yet flowing and delightful

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when one needs it so. Cancellaresca reflects a pleasing discipline and a structural thoughtfulness in contrast on the one hand, to the natural decorative tendencies of secretary with which it competed, and on the other hand, to Italian hand to which it gave birth. Cancellaresca suits us today as a normal writing just as it pleased the men of the Renaissance. The capitals too are pleasing and clear; whether small, plain and upright as in early examples or sloped, swashed and larger as in the later period.

In one or another of its five variants, cancellaresca was the handwriting of Titian, Michelangelo and Raphael, of Bembo, Aldus, Lorenzo de Medici and Ficino, of San Vito, Sallando, L. Dati and many others. It was also the official business and correspondence script of the scholars and writers engaged in the secretarial departments of those court and papal chanceries requiring at this time a literary style of Latin composition for which the usual secretary and mercantile hands were considered unsuited. Thus during its short life, it represented one of the factions, on the surface at least, in the strife and history of Italian literature. It was written from the 1450's, in certain circles to achieve certain effects considered worth while in what we understand as the classical spirit of the times. Despite the universality of secretary, cancellaresca kept its independence and must have had a deep appeal and literary importance when the time came to mold a contempoary running hand into metal types; for in this honour it preceded secretary by over fifty years.

The cancellaresca family consists of five distinct but subtle variations of one script style. Each of the variants except formata is found in documents, in maps and in everyday personal, literary and business correspondence; and all five are found in mss. Each has the authority of the published manuals of famous Italian writing masters. We are therefore dealing with an exceptionally rich family group of handwritings.

Cancellaresca bastarda is the oldest and commonest form, running from the 1450's, perhaps earlier, to the 1570's. It is usually smaller, more open and rounder than the stylish corsiva. The serifs to ascending projectors are often, but not always, a general

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guide to dating. The ordinary, angled serif, the mallet-head and lightly-touched dot-head are signs of XV century forms. Carefully formed serifs, well-shaped dot-heads and long banner-like heads (testigiatta) are more characteristic of XVI century. Examples giving its forms and span of life can be seen in a papal brief of 1465⁽¹⁾, signed L. Dati; in the handwritings of Lorenzo⁽²⁾ and Ficino in the 1480's; in Raphael's handwriting⁽³⁾ in the 1500's and 1510's; in Neudorffer's writing book, Nuremberg 1538; and in Spanish court documents⁽⁴⁾ and writing books, e.g. Lucas, Madrid 1570 by which time the script has attained a range of three sizes, the familiar small, medium and large of subsequent writing books.

The precise origins of cancellaresca bastarda are still not clear. Much work is needed to establish its independence from the parallel Humanist bookhands of early XV century. There was from the XIV century, for example, a fine, set upright bookhand of mixed character, called Florentine bastarda; which in Tagliente's manual of 1524 had changed into a mercantile hand of the secretary family, though it kept some of the ‘feel’ of the older book script. Curiously this is the only secretary hand in Tagliente's collection that is without looped ascenders. And in fact these ascenders are seriffed with long hairlines like queues, very much in the style of the Florentine bastarda itself. Yet it would be pure conjecture at this point to relate cancellaresca bastarda to the other older book script, except by the accident of terminology. Especially since the Florentine beginnings so implied would not square with possible Venetian origins in the pamphlets, for example of the minutes of proceedings in the Doge's Palace.

(1) See facs. in G. Batelli, Acta Pontificum, in Exempla Scripturarum, III, Rome, 1933, pl. 23.

(2) As in documents in the Morgan Library, for example two letters from Florence dated 14 Dec. 1481 and 15 June 1486, showing the change in his d's from round to straight. See also facs. in Catalogue of the Medici archives etc., Christie, Manson & Woods, London 1918.

(3) See fig. 4 and others of the Morgan Library. See also facs. in Society of Pure English Tracts, XXVIII, London, 1927, pl. 35, a letter of Apr. 1508.

(4) See fig. 10 and others in the Morgan Library dated 25 Apr. 1570 and 23 Aug. 1579. (For fig. 1-20, see p. 125-130).

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Cancellaresca corsiva is the famous and popular showpiece of the family. Since mid-1920's there has been an accelerated interest in the writing books of the four earliest published Italian writing masters (Arrighi, Tagliente, Palatino and Amphiareo) and in the single writing book of the great map-maker, Mercator. Not only do these masters provide splendid models for the corsiva at the height of its fashion, but they give it that primary position in their contents that justifies the present bibliographical, typographic and calligraphic interest. Nevertheless it is not the representative member, but only one member in a family of five related scripts.

Compared with cancellaresca bastarda, the corsiva is written with a springier rhythm in the arches and in the branching strokes, a penmanship calculated to produce a delicate, almost-pointed-arch angularity in the appearance of the whole script. It is of slenderer proportions too, again to achieve a greater elegance. Since the basic forms and details are alike in both scripts, scale, proportions and writing rhythm are paramount criteria in classification. The difference between the Aldine and Arrighi italics in type makes this clear; so too would a comparison of the handwritings of Raphael and Michelangelo.

Many factors, historical and technical, are at work in the life of every script. Cancellaresca corsiva is a good example of a small art form caught up during its short life in the country of its origin and swept northwards in the stream of great arts and ideas that flowed out of the Italian Renaissance in the first part of the XVI century. Its true story seems to have two parts: one, an original and indigenous growth, the other a reflection of this in the course of transmission to foreign lands.

Early forms of cancellaresca corsiva are not easily found before the 1490's. James Wardrop has done a signal service in unearthing the Tagliente autograph of Venice, 1491⁽⁵⁾. A comparison of the script in this letter of application for an official job with the sweet and crisp cancellaresca bastarda of the book scribe Sallando, Mantua 1483-86⁽⁶⁾, suggests the transitions that were in the air

(5) See facs. in Signature, N.S. 8, London 1949, pp. 57-61.

(6) And the same author in Signature, N.S. 2, London 1946, pp. 4-30.

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Roman, Italian hand and batarde lettering painted on one of four small processional banners on a narrow painting about 6 ft. long: H.G. Pot, Glorification of Prince William I, Dutch, end XVI century.
(Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem; No. 238)

Sloped batarde and canc. corsiva place names on engraved map, Duchy of Wirtenberg, No. 60 from Ortelius: Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, Antwerp 1584 (1579). Portion, bottom right corner, reduced 3:2; full map size, 17″ wide by 15″ high.
(British Museum, C2. c. 18)

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Written models of roman lower case from pl. 4, and batarde, set secretary and mixed canc. from pl. 8, of autograph ms. writing book, Nouvel ABC of Felix van Sambix, Antwerp 1585. Page sizes vary, 8″ wide by 6 1/4″ high; reduction here 7: 4. Initiais D and J, headpiece ornament, 3 fleurets and some rules printed.
(Plantin-Moretus Museum Library, M. 17. 17)

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at the time. This period, the 1490's is the beginning. Then came the papal briefs of the 1510's which gave the script its official authority, and the five writing books aforementioned of 1522 to 1548, which, one would judge, supplied a great literary and public demand. The first part of the history of canc. corsiva as an independent script closes in the year 1554 with two important publications: Amphiareo's famous reprint under a new title and Ruano's manual, the last Italian writing book devoted to some teaching of canc. corsiva.

The second half of our story is kept fresh and alive partly by the many reprint editions of the Italian ‘big four’ and partly by the publications of the new northern European masters. The reprints ran on for more than another generation, even unto Antwerp. The newer masters were under the double acknowledgement of Italian influences in their versions of canc. corsiva and native influences for all the regional hands which they naturally showed first, Yciar excepted. Wise and gifted Arrighi with astonishing accuracy had correctly diagnosed the primary yet relative importance of cancellaresca corsiva itself among the scripts of his time. His first manual, of Rome 1522, was devoted entirely to the corsiva. In this he is matched only by Mercator. Arrighi's second, of Venice 1523, had only one plate of cancellaresca corsiva (lettera da brevi) among a most comprehensive showing of contemporary scripts and types, plain and decorative, for business, book and artisans' needs. In the writing books of Yciar, Saragossa 1550, and Hamon, Paris 1561, and even in Beauchesne and Baildon, London 1571, cancellaresca corsiva still occupies a majority position in the number of plates. But very few, and sometimes hardly more than single plates of the corsiva proper are shown in Wyss, Zurich 1549, in Neff, Cologne 1549. Single plates of an italic of set cancellaresca corsiva flavor appear in Perret, Brussels 1569, and Houthusius, Aix-la-Chapelle 1591. An interesting parallel to these new publication is this list of Tagliente's reprints after his first edition in 1524: Venice 1527, 1529, 1532, 1533, 1536, 1542, 1545, 1546, 1550, 1553, 1554, 1556, 1560, 1562, 1563, 1565, 1568; Rome 1525; Antwerp 1545, 1550.

