COLON IÆ. FELICITER.
As for the Roman bookseller, he was in the habit of placarding his shop with the titles of books just published, or about to be published. Take, for instance, the shop described by Martial in the lines:
" Contra Caesaris est forum taberna,
Scriptis postibus hinc et inde totis,
Omnes ut cito perlegas poetas.
Illinc me pete.
The actor has never been inclined to hide his light under a bushel. Advertisement has always been dear to him, and it is not surprising to find that the Roman actor made the most of the opportunity of the publicity offered to him by the album. Not content with having his name inscribed in gigantic letters, he went a step further, and anticipated the illustrated affiche. Just as Sarah Bernhardt employs the decorative skill of Grasset to depict her as Joan of Arc, so did the old Roman actor employ Callades, an artist mentioned very favourably by Pliny, to portray him in his favourite parts. Callades would seem to have been the Chéret of his age: he was the great artistic advertiser of ancient Rome, just as Chéret is the great artistic advertiser of modern Paris.
It is obvious, then, that the idea of the illustrated poster existed among the Romans: the difference between Callades and Chéret is one of method rather than of vital principle. And even the difference in method is slight.
Of the poster in the time which immediately succeeded the fall of the Roman Empire we have very little trustworthy information. It is possible that the Romans introduced the album into Gaul and into Britain, and that the sight of it became as familiar to the inhabitants of Eboracum and Uriconium as it was to the natives of Rome and Pompeii. A French historian of distinction has stated that the affiche was employed by the earliest of the kings of France, but this statement can hardly be said to be borne out by facts. It is at least certain that the signboard, which is a variation of the pictorial poster, was employed in the early part of the Middle Ages. The poster, unless illustrated, would have been useless in a community in which the art of writing was held effeminate, in which the most illustrious knight openly boasted of his inability to sign his name. The principal means of advertisement at that time was the public crier. As early as the twelfth century the criers of France formed an organized body, "for," as Mr. Sampson tells us in his History of Advertising, "by a charter of Louis VII. granted in the year 1141 to the inhabitants of the province of Berry, the old custom of the country was confirmed, according to which there were to be only twelve criers, five of whom should go about the taverns crying with their usual cry, and carrying with them samples of the wine they cried in order that people might taste. For the first time they blew the horn they were entitled to a penny, and the same for every time after, according to custom.... These wine-criers are mentioned by John de Garlando, a Norman writer, who was probably contemporary with William the Conqueror." The wine-crier is frequently mentioned in early French street-ballads. To instance one of them:
"Si crie l'on en plusors leurs