Engraving: Its Origin, Processes, and History

by comte Henri Delaborde

Papillon, in support of the opinion that the earliest attempts took place at Ravenna before the end of the thirteenth century, brings into court a somewhat doubtful story. Two children of sixteen, the Cavaliere Alberico Cunio and his twin sister Isabella, took it into their heads in 1284 to carve on wood "with a little knife," and to print by some process seemingly as simple a series of compositions on "the chivalrous deeds of Alexander the Great." The relations and friends of the two young engravers, Pope Honorius IV. amongst others, each received a copy of their work. After this no more was heard of the discovery till the day when Papillon miraculously came across evidences of it in the library of "a Swiss officer in retirement at Bagneux." Papillon unfortunately was satisfied with merely recording his discovery. It never occurred to him to ensure more conclusive publicity, nor even to inquire into the ultimate fate of the prints he only had seen. The collection of "The Chivalrous Deeds of Alexander the Great" again vanished, and this time not to reappear. It is more prudent, in default of any means of verification, to withhold our belief in the precocious ability of the Ravenna twins, their xylographic attempts, and the assertions of their admirers, although competent judges, such as the Abbé Zani[4] and after him Emeric David, have not hesitated to admit the authenticity of the whole story.

Fig. 1.—THE ST. CHRISTOPHER OF 1423.

The learned Zani had, in truth, his own reasons for taking Papillon at his word. Had the story tended to establish the pre-existence of engraving in Germany, he would probably have investigated the matter more closely, and with a less ready faith. But the glory of Italy was directly at issue, and Zani honest though he was, did not feel inclined to receive with coldness, still less to reject, testimony which, for lack of better, might console his national self-respect, and somewhat help to avenge what the Italians called "German vanity." Pride would have been a better word, for the pretensions of Germany with regard to wood engraving are based on more serious titles and far more explicit documents than the one discovered by Papillon, and recklessly passed on by Zani. Heinecken and the other German writers on the subject doubtless criticise in a slightly disdainful manner, and with some excess of patriotic feeling. For all that, they defend their opinions by documents, and not by mere traditions; and if all their examples are not quite evidently German, those which are not should in justice be attributed to Flanders, or to Holland, and by no means to Italy.

In this struggle of rival national claims the schools of the Low Countries are entitled to their share of glory. It is quite possible that their claims, so generally ignored towards the end of the last century, should in the present day be accounted the most valid of all; and that, in this obscure question of priority, the presumption may be in favour of the country which supplied an art closely connected with engraving with its first elements and its first examples. It would be unbecoming in every way to pretend to enter here on a detailed history of the origin of printing. The number of exhaustive works on the subject, the explanations of M. Léon de Laborde, M. Auguste Bernard, and more recently of M. Paeile, would render it a mere lesson in repetition or a too easy parade of borrowed learning. Anyhow, the discovery of printing with type is so intimately connected with the printing of engravings, and the practical methods in both are so much alike, that it is necessary to mention a few facts, and to compare a few dates. We shall therefore, under correction, reduce to the limits of a sketch the complete picture drawn by other hands.

If printing be strictly understood to mean typography, or the art of transferring written matter to paper by means of movable and raised metal types, there can be no doubt that its discovery must date from the day on which there was invented at Mayence the process of casting characters in a mould previously stamped in the bottom by a steel die bearing the type to be reproduced.

Gutenberg, with whom the idea of this decisive improvement originated, is in this sense the earliest printer. His "Letters of Indulgence" of 1454 and his "Bible" are the oldest examples of the art with which he is for ever associated. In a general sense, however, and in a wider meaning of the word, it may be said that printing was known before Gutenberg's time, or at least before he published his typographical masterpieces. People previously knew both how to print broadsides from characters cut on a single block, and how to vary the arrangement of the text by using, in place of an immovable row of letters, characters existing as separate types, and capable of various combinations. On this point we must trust to the testimony of one of Gutenberg's workmen, Ulrich Zell, the first printer established in Cologne. Far from attributing to his master the absolute invention of movable type, he merely contrasts with the process known and practised in the Low Countries before the second half of the fifteenth century "the far more delicate process" of cast type "that was discovered later." And Ulrich Zell adds, "the first step towards this invention was taken in 1440 in the printing of the copies of Donatus[5] which were printed before this time in Holland (ab illis atque ex illis)."

Now if these copies of Donatus were not printed by means of movable type, why should they be mentioned rather than the many other works equally fitted to give a hint to Gutenberg? Why, in going back to the origin of the discovery, should his pupil say nothing of those illustrated legends which were xylographically cut and sold in all the Rhenish towns, and which the future inventor of printing must have seen hundreds of times? For the attention of Gutenberg to have been thus concentrated on a single object, there must have been some peculiar merit and some stamp of real progress in the mode of execution to distinguish the copies of Donatus printed at Haarlem from other contemporary work. Laurence Coster—the name attributed to the inventor of the process which Gutenberg improved—must have already made use of a method more closely allied than any other to the improvements about to follow, and destined to put a term to mere experiments.

To suppose the contrary is to misunderstand the words of Ulrich Zell and the influence which he attributes to the Dutch edition of Donatus, from which Gutenberg derived "the first idea of his invention." It is still more difficult to understand how, if the Donatuses are block-printed, reversed letters are sometimes found in the fragmentary specimens which survive. There is nothing the least extraordinary in such a mistake when it can be explained by the carelessness of a compositor of movable type, but such a mistake would really be incredible on the part of a xylographic workman. What possible caprice could have tempted him to engrave occasional letters upside down? One could only suppose he erred, not from inadvertence, but with voluntary infidelity and in calculated defiance of common sense.

The discovery which has immortalised the name of Gutenberg should be recognised and admired as the conclusion and crown of a series of earlier attempts in printed type. Taking into account the inadequacy of the movable type, whether of wood or of any other substance, first employed by the Dutch, and the perfection of the earliest specimens of German printing, it can and should be admitted that, before the publication of the "Letters of Indulgence," the "Bible," and other productions from the workshop of Gutenberg and his fellow-labourers attempts at genuine typography had been already pursued, and to a certain extent rewarded with success.