Meanwhile in Italy itself, in the new writing books, only the name of cancellaresca corsiva remained, in a delightful confusion

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of terms. Other developments were taking place under its cover; while still other script-varieties were running their parallel course. In manuscripts and documents and italic types, numerous and beautiful examples of the corsiva are still to be found in the 1560's. The Morgan Library MS 547, a de luxe presentation copy of laws and statutes, written out in Venice in 1562 and delivered by the Doge Priuli to Pietro Venier of Crema, is a model cancellaresca corsiva and one of many such. But it is a long cry from the sweet hand of the papal briefs of Raphael's time and the models of Arrighi and Tagliente. Other influences have been at work, and not least of all, italic types.

Amphiareo's bastarda, the third of our cancellaresca group, demonstrates a successful attempt of an always normal desire to bring together different features of two contemporary styles of handwriting, in this case secretary and cancellaresca. On an elegant cancellaresca corsiva body are grafted certain letter forms, constructions and intentions originating in secretary. Amphiareo's bastarda is a handsome script with its looped ascenders and daggered descenders and especially its exclusive secretary inverted 2-shaped ‘r’, all artfully blended with the sharpest and most dignified corsiva in the remaining letters. The same freedom of combination pervades the capitals, perhaps to an even greater degree, all of which lends a curious feeling of familiarity and strangeness to this Renaissance script-variety. Classifications with lists of dated exemples still await, but are in hand.

The script is perhaps ten years older than cancellaresca corsiva. Amphiareo himself admits to inventing it in Florence in 1518, but of course that meant he was teaching it there on demand during his travels in his earlier years. He must however have organized an existing regional tradition more than a generation old into a definite method of teaching, with the precise models this requires. The interesting points are two: that bastarda is here meant as a mixture of styles, not as common round cancellaresca; and secondly, that Florence is important in the history of the whole XVI century cancellaresca group, even though most of the famous published writing books came out of Venice and Rome.

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Cancellaresca formata is a rather special member of the family group. It is a specialist calligrapher's hand used, it appears, only by the best professionals; a book script only, too difficult of penmanship and style for most amateur lovers of italic. As a result, some of the most beautiful Italian de luxe manuscripts of mid-XVI century are written in this hand by men of Palatino's calibre, men like Ruano and Monterchi. The script had a very short life, perhaps some thiry years, from the 1540's through the 1560's; and printed models and instructions seem to be found only in Palatino's later editions and in Cresci. Ruano's ‘cancellaresca formata’ is actually the only large diagrammatic study of the ‘forming’ of upright cancellaresca corsiva.

By a touch, cancellaresca formata is the boldest of the whole cancellaresca group in weight, the most severe in details and the shortest in ascenders. Like the three preceding variants, the slope is gentle, 5-10^o, about halfway between the upright secretary and the greatly sloped Italian hand to come. Cancellaresca formata is very plain and severe and does not lend itself to speed because pen slant and pen movement are continually changing to render the details properly. It is in fact a master's mixture of batarde and cancellaresca, with angular transitions and terminals borrowed from the first and combined with a tight, almost type-like rendering of the second. Thus the ‘francese’ touch that Palatino describes. One might almost think it was his answer, in an exclusive, formal book-script, to that other mixture, the common business and personal hand advertised as Amphiareo's bastarda.

Cancellaresca romana, the last script-variant of our group, is an excellent example of a transitional yet independent hand, placed historically and technically between two major styles in late Renaissance use. It can be dated for us here as almost exactly parallel to the span of Plantin's printing career. Palatino again holds the single key to its origins, among published manuals. Tagliente, twenty years earlier, hints in one of his plates at the great slope possible to his angular cancellaresca; but hints only in this one technical detail. Cresci of course is famous for his rounded version. Cancellaresca romana is easy to distinguish from its

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fellows. When the cancellaresca corsiva has a thin attenuated feel; when the proportions are too slender and the slope is greater than usual; when the terminals at ascender heads are longer and more than normally blobby and banner-like; when serifs to descenders are whipped out longer and at a greater slant; when there is a feeling of much more running and joining; and when there is a greater size and flourish to the capitals - then we have cancellaresca romana, the end of one style, cancellaresca, and the beginning of another, Italian hand.

It is a dashing yet disciplined hand, whether seen in Cresci's autograph letter of 1562⁽⁷⁾ or in the Morgan Library collection of office copies of the correspondence during 1563-65 of Cosimo de Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany. English documents and letters of this time and to the end of the century, are still in purest cancellaresca corsiva, as some of Queen Elizabeth's writing, or Doddington's. But when Curione publishes what he calls ‘cancellaresca corsiva’ in Rome, 1588, it is in fact what we know as Italian hand, full style.

It is worthy of note, curiously enough, that there is one decade - the 1560's - when all five script-varieties of this cancellaresca group could be found in use in Italy. But despite our emphasis on this family of script for the sake of the ‘age of italic’, it must not be forgotten that both secretary and cancellaresca were required in the good XVI century penman's repertoire, just as secretary and Italian hand were the staples of the XVII, and secretary and English Roundhand the requisites of XVIII and XIX century. Leonardo da Vinci and Pierre Hamon are some of the greats who have left us examples of equal skills in both scripts. Robert Granjon plays with both scripts in his signature, using secretary for the capitals and cancellaresca for the smalls. Da Vinci and Mercator used cancellaresca for their map-writings as distinct from their ordinary secretary handwriting. But it was far too difficult for most to keep this distinction clear, hence ‘free style’.

With all the small subtleties and nuances of difference in form and in style, one is grateful that there is in the paleography of

(7) See fig. 18.

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handwritings a great class called ‘free style’, into which we may put all our mixed hands. Into this group, of course, must be put all those countless technical variations of form and slope and proportions, as well as the mixtures of style characteristics that come from the very nature and freedoms of ‘free style’ in handwriting. Throughout the XVI century, secretary showed in all kinds of mixtures the encroaching influence of the ‘sweet’ cancellaresca, resulting in many ‘free styles’. And conversely, in Raphael's cancellaresca bastarda, his ‘a’ is the detached o-i construction of fast batarde and secretary, barely held together at the top, even in the manner used to this day in Kanzlei. In the long march of history, secretary proved the hardier script for it lasted well into the XIX century, while cancellaresca was perpetuated in italic types, but lost as it developed into a new script, the Italian hand.

Italian hand, lately being called Baroque chancery cursive (‘cancellaresca corsiva’, canc. cors. moderna, Italic, italienne, italienne bastarde).

Italian hand is a delicate, graceful handwriting; tall and thin, strongly sloped and often heavily flourished. Though it must be included in a study of XVI century calligraphy, the script is

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essentially a XVII century hand, pleasant to Rubens and Rembrandt as well as to the writing masters Van den Velde, Materot and Barbedor. lts beginnings have been given above. If we exaggerate the terminal characteristics of cancellaresca romana to the limits of legibility, and if we add to these a feeling of roundness within the slenderness and a pervasive quality of serpentine line, then we have the basic rules of the construction and penmanship of Italian hand.

Outside of Italy there was still no inkling of the new script. Felix Sambix, the great Antwerp writing master shows no example of it in his autograph writing book 1585⁽⁸⁾. The bastarda and corsiva variants of cancellaresca were enough to keep the rest of Europe busy until the XVII century when the Low Countries and France took over the lead in published writing manuals. In Italy, Cresci in 1570 and Hercolani in 1574 had strongly hinted at imminent changes before Curione's manuals of 1588 and 1593 settled matters with detailed models and systematic exercises. But with this we've run beyond Plantin.

(8) See plates.

