These early woodcuts were the forerunners of the better known block-books, which also, according to Heinecken, were at first the work of the card-makers. Block-books consisted of prints accompanied by a descriptive or explanatory text, both text and illustration being printed from the same block. Since they were intended for the moral instruction of those whose education did not fit them for the study of more elaborate works, they generally deal with Scriptural and religious subjects. The earliest of all the block-books was the Biblia Pauperum, or “Bible of the Poor,” so called because it was designed for the edification of persons of unlearned minds and light purses, who could neither have afforded the high prices demanded for ordinary manuscript copies, nor have read such copies had they owned them. The Biblia Pauperum, however, exactly met their want. It is not so much a book to read, as a book to look at. It has a text, it is true, but the text is subordinate to the pictures.
The Biblia Pauperum is on paper, as paper was cheaper than vellum and considered quite good enough for the purpose. One side only of each leaf was printed, two pages being printed from one block, and the sheets folded once and arranged in sequence, not “quired” or “nested.” The resulting order was that of two printed pages face to face, followed by two blank pages face to face. The illustrations are of scenes from sacred history, and portraits of Biblical personages, accompanied by explanatory Latin or German texts in Gothic characters. The original designer and compiler of this favourite block-book is unknown, but he certainly worked on lines laid down by some much older author and artist, for manuscript works of similar nature existed at least as early as the beginning of the fourteenth century. The earliest known instance of a composition of the kind, however, is a series of enamels on an antependium or altar-frontal in the St Leopold Chapel at Klosterneuburg, near Vienna, which originally contained forty-five pictures dealing with Biblical subjects, arranged in the same order as in the Biblia Pauperum, and which were executed by Nicolas de Verdun, in 1181. Some attribute the inception of the Biblia Pauperum to Ansgarius, first Bishop of Hamburg, in the ninth century, others to Wernher, a German monk of the twelfth century, but it seems unlikely that the point will ever be decided. The Biblia Pauperum is usually supposed to have been first printed xylographically in Holland, and type-printed editions were issued later from Bamberg, Paris and Vienna.
To modern eyes the illustrations of this book are strange and wonderful indeed. “The designer certainly had no thought of irreverence,” says De Vinne, “but many of the designs are really ludicrous. Some of the anachronisms are: Gideon arrayed in plate-armour, with mediæval helmet and visor and Turkish scimitar; David and Solomon in rakish, wide-brimmed hats bearing high, conical crowns; the translation of Elijah in a four-wheeled vehicle resembling the modern farmer's hay-wagon. Slouched hats, puffed doublets, light legged breeches and pointed shoes are seen in the apparel of the Israelites who are not represented as priests or soldiers. Some houses have Italian towers and some have Moorish minarets, but in none of the pictures is there an exhibition of pointed Gothic architecture.”
PAGE FROM THE BIBLIA PAUPERUM (SECOND EDITION).
Our illustration gives a reduced representation of a page from the second edition of the Biblia Pauperum, dating from about 1450. The middle panel shows Christ rising from the tomb, and the wonder and fear of the Roman guards; the left-hand panel shows Samson carrying off the gates of the city of Gaza, and the right-hand panel the disgorging of Jonah by the whale. The upper part of the text shows how that Samson and Jonah were types of Christ, and the four little figures represent David, Jacob, Hosea, and Siphonias (Zephaniah), the texts on the scrolls being quotations from their words.
The accompanying rhymes are as follows:—
Obsessus turbis: Sāpson valvas tulit urbis.
Quem saxum texit: ingens tumulum Jesus exit.
De tumulo Christe: surgens te denotat iste.
(In the midst of crowds, Samson removes the gates of the city. The anointed Jesus, whom the stone covered, rises from the tomb. This man [Jonah] rising from the tomb, denotes Thee, O Christ!)