Plantin's use of XVI century letter styles

These eight styles of XVI century letter design were familiar to printer-publishers like Plantin. All of these scripts, except Italian hand, were common as type faces and were to be found in every large print shop. Plantin himself, is unique in his awareness of, and apparent pleasure in, the rich possibilities of this variety in letter form. He found it a useful and expressive typographic device in solving the layout problems of certain books. Even his first effort shows this; the little ‘La Institutione di une fanciulla nata nobilmente of 1555, with its Italian text set in italic and its French text set in roman types, on facing pages, and even these in alternating position, spread by spread. Some copies of this first book are printed on blue paper, like Palatino's Libro etc. of 1540. This ‘calligrapher's delight’ in mixing various type faces and sizes must surely have raised many grievous problems in the

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composing room; but he saw to it, step by step; choosing the right types, ordering new ones if necessary, supervising the composition, and training the compositors. Many of the books he undertook were important works and Plantin had the designer's gift of making them look and feel important. Throughout his career he left many examples of such books. The Dictionarium Tetraglotton of 1562, with the Latin words set in roman, followed by the Greek, then the French in italic, and the Flemish in blackletter, all run-in copy, a difficult typographic task and an excellent calligraphic result. The magnificent, monumental Polyglot Bible of 1567-73, a superb lesson in layout to all typographers and calligraphers. Even the last volume, which is a supplemental work-book is interesting. The layout of the Hebrew-Latin grammar and dictionary section is in four full-length columns per grand page, which doubles the columns per page of the Biblical text and which reminds one of ancient beginnings in manuscripts like Codex Sinaiticus; at the same time with its 8 pt. type, its heading and sub-heading style, and its separation of columns by hairline rules, it strongly resembles and presages our XX century newspapers. The great Ortelius, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum of 1579, is another instance where the map designer and the printer have combined studio and staff to produce in one volume a manual of book-making techniques, this time in solving those problems of map lettering and engraving, and text layout and typography that were involved in assembling this great collection of large folded sheets. And lastly among those I have seen, the unsigned Imagines of 1581, in which the three columns of three languages of texts for each left hand page are arranged with imagination and decorative effect to support the full-page illustrations opposite on each spread; with the French text again set in roman types, the Latin in italic and the Flemish or German in various blackletter; and with the carry-over words under each of these columns tastefully brought to the reader's attention by the use of smaller sizes of italic, roman and secretary, in that order. What a manual of XVI century scripts!

These books are well known, but their technical excellence in the handling of design problems is not so well known. So strong is the first impression of Plantin's work that of merely continuing

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the layout styles of the great French printers before him, that it takes time and study to perceive those small and subtle excellencies in the typography of his books that count as original style and art in book-making. The little Biblia Sacra of 1584, once seen, remains in the memory as a masterpiece of technical skills in type composition; in the use of 6 pt types, and in the solution of all the difficult page-design problems involved in the setting of complete O.T. and N.T. texts. And all this in 799 pages plus prelims and index. Beyond this skill in page layout, his love and knowledge of lettering and letter forms show clearly in works like those I have described. He must have been an understanding client of the punch cutters and type founders of Europe, and surely an enthusiastic collector of type fonts, albeit a very business-like one.

What better way then for us to study the letter forms in XVI century typography than to examine in some detail the type specimens that Plantin built up and left to us. This was the finest stock of types in the XVI century, in the variety of type faces, in the range of sizes, and in the completeness of series; the first of its kind and scope; the summarized work of a man of business and art in printing and publishing⁽⁹⁾. In tracing the lines of development of the letter forms in Plantin's astonishing array of types, we chart a course through calligraphic and typographic history from the beginnings of printing in Germany and Italy through to the celebrated Frankfort type specimen sheet of 1592⁽¹⁰⁾.

In blackletter, rotunda and batarde, most sizes, even the very largest and smallest, were established and in use in the XV century. Blackletter and batarde on one and the same piece of printing are found as early as the Mainz Indulgences of 1455. Rotunda is in common use almost a hundred years before Plantin. Medium sizes (16 pt) are seen in Fust and Schoeffer's Bible of 1462, and then

(9) Here we are deeply indebted to Harry Carter for the excellent study and handsome facsimile of Plantin's types presented to the Congressists. Through the courtesy of the Printer to the University, Oxford University, I was greatly helped by an advance copy.

(10) For facs. see the introduction by S. Morison in W.T. Berry and A.F. Johnson, Catalogue of Specimens of Printing Types by English and Scottish Founders, 1665-1830, Oxford, 1935.

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beginning only a few years later, in countless thin quartos of Italian and Spanish literary works. Small sizes (12 pt and under) appear in the Catholicon, Mainz 1460, and in the Latin Bible of Rusch, Strassburg. Radtoldt's specimen of 1486 shows nine sizes, 36 pt to 9 pt. Even smaller sizes of rotunda are used before 1500 by some of the printers in Cologne and in Lyons. Large rotunda for music service books and large blackletter for missals are common practice in large folio inkunables. Text sizes of batarde (16 and 14 pt) are common throughout Europe, except in Italy and Spain, for a great part of vernacular literary and liturgical printing. Caxton's books in England alone together with his Flemish beginnings in the craft can provide a whole side-chapter in the study of French and Flemish batarde.

In Plantin's blackletter types as a family of letter forms, we can discern the change of affairs that took place in the XVI century. The demand for formal blackletter (Flamande) remains firm. Fully ten sizes, from largest 40/42 pt to tiniest 6 pt are in stock and in use. One medium size of true batarde and three smaller sizes of a batarde-schwabacher mixture (Allemande, notable mainly for the changes from batarde lower case in o, d, u, s) are found in many of Plantin's books. But rotunda is gone as a useful type. Only one size, the very large Canon d'Espaigne is now needed in the shop. The XVI century, given the choice between two kinds of round, full-proportioned letters for general use in printing types, has dropped rotunda in favor of roman. Not so however in the writing manuals. The popularity of rotunda as a drawn and painted letter in all the various crafts necessitated instruction in the writing manuals from the very first of Fanti's (1514) to the end of the century in reprints of Cresci, Lucas and Yciar. That which an era of such distinction as the Renaissance deems to term ‘moderna’ isn't easily done away with in a century and a half.

Another valuable historical document of letter forms and type founding, directly after Plantin, is the 1592 Berner-Egenolff specimen sheet of Frankfort, which provides a fine study in roman types and the required companion italic and greek types. The whole picture of XVI century needs is clear, in ten sizes. The layout itself is expressive of composing room usage. The types

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shown are beautifully graded from largest to smallest to suggest their use for title pages, headings, initials, text and notes, with ornaments to accompany these types for borders, head- and tailpieces and section breaks. In this sheet we see how the final triumph of roman over blackletter for most printing needs was already accomplished in Plantin's time. But compared with the riches of Plantin's collection of 1579, the 1592 specimen is a foundry's carefully edited broad-sheet of the stock it sees fit at the time to make available to the trade.

Plantin had many more sizes of roman, 17 in all, with accompanying italics in 14 sizes, though not matching, in our sense. This is an astonishing collection of composing room material especially when this range is seen strongly fortified with five working sizes of Greek types, nine sizes of Hebrew and three sizes of music types. And if to this is added the famous storehouse of engravings, on wood and copper, then we are indeed in the greatest printing office and art department of Europe, ready for any kind of work, producing in fact an average of fifty editions annually⁽¹¹⁾.

Considered as letter forms, all the roman types, except the two largest sizes, 84 and 42 pt, were the Garamond-style roman; hence the French look of Plantin's books. Not that the types alone produce this appearance; for the art of layout is deeply involved, the art of arranging texts beautifully and appropriately on the written or printed page. But it is the type face, or the script itself, that is in constant evidence, that must be moved and positioned across the lines and then down the page to create on paper the effect in the mind.

As a rule, but depending on the size of the page, the sizes of roman types larger than ‘texte’ were used for display work, that is for the main titlings or the title pages, chapter headings, initiais, etc. ‘Texte’, ‘Augustin’, ‘Mediane’ or ‘Cicero’, and ‘Philosophie’ were the ordinary sizes for most texts, roughly equivalent to our 16 pt, 14 pt, 12 pt, and 10 pt. Smaller still, were the types for very small books. ‘Cicero’ has remained the European name

(11) See Elizabeth Armstrong, Robert Estienne, Royal Printer, Cambridge, 1954, p. 27 ff. and of course Max Rooses, Christophe Plantin, Antwerp, 1883.

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for 12 pt, but became the English term ‘pica’ in XVII century: 12 pt and 11 pt remain to this day the average book text sizes of roman printing types. It is instructive to follow dues for the naming of the type-size Cicero in XV and XVI century printed editions of the works of Cicero, the De Oratore for example.

The first books printed in Italy came from Subiaco, near Rome, from the press of Sweynheym and Pannartz in the year 1465. The De Oratore is believed to be the first product. The pages of this book are very plain and simple, with no running heads, folio numerals or quire marks. The whole book is set in a 15/16 pt roman, or almost roman type which is also approximately the normal size of book writing in many humanist manuscripts of the XV century. This size is a little smaller than Plantin's ‘texte’ but larger than his ‘Augustine’, thus approximately 15 pt. The first line of each new book is set in caps, following a large handdrawn decorated initial. The caps are quite roman; the lower case is not yet our fully-styled, wholly-seriffed roman, but close enough to feel roman, and certainly close enough to provide great controversy⁽¹²⁾. Of the five editions of De Oratore⁽¹³⁾ which followed in the next thirteen years in Italy, all but one are set in

(12) And ideal footnote discussion! The problem remains a difficult one because all the ideas conveyed in each of the present terms - Gotico-Romano, semi-gothic, semi-roman, fere-humanistica and mixed rotunda-roman - are nevertheless clear and true. What is lacking is simply agreement and brevity. If the reader would tackle the problem for himself, he need only do the following: (1) compare what is clearly rotunda, e.g., the two d's, a, g, s, conjoining and capitals of the 1462 Fust and Schoeffer Bible type with what is clearly roman, although of two weights and proportions, e.g., the single straight-backed d, the round-bowled a, the s-tailed g, the unbroken-curved s, the lack of conjoining, and the classical caps in the types of Da Spira, Jenson, Aldus and Ratdolt; (2) then in order to understand the subtleties enforced on letter forms when mixtures are attempted or required, let him apply the lessons learned to the first, and the second, Subiaco types and to the types of Gering & Co. in the Paris Bible of 1470; (3) it will be seen that something Roman, something Venetian, was going on, but that other influences were also present; (4) then let the reader give a name to the first Subiaco type - in one word! If help is needed, consult S. Morison, Early Humanist Script and the First Roman Type, in The Library, 4th Series, Vol. XXIV, Nos. 1, 2. June-Sept. 1943, p. 1-29.

(13) V. da Spira, Venice 1470; C. Valdarfer, Venice 1470; P. Lavagnia, Milan 1477; A. Cathareni, Venice 1478.

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approximately 16 pt roman: and that one, of Ulrich Han's, Rome 1468, is our first 12 pt, though it too, is not a full-fledged, fully-seriffed roman, but nevertheless a large, lively 12 pt.

Now 12 pt in roman is, and was, fairly small as a book-writing or hand-writing size, for main texts. So this is the first break from the calligraphic book practice of XV century Italy. The only earlier 12 pt type, of any kind, was the small rotunda of the Catholicon, which however, like all the blackletter group, has a larger face than the roman on the same metal point size.

From the mid-1480's to 1495, in four massive editions of collected works of Cicero, including the De Oratore, 16 pt roman type is still used for the text, but that text has shrunk on the page to islands of various dimensions, surrounded by 14 pt or 12 pt notes and commentary. As long as the books remained in large quarto size, or small folio, the calligraphic habit of 16 pt type was normal practice. But in the XVI century the books became smaller and the 16 pt size of type was too large. The text becomes 14, 12 and 10 pt in octavo editions of De Oratore in single or collected works from the presses of Colines (Paris, 1533 and 1543), Estienne (Paris, 1553), Richardius (Paris, 1557) and Francisci (Venice, 1587); then 8 pt and finally 6 pt in the tiny books, only 2″ × 4 1/8″, of Leggatt (Cambridge, 1589) and Raphelengius (1595) in his edition of the Epistolae ad M. Brutum. The diminishing range of text sizes and book pages is completed; the display or larger sizes of type were added in the process. The printed books and the roman types went a long way, in little more than 100 years, from the calligraphic sizes and layouts of their origins.

The page sizes drop the whole gamut of quartos, octavos, and smaller, from 8 1/4″ × 12 3/8″ to 2″ × 4 1/8″ and so too, the styles and techniques of layout become more refined and complicated. Pages are rarely numbered at first; then some help to the reader is given by quire marks in roman letters and roman numerals in the bottom margins of each recto of the first half of each gathering; then to these quire marks are added consecutive folios in arabic numerals at the tops of all rectos, but recto only; finally comes our consecutive numbering of left and right hand pages at

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the top, near the outer margins, to the left and right of running heads.

The commentaries and notes show gradual increase in quantity and change in position; from none at all in the six earliest editions mentioned, although the margins on these are ample for the inevitable written-in marginalia; to the long and narrow strips of commentary bordering the islands of text on three sides; then in early XVI century, long preliminary sections of commentary and ‘argument’ assisted in the main body of the book by 8 pt and 7 pt side-margin notes; then in mid-century begins the custom of alternating continuous text and notes, a long section of notes, often more than two pages following short pieces of text. In this period, following previous manuscript and document layout habits, differences in size of type and in methods of indention are used to aid the reader in distinguishing notes from text. The always-useful side-margin notes are down to 6 pt by this time. Lastly, comes our present custom of indicating footnotes by superior reference numerals or marks in the continuing text proper to guide the reader among the notes at the foot of the page.

In the layout of display matter too, the line of development seems to procede from simple to complex. At first there is no title page and often no printed title at all, not even first chapter heads but rather a statement in the colophon, if there is one. Sometimes we find the title of the book written in by hand at the top of the first folio of text. But the manuscript style of leaving a squareshaped space for a large initial at the beginning of each chapter remains through our whole period. Whether this space was actually filled or not is another matter, as each book seen attests. By 1470 however, full incipits include author and short title, usually in caps positioned over the initial and first line of text. Then to this simple use of short title as first chapter heading was added the plain title page of spaced caps of the same size as the text size. In the Aldine Poliphilus of 1499, for example, these were centered lines set in inverted pyramids, one over the other, nicely placed on the page with plenty of air around. Ratdolt in Venice 1478, had already introduced a very light and open ornamental border. Others followed with heavier woodcut borders in white line techni-

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que. So we have in the XV century the two basic ideas in the art of title page layout - the one very simple and plain, the other highly ornamented. But these had been merely suggested, as it were, in the individual products of certain XV century presses. The sense of regional requirements in the styling of title pages was a XVI century development. Hence, we may refer to the Basle style, the Lyons style, the Paris style and the Antwerp style of typography and decoration in title pages.

Certain landmarks of inventiveness stand out as traits of personal style within the regional development. The varied treatment of the triangular blocks of type, of the Aldine kind just mentioned, is instructive. A single such block of type is seen by itself in the middle of a page surrounded by a heavy woodcut border in a book of G. de Ponte, Venice 1500⁽¹⁴⁾. The double inverted pyramids reappear in a title page of Lescuyer, Lyons 1516⁽¹⁵⁾, but this time on an open, unbordered page under a circular medallion containing a light and airy woodcut portrait. Froben in Basle could make an hour-glass design of the two triangles of type and center it in the opening under the arch of one of his typical, heavily decorated woodcut title pages of the 1520's.

Other XV century layout schemes can be noted in XVI century practice. Ratdolt in Augsburg 1493⁽¹⁶⁾ keeps to his lighter Italian vein with an open, unframed illustration acting as frontispiece on a left-hand page over a few lines of colophon, with the title proper used as chapter heading on the page opposite. The same Renaissance airiness and light touch pervades a title page of H. Estienne, Paris 1518⁽¹⁷⁾, which is nevertheless as highly ornamental as the Basle style, with figures, interlacings, ribbons, medallions, shield and wreath surrounding the three paragraphs of small titlings tastefully set in the central square panel. But the Lyons style of title page design seems to be a XVI century invention, like the italic and secretary types. Here we find the use of

(14) See facs. in S. Morison, Four centuries of Fine Printing, London 1924, pl. 5.

(15) Idem, pl. 278.

(16) See facs. in S. Morison, German incunabula in the British Museum, London 1928, pl. 58.

(17) S. Morison, Four centuries, pl. 87.

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borders entirely composed of type ornaments, arabesques which leave an entirely different impression of decoration, a distinctly typographic flavour and unity. The last style in the repertoire of title page layout is the printer's device or cryptic emblem, handsomely placed on the open or bordered page, varying in size and position according to the length and ‘feel’ of the titling matter. Thus, in our quest for the type size named Cicero, we have also found some of the influential aspects of layout governing the uses, as well as the sizes of type. Plantin had all these styles and techniques of layout at his fingertips, plus copperplate engraving, and he knew how to use each style.

To complete our studies of XVI century scripts in Plantin's types, it is necessary to group italic, batarde and secretary. We have already described some of their characteristics as individual scripts; now we must go further. Plantin's types of 1579 tell one story; twelve sizes of italic, two sizes of batarde, two sizes of secretary, and two sizes of the batarde-schwabacher called Allemande. The writing books from 1548 to 1579 tell another story, in different accents. And we must thread our way through these as well.

The types of XV and XVI century come out of the writings of the time. Where the bookhands are single set letters as in blackletter, batarde, rotunda and roman, the types could easily and faithfully be copied from the scripts. Selecting the best average model form of each letter and fitting these together well were the new typographic problems of design. But this was only one step in the transfer process involving the change of calligraphic form and individual art techniques into suitable type manufacturing processes within the economics of printing. As soon as a letter style came into existence as a type face, it was far better and more useful to copy and improve that type itself for the engraving of new ones, than to refer to the original manuscript or document source, except as the roughest guide for feel and for regional necessities of custom and legibility. But where the character of the letter form is deeply affected by running and joining elements as in secretary, batarde-secretary, and cancellaresca, the type founder's problem

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is more complicated. Ascenders, loops, terminals, joins, and capitals presented serious technical problems in metal.

In the matter of running alone, Aldus chose to preserve in his italic types all the habits of 2-letter and 3-letter diagonal joinings and some of the horizontal joinings charcteristic of the cancellaresca of his time, his region and his editors. It was soon found in Griffo's cutting of the same type in Fano two years later, that the spirit of the writing was well enough preserved without the presence and difficulties of so many ties. The handwriting effect was instantly observable in the slope of the italic, in its slenderness and grace, in the difference of its lower case letter forms from all other book hands and book types. It was therefore not necessary to use diagonal joins in the manner of actual handwriting but to use single letters in place of the combinations an, in, un, as, is, us, mi, mu, ni, nu, nt, and many others, including the famous ii, last one long. Similarly, with the horizontal joins of ta, ti, tu, ci, cu fi, fe, fu, ge, ga, and the normal overhead arch tying the letters long st, long sp, long sl, fl, st, ct, and double long ss. Arrighi, Tagliente and Granjon profited by this clarification. They eliminated nearly all diagonal joins except ii. But all of these masters kept on a single type the Aldine double long ss, long sp, long st, st, ct, and fi. Granjon also restored as, is, us, in all the sizes of italic types he cut for Plantin, except in the smallest (6 pt). In the still smaller 6 pt, cut by Hautin, we find as, is, us, joined again as in the Aldine italic. In these small details, XVI century practice is still universal in many italic types of today.

There is a little book of Plantin's called La Premiere et La Seconde Partie des Dialogues Francois, Pour les Jeunes Enfans printed in Antwerp 1567. It is useful for many reasons to students of XVI century book arts, but here mainly because one of its central characters is the calligrapher, Pierre Hamon, friend of Plantin and handwriting teacher to his daughter. Hamon's writing book L'Alphabet, Paris 1561, is invaluable in matters typographic and calligraphic. The privilege alone is worth reciting for tracing inter-penetrations and influences.

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‘Extrait du privilege.

Par privilege du Roy donné à Sainct Germain des Prez le's Paris, le septienne iour de Iuing l'an mil cinq cens soixante vng, signé Par le Roy en son conseil Bonacorsy, Et seellè du grand seau en cire iaune. Il est permis à Pierre Hamon Blesien de faire tailler, grauer & autrement faire Imprimer & mettre en lumiere toutes fortes d'exemplaires, Alphabetz & Liures, de lettres differentes, tāt Francoyses que Italiques, & autres de son inuention. Et deffenses à toutes personnes de quelque estat & condition qu'ilz soient, graueurs, tailleurs, imprimeurs & autres, de non grauer, tailler, pocher, imprimer ne vendre, ne faire grauer au burin sur cuiure à taille doulce ne à l'eauforte, ou tailler sur planches de boys ne pocher aucunes de sesdicts Karactaires de son inuention sans la permission & cōgé dudit Hamon sur peine de confiscation de leurs marchandises, planches, poincons & autres choses dudit art: d'amende arbitraire, & de tous despens, dommages & interestz, ainsi que plus à plain est declaré audit privilege.’

(‘.... Pierre Hamon of Blois is authorized to have cut, engraved and in any other way to print and divulge all kinds of examples, alphabets and books, of diverse letters, both French and Italic and others of his invention. And it is forbidden to all others, whatever their profession or status; engravers, punch-cutters, printers and others, either to engrave, cut, stencil (sketch or trace), print or sell, or to have made any copper plate engraving or etching, or wood engraving, or to stencil any of the said letters of his invention without permission and leave of the said Hamon, on pain of confiscation of their plates, punches, and other things pertaining to their art; of a discretionary fine,....’)

But the lessons of his two groups of plates and the remainder of the prelims are even more valuable. After the privilege which is set in an 8 pt Granjon-type of italic, comes a laudatory poem of Ronsard, set in secretary type, then only a few years old. This is boldly followed by another such poem set in a 16 pt French italic. Then there are the twenty plates - 8 in batarde-secretary and 12 in various kinds of cancellaresca. Though only two hands are given in the plates, Hamon presents a studied relationship of

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our three styles by the way he uses contemporary types in his prelims. To these must be added that script-variant for which he is famous, running batarde or batarde-secretary.

For us it is well to note that Hamon in his writing book of 1561, is thinking of batarde, batarde-secretary, secretary, italic and cancellaresca as a group whether in types or in writing. His monumental Recuieul des escrits anciens (Paris, B.N. Fr. 19116) of 1566-67 is the most important study of the history of ancient writing produced in the XVI century, far superior to Palatino's exotics. And it is not surprising that his view of the crafts of calligraphy and typography as well, should be comprehensive. Two pages in the Recuieul, ff. 42 and 43 show Hamon's copies and studies in various secretary hands from German and English copy-book sources. His own notes are copious and he writes easily and beautifully in batarde, secretary or cancellaresca. Nor does he hesitate in the least to mix these scripts in the same text. In fact aside from Tory's alphabets (‘Champfleury’, Paris 1529, ff. 74, 75) and trusty Fugger (Nuremberg 1553, ff. F-G), there is no other good XVI century source for batarde or for batardesecretary.

As for a direct connection between italic types and cancellaresca writing, it is only necessary to compare Hamon's pl. 9 (C iv) ‘Lre Italique ronde & commune’ with the italic types of the 6-line poem of eulogy in the preface (A.iii). Here I believe, there is the clearest evidence of inter-influences, but this time inspired by the type forms, which are by now, in the middle of the century, quite acceptable to the calligraphers. The writing and the type are about the same size, Plantin's ‘Texte Cursive’, of Granjon. The writing is a semi-running cancellaresca bastarda and quite similiar to the types except in all the things where lettering and writing should differ from type: no hard and fast thicks and thins; greater freedom in the terminals to ascenders with dotted and seriffed heads mixed; longer ascenders and descenders; and of course sweetly flourished caps which make their counterparts in type look tame. Another instance, but much less decorative, of italic lettering based on italic types is in the small greatly-sloped letters of the legends on the engraved maps in Le Miroir du Monde printed

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by Plantin in 1583. This is the students' pocket guide to Ortelius by the versatile P. Heyns⁽¹⁸⁾. Cresci in his Essemplare of 1579 (1560) does the same thing in comparatives but in another way, and between two of his own scripts, by matching the freedom of his cancellaresca romana against the severity of his cancellaresca formata, by showing and teaching this difference to his readers.

It is not only in XVI century italic type that we note the difficulties imposed by the acceptance or rejection of running and joining ideas. The same struggles and conflicts are to be seen in batarde and secretary types. Granjon's first cutting of the latter about 1557 came out of his desire to create in type the written ‘lettre francoise’ but his ‘Civilité’ seems to be standing still, literally, compared with the running kanzlei type of Froschauer, Zurich 1567⁽¹⁹⁾. Yet both are good of their kind, made of single types and excellent models for any scribe searching for French and German secretary handwriting.

As for the running batarde, three examples come to mind for an excellent comparison of calligraphic and typographic forms. I refer to the Morgan Library document of Emperor Charles V, concerning Austrian matters and dated 18 September 1520; to the types of Kilian⁽²⁰⁾, Nuremberg 1545 in his Marsilius of Padua; and to the upright and sloped running batardes shown in Fugger's writing book. The handwriting is a superb piece of long line document work. The type is very good, too, and especially noteworthy are the two forms of ‘n’, one in normal batarde and the other a rounded secretary form for use as finial only, and very enlightening in the words ‘wann’ and ‘mann’ where both forms are used side by side. The writing book models of Fugger are a most excellent graphic explanation of the ideas of form and currency in running batarde. Hamon, in these matters doesn't teach us

(18) P. Heyns was a schoolmaster, an expert writing master, a designer, a cartographer, an accountant and mathematician and an author. See Colin Clair, A secret of the Laurel Tree unveiled in De Gulden Passer, 1955, pp. 36-41, for an informative study of Heyns' Rekenboeck.

(19) See facs. in D.B. Updike, Printing Types: Their History, Forms and Use. Harvard University Press, 1922/37/51, fig. 77.

(20) See facs. in Crous and Kirchner, Die gotischen Schriftarten, Leipzig 1928, pl. 53.

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but shows us instead his two versions of sloped batarde-secretary. In one there is an influence from the Italian cancellaresca corsiva, in the other the batarde forms are truer. Compare m, n, u, of Lettre Carrée & Lettre Ancienne with the same forms in his Lettre d'État and Lettre Ronde. Where Hamon is most skillful is in his avoidance of the squat secretary proportions, even in the very small sizes of his running batarde. In almost the same way Amphiareo and Cresci found it necessary to attempt to slenderize their regional squat mercantiles by borrowing the proportions of their cancellaresca.

A true understanding of essential italic, batarde and secretary forms, set or running, must come, as with any other scripts from a deep study of the manuscripts and documents of the time. Only in scripts can we study scripts. But the giant strides of printing even in the first hundred years up to our Plantin, make much other material available to the keen student. Hence the value of the type specimens of 1579 and the writing books of the whole century. Among most writing masters there was little evident sympathy for typography. Their specialty kept them busy enough. Thus, in the matter of recognizing the problems of type, of type founding, and of typography, we can single out only three; Arrighi, Fugger, and Hamon. Plantin's specimen sheet with its almost copybook completeness is a constant guide in sifting further through the work of the writing masters.

On italic itself, its history and its forms in XVI century calligraphy and typography, many distinguished writers have made valuable studies in recent times. Chiefly known to me, in English, are the works of D. Updike, S. Morison, A.F. Johnson, J. Wardrop, A. Fairbank, and B. Warde⁽²¹⁾. It is true to a great extent that ‘the XVI century is the age of italic types’ as Johnson once said. The copy books of the Italian writing masters are the strongest support of this. Plantin's type specimen sheet is also useful as an indication of the strong position of italic. But it is also important to put italic into some relation with the other great scripts

(21) See bibliography in A. Bank, The Story of Garamond, in Print, The Magazine of the Graphic Arts, Vol. VIII, no. 1, New York 1953.

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of the century. And there are examples where italic or cancellaresca is used on the same job with many other scripts. Hamon's great notebook of early book hands is one such. Another is plate 8 from the manuscript writing book of Felix van Sambix, Antwerp 1585, where on one page we may find a rich feast of XVI century knowledge and skill in a variety of scripts and models. Still another is an Italian example of such mixture, in some of the pages of F. Moro's manuscript writing book in the Victoria & Albert Museum, London.

Nor do the map engravers fail us here. In Ortelius, Theatrum etc., there is an interesting large map of the Duchy of Wurtemberg. In all the available spaces between the peaceful buildings and trees are the larger and smaller place-names. The small letterings of these towns and places are in set italic, but all the countries and provinces and neighboring territories are in a sloped, set, batarde, decorative and flourished wherever space permits. In the description panel, all is sedate with spaced roman caps for heading and italic lower case for the remainder.

And finally, there are four delightful panels of letterings on the banners carried in a procession in the painting by Hendrick Gerritz. Pot, of Haarlem and Amsterdam, in the Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem. The panel bearing the date 1574 combines lines of gay set Italian hand, batarde and roman lower case in a masterly rendition of descriptional lettering.

XVI Century writing masters and their copy books and manuals

The repertoire of eight scripts that we have been considering is the great common element in the arts and crafts of writing, lettering and printing. In other respects these three arts are independent of each other and capable of exerting influence on each other. Two styles, however, were sufficient for the lettering needs of all the other arts and crafts: blackletter lower case and roman capitals. This is to be observed in any study of the great quantities of inscriptions on paintings, sculptures, medals, placquettes, armour, silver-

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and gold-smith work, jewellery, ceramics, stained glass and tapestries - where lettering was used only for purposes of description or identification. It was only necessary for such craftsmen to have good models available when needed. Hence the importance of the XVI century writing and lettering manuals, which not only gave the best letter forms as models of the prevailing styles. but hinted in their arrangements or instructions at suggestions for their proper use. The list of writing books which follows suffers from the same troubles which plague all similar bibliography: it can never be definitive. The copies of each book seen, or to be seen, are not always the same, either in size, or in contents, or in title page, or in condition. Nor are they complete in every instance, in the original sense. They may be made-up copies, or they may be bound in with other works, often related, often additional from other editions and materials of the same author. So we must take them as we find them - rare, important, troublesome to classify, but extremely useful. And I can speak only of those I know, by having seen the originals; or by knowing of their existence⁽²²⁾. Nevertheless the manuals and copy books of the writing masters are the keys to the study of XVI century calligraphy and its influences in the time of Plantin. And the total roster in the brief survey now appended runs the whole of that century.

(22) In the bibliographies of A.F. Johnson: A Catalogue of Italian Writing Books of Sixteenth Century in Signature N.S. 10, London 1950, and in the Katalog Der Ornamentstich-Sammlung, Kunstbibliotek, Berlin 1939; as well as in whole facsimile copies of which we fortunately now have eleven, and the many singleplate facsimiles in the four great collections of Day, Jessen, Heal and Tschichold.

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Acknowledgments

For my work in this Plantin Celebration and Congress, I wish specially to thank the Secretariat of the U.S. Educational Commissions in Belgium and in the United Kingdom for making possible my visit as Fulbright Senior Fellow and I wish to thank Dr Voet and his entire staff of the Plantin-Moretus Museum for their abundant kindness and patience with me and my materials. In addition, I am indebted to the keepers and staffs of many great libraries and museums in the U.S. and Europe, from whom I have always had the friendliest help and courtesy in hunting and studying their treasures. For the materials used here, acknowledgment is due in particular to Mr Adams, Director of the Morgan Library, Dr Bühler, Curator of Incunabula, and Mr Brewer, photographer; to Mr Mayor, head of the Print Room, Metropolitan Museum of Art; to Mr Wardrop, Deputy Keeper of Books, Victoria and Albert Museum; and to Mr Wells, librarian of the Wing Collection, Newberry Library. For the unusual privilege of seeing their Plantin books as a group, I am grateful to the Keeper and staff of the Dept of Printed Books, British Museum, and to Mr Clifford Maggs of Maggs Bros. And for those happy hours of discussion on innumerable details of Plantin's life and work, I shall always remember my good friends Harry Carter and Colin Clair.

Note to the reader:

The study of set and running cancellaresca scripts - which follows the listing of writing books overleaf - is divided into two parts: fig. 1-7 are examples from early XVI century, and fig. 8-20 show the five members of the family in the 1550's and 1560's.

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I. XVI Century writing masters' copy-books

Date, First Edition	Writing Master	Short Title	Place
1509	Pacioli	Divina proportione opera	Venice
1514	Fanti	S. de F. Theorica et Pratica, etc.	Venice
1522	Arrighi	La Operina di L. Vicentino etc.	Rome
1523	Arrighi	Il Modo de temperare le penne etc.	Venice
1524	Tagliente	Lo presente libro insegna etc.	Venice
1525	Celebrino	Il Modo d'Imparare di scrivere etc.	Venice
1525	Durer	Unterweysung der Messung dem Zirkel etc.	Nuremberg
1527	Verini	Luminario. Liber Elementorum etc.	Florence
1529	Tory	Champfleury etc.	Paris
1535	Fanti	Thesauro de Scrittori	Rome
1538	Neudorffer	Ein Gute Ordnung etc.	Nuremberg
1540/45	Palatino	Libro di M. Giovambattista Palatino etc.	Rome
1540	Mercator	Litterarum Latinarum etc.	Antwerp
1546	Manzoni	Libretto... a leggere, scrivere & abaco	Venice
1548/54	Amphiareo	Un Nuovo Modo... / Opera di Frate V.A....	Venice
1549	Wyss	Libellus Valde Doctus etc.	Zurich
1549	Neff	Ein Köstliche Schatzkammer etc.	Cologne
1549	Stymmer	Ein nüw Kunstych Fundamentbüchle etc.	Zurich
1550	Yciar	Arte Subtilissima... / Libro Subtilissimo...	Saragossa
1553	Fugger	Ein nutzliche und wolgegrundt Formular etc.	Nuremberg
1553	Kleiner	Ein new Cantzleysch Fundamentbüchlin etc.	Zurich
1554	Ruano	Sette Alphabeti di Varie Lettere etc.	Rome
1560	Cresci	Essemplare di piu sorti lettere etc.	Rome
1561	Hamon	(L') Alphabet de l'Invention des Lettres etc.	Paris
1567	Sylvius	Nouvel Exemplaire etc.	Antwerp
1568	Heyns	A.B.C. Oft Exemplen etc.	Antwerp
1569	Perret	Exercitatio Alphabetica etc.	Antwerp
1569/78	La Rue	Exemplaires... / Premier Livre...	Paris
1570	Cresci	Il Perfetto Scrittore di M.F.G.C. etc.	Venice / Rom
1570	Lucas	Arte de Escrivir de F.L.	Madrid
1571	Beauchesne & Baildon	A Booke containing Divers Sortes of hands etc.	London
1574	Hercolani	Lo Scritor Utile et brieve Segretario etc.	Bologna
1579	Cresci	Il Perfetto Cancellaresco Corsivo etc.	Rome
1582	Gagliardelli	Soprascritte di Littere... Cancā, Corsā etc.	Florence
1583	Brun	El Maestro A.B.... / Arte Muy Provechoso....	Saragossa
1585	Sambix	Nouvel A.B.C. par F.V.S.	Antwerp
1587	Scalzini	Il Secretario etc.	Venice
1588	Curione	L'anatomia delle Cancellaresche corsive etc.	Rome
1589	Romano	Il primo libro di scrivere etc.	Rome
1590	Bales	The Writing Schoolemaster etc.	London
1591	Houthusius	Exemplaria sive Formulae Scripturae etc.	Aix-la-Chapel
1591	Scalino	Il Secretario & Regole Nuovo etc.	Venice
1593	Curione	Il Teatro della Cancellaresche etc.	Rome
1594	Hondius	Theatrum Artis Scribendi etc.	Amsterdam
1599	Beaulieu	Examplaires du Sieur de B.	Montpellier
1599	Le Gangneur	La Technographie etc.	Paris
1599	Perez	Arte de Escrivir	Madrid

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Printer	Format & Size in inches, width first	From copy in
Paganini	↑ 8″ × 12 3/8″	S. Morison, whole facs. New York, 1933
Rubeus	↑ 5 5/16 × 8	New York, Morgan Lib. 1514
(? Arrighi) (? cut by da Carpi)	↑ 5 5/8 × 8	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1522
(? Arrighi) cut by Celebrino	↑ 5 1/2 × 8	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1523
(..........)	↑ 5 1/2 × 7 7/8	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1532
(? Celebrino)	↑ 4 1/8 × 6 3/16	S.M., whole facs. Paris, 1929
(..........)	↑ 8 9/16 × 12 1/8	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1525
(..........)	↑ 5 7/8 × 8 11/16	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1527
(? De Gourmont)	↑ 6 1/4 × 9 5/8	New York, Morgan Lib. 1529
(...........)	↑ 5 1/16 × 8	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1535
(? Neudorffer) engraved by author	→ 11 × 7 5/8	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1538
Blado / di Francesco	↑ 5 1/8 × 7 5/8	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1540, 1545, 1547, 1566
(..........)	↑ 5 3/8 × 7 3/8	S.M., whole facs. Antwerp, Paris 1930
de Trino Lanno	↑ 8vo	A.F. Johnson bibliography
		Signature N.S. 10, 1950
Troiano / Giolito	→ 8 3/16 × 5 9/16	Chicago, Newberry Library / New York,
	8 × 5 5/8	Met. Mus. of Art
(? Wyss) cut by Wyss	→ 9 1/2 × 7	[whole facs.]
Vopelij	↑ 8 7/16 × 12 5/8	facs. pl. Jessen; Tschichold; Berlin, Kat. Ornam.-Samm. 1939
Wyssenbach	→ 10 1/16 × 8	ditto
Bernuz; cut by De Vingles	↑ 4 7/8 × 7 3/16	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1564; and S.M. copy, 1550
Geysler	→ 7 3/4 × 6	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1553
(.........)	↑ 8 11/16 × 12 1/4	facs. pl. in Jessen; and Kat. Ornam-Samm.
Dorico	↑ 8 × 10 5/8	London, Vict. & Alb. Mus. 1554
Blado	→ 8 3/8 × 6 1/4	London, Brit. Mus. 1578
le Royer^(*)	→ 7 7/8 × 5 7/8	London, Brit. Mus. 1561
(.........)
Plantin plates printed by de Vries	→ 6 1/2 × 4 1/8 (type area)	facs. pl. in Rooses, Plantin and entry Kat. Ornam.-Samm. 1585
Plantin (publisher) text engravings, de Hooghe	→ 11 5/8 × 9 3/16	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1569
(? Micard)	→ 8 7/8 × 6 7/8	facs. pl. in Jessen; and entry Kat. Ornam.-Samm.
Rampazetto (? Cresci); engraver, Aureri	→ 10 3/4 × 8 1/16	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1570
(.........)	↑ 5 3/8 × 7 9/16	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1580
Vautrouillier^(*)	↑ 8 1/4 × 5 7/16	London, Brit. Mus. 1571
Benacci	→ 10 7/8 × 8 1/2	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1574; ditto London V. & A. Mus.
Spada	→ 7 1/4 × 5 1/4	London, Brit. Mus. 1579
(.........)	→ 10 × 7 3/8	London, V. & A. Museum 1582
de Robles^(*); cut by author	↑ 8 7/8 × 12 1/4	S.M. & H. Thomas, whole facs. Paris, 1929
Trognesius	→ 7 7/8 × 6 1/4	Antwerp, Plant.-Mor. Mus. 1585. (printed & ms.)
Nicolini; cut by G. Franco	→ 9 1/2 × 6 3/4	London, V. & A. Mus. 1587
(.........)	→ 9 5/8 × 8 1/8	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1588 & 1593
(.........)	→ 11 3/4 × 7 7/8	London, V. & A. Mus. 1589
Orwin	↑ 4 1/2 × 6 3/4	facs. title p. in Heal; single plate in Hondius
(.........)	→ 10 3/8 × 7 3/8	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1591
(.........)	→ 8 1/2 × 6 9/16	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1591
(.........) ‘alla insegna del martello’	→ as above 1588	(loan collection, author)
(? Hondius)	→ 8 5/16 × 5 7/8	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1594
(.........) engraver, Greuter	→ 10 1/8 × 7	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1599
(.........)	→ 10 × 7 1/2	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1599
(.........)	→ 7 × 5 1/4	New York, Met. Mus. of Art 1599

(*) Known to be in correspondence with Plantin.

(*) Known to be in correspondence with Plantin.

(*) Known to be in correspondence with Plantin.

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II. XVI Century writing masters' copy-books

Resumé of Reprint Editions (by cities, printers & dates) Venice Arrighi: Aristotile 1532. Tagliente: Sabbio 1527, -29, -30, -33, -36, -42; Rampazetto 1545, -46, -50, -53, -54, -56, -60, -62, -63, -65, -68. Palatino: Heits of M. Sessa^(*) 1578, -88; Rampazetto 1588. Amphiareo: Trino Lanno 1556, -57, -58, -59, -64, -65, -66, -72, -75; Scotto 1555; Gardano 1580 (and 4 others to 1596). Cresci: Rampazetto 1575; Salicato 1583, 1600. Rome Arrighi: Dorico 1539, -48. Tagliente: Blado 1525. Palatino: Libro Girolama 1543, -44; Blado 1545, -47, -50, -53; Matovano 1556; Dorico 1561. ......: Compendio Dorico 1566, -75. Cresci: Blado 1563, -66, and Heirs of, -68, -75. Antwerp Arrighi (complete): Loë (Loëus)^(*) 1543, -45, -46. Tagliente: Loë 1545, -50. Mercator: R. Bellere 1557; J. Bellere^(*) 1557. Heyns: Plantin 1585. London Beauchesne & Baildon 1590. Bales 1597. Lyons Hamon 1580. Madrid Lucas 1580. Saragossa Yciar: Çapila 1555. Nuremberg Durer: Formschneyder 1538. (The above from bibliographies and lists of A.F. Johnson, S. Morison, J. Wardrop, J.C. Brunet.)

Summary list of contents (by scripts & miscellanea) Ten books are devoted to one script exclusively: Pacioli: roman caps Celebrino } secretary Heyns } secretary

(*) Printers in correspondence with Plantin.

(*) Printers in correspondence with Plantin.

(*) Printers in correspondence with Plantin.

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Arrighi (1532) } canc. cors. Mercator } canc. cors. Cresci (1579) } Italian hand. Gagliardelli } Italian hand. Scalzini^(*) } Italian hand. Romano } Italian hand. Scalino^(*) } Italian hand. Six-copy books are devoted to two scripts only: Durer, roman caps and blackletter; Stymmer (? secretary and batarde); Hamon, batarde-secretary and cancellaresca; Curione, Italian hand and roman; Beaulieu } secretary & Ital. hd. Le Gangneur } secretary & Ital. hd. Six books show three scripts: Verini: secretary, rotunda & roman; Tory: roman, blackletter & batarde; Neudorffer: secretary, batarde & canc. basta.; Kleiner: blackletter, batarde & secretary; Ruano: roman, rotunda & cancellaresca; Brun: canc, bastarda, rotunda & roman. Three books give four scripts: Fanti (2): secretary, rotunda, blackletter, roman; Hercolani: canc. (romana & cors.), secretary, rotunda, roman; Perez: (? canc. basta., redondilla), roman, italic (Grifa). Sixteen manuals are comprehensive & complete, showing many of our eight scripts and others, hence important handbooks for teacher, student & craftsman: Arrighi (1523) Tagliente Palatino Amphiareo Wyss Neff Yciar Fugger Cresci (1560 & 1570) Perret Lucas Beauchesne & Baildon Sambix Houthusius Hondius. Four are text-books, without plates, or with models set in type: Manzoni (? Sylvius) Heyns Bales.

Size & format miscellany The shortest & daintiest book is Celebrino's, only 8 plates on 4 leaves. The Newberry Library Tagliente (1525) is a ‘de luxe’ special (now in whole facsimile). The largest is Brun's, which is also the only one printed in two colors & with single-line copies at the top of ruled, blank pages. Many of the copy-books are quite long, from 85 to 130 plates, but not very thick. Neudorffer, 93 pl. (incl. 40 counterproofs) Palatino, 96 pl. Amphiareo, 85 pl. Wyss, 114 pl. Yciar, 88 pl. Fugger, 208 pp. & over 100 pl. Ruano, 88 pl. Cresci, about 90 pl. (1570) Lucas, about 96 pl. Gagliardelli, 134 pl.

(*) Two books & two authors, but both ‘detto Camerino’.

(*) Two books & two authors, but both ‘detto Camerino’.

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Four books are folio (9″ × 12″ or over). Nineteen are quarto volumes (6″ × 9″ or over). Twenty are octavo (4 1/2″ × 6″ or larger) and Celebrino is smaller. Of 22 books up to Ruano, only 5 are oblong: Neudorffer, Amphiareo, Wyss, Stymmer & Fugger. Of 24 from Cresci (1560), only 3 are upright: Lucas, Brun & Bales. Most of the plates are eut or engraved in wood; the books of copper-plate engravings are: Neudorffer, Perret, Hercolani, Curione, Houthusius(?), Hondius (copper-plate models in woodcut borders), LeGangneur. Neudorffer, Wyss & Brun cut their own plates. Amphiareo drew his capitals on the blocks.

Text miscellany For long explanatory texts, not necessarily instructions, see in Arrighi, Tory, Palatino, Mercator, Yciar, Ruano, Cresci, Scalino & Gagiardelli. For thorough study of salutations & abbreviations, see Cresci (1570) & Gagliardelli. For exotics, musics, etc. see Palatino, Yciar & especially Fugger. For different initiais on each page, arranged in alphabetical sequence, see Hamon, Beauchesne & Baildon, & Sambix. For the best instruction by analysis of form and penmanship, see Mercator & Fugger. For the most thorough study of roman caps in all sizes, see Cresci (1560 & 1570). For the study of numerals, see Fanti, Fugger & Heyns (Rekenboek).

Display and Decoration miscellany For large capitals & initials in roman, uncialesque, rotunda, bollatica, see in: Pacioli Fanti Arrighi (1523) Tagliente Durer Verini Tory Palatino Amphiareo Yciar Fugger Ruano Cresci (1560 & 1570) Lucas Beauchesne & Baildon Hercolani Curione Sambix. For flourishes in handwritings, see Tagliente, Neudorffer, Mercator & Beaulieu. For borders, ornament, decorative units, strap-work & inter-lacings, see: Perret & Hondius, Cresci & Curione, Verini & Hercolani, Arrighi (1523), Tagliente, Palatino, Amphiareo & Yciar.

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Fig. 1. - Cancellaresca bastarda (beginning 2^nd line).

Fig. 2. - Set cancellaresca corsiva. Both in the same ms. Liber Censuum, a de luxe Papal register of incomes and tax returns, ca. 1505 (New York, Morgan Library, M. 473).

Fig. 3. - ‘2-cancellaresca bastarda’ pre-Amphiareo, 1502. Autograph of T. Fusco, secretary of Cardinal d'Este, in borrowers' register, Biblioteca Vaticana. facs. f. 101. Il Due Registri di Prestito etc. Cod. Vat. Lat. 3964 & 3966. Rome, 1942.

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Fig. 4. - ‘2-canca. corsiva’ pre-Amphiareo, 1514. Papal Treasurer's payment voucher and at bottom, under signature of Jo. Gaddus, is Raphael's autograph recepit in canca. bastarda. (Morgan Library).

Fig. 5. - ‘2-canca. corsiva’ pre-Amphiareo, 1515. Entry on f. 6, Vat. Lat. 3966, register of borrowers, Bibl. Vaticana, facs. op. cit.

Fig. 6. - Canc. corsiva, 1518. Papal document of Leo X over signature of Cardinal Sadoletus. (Morgan Library)

Fig. 7. - Canc. bastarda, 1519. Royal document over signature of Charles V, King of Spain, to Ludovic, count palatine of the Rhine, from Saragossa, (Morgan Library)

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Fig. 8. - Canc. bastarda, 1552. Autograph letter of Paul Eber to Dr. John Humel, in collection, Reformation in England and Germany. (Morgan Library).

Fig. 9. - Canc. bastarda, 1566. Autograph of Pierre Hamon, f.2 of his Recueil etc. (Paris, Bibl. Nat., Ms. Fr. 19116.)

Fig. 10. - Canc. bastarda, (with r & 2) 1569. Royal document of Philip II, King of Spain to Duchess of Lorraine. (Morgan Library)

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Fig. 11. - Set canc. corsiva, 1562. Venetian Laws and Statutes. (Morgan Library, M. 547).

Fig. 12. - Semi-running canc. corsiva, 1561. Pierre Hamon's lettre carrée commune from his manual, L'Alphabet etc. Paris. (London, British Museum, 1268. a. 5)

Fig. 13. - Semi-running canc, corsiva, 1569. Autograph letter of B. Doddington to Duke of Norfolk, from Cambridge. (British Museum, Lansd. 11, P. 23251 and courtesy A. Fairbank).

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Fig. 14. - The 2-r and 2-d type of Amphiareo's bastarda, 1559 (but g as in canc. romana) Letter of Francesco de Medici, over his postscript and signature, from Bologna. (Morgan Library)

Fig. 15. - Looped ascenders, especially d, as in Amphiareo's bastarda, 1568 (but without characteristic 2). Autograph letter of Nanni di Bigio, from Ostia. (Morgan Library)

Fig. 16. - Canc. formata. Palatino, Libro etc., Rome, 1540, 1545, 1565. (New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art).

Fig. 17. - Canc. formata, 1551. Ruano's ms. of Hildebert, from facs. in J. Wardrop: Vatican Scriptors, in Signature N.S. No 5, London 1948, pp. 3-28. See also Farnese ‘Hours’, Morgan Library, M. 69.

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Fig. 18. - Canc. romana, rounded and in effect early Italian hand, 1562. Autograph letter of Cresci to Cardinal Sirleto, from Milan. from facs. in J. Wardrop, ibid.

Fig. 19. - Canc. romana, normal pointed version, 1564. From collection of office copies, correspondence 1563-65, of Cosimo I de Medici, Florence. (Morgan Library)

Fig. 20. - Rounded canc. romana, or early Italian hand, 1567. Autograph letter of Titian, to Cardinal Farnese; from Venice, at age 90. His third variety of canc. (Morgan Library)