Another very popular block-book, of German origin, was the curious compilation known as Ars Moriendi—the Art of Dying—or, as it is sometimes called, Temptationes Demonis, or Temptation of Demons. It describes how dying persons are beset by all manner of temptations, the final triumph of the good, and the sad end of the wicked, with suitable emotions on the part of the attendant angels, and the hideous demons by which the temptations are personified. This work was greatly in vogue in the fifteenth century, and after the invention of type-printing was reproduced in various parts of France, Italy, Germany and Holland.
The only block-book without illustrations was the Donatus de octibus partibus orationis, or Donatus on the Eight Parts of Speech, shortly known as Donatus. It was the Latin grammar of the period, and was the work of Donatus, a famous Roman grammarian of the fourth century. Large numbers were printed both from blocks and from type, but xylographic fragments are scarce, and none are known of any date before the second half of the fifteenth century. Yet it is believed that probably more copies of this work were printed than of any other block-book whatever. Besides its lack of illustrations, the xylographic Donatus is unique among block-books from the fact that it was printed on vellum and not on paper, and (another unusual feature) on both sides of the leaf. Vellum was dear, and had to be made the most of, and no doubt was used only because a paper book would have fared badly at the hands of the schoolboys.
Only one block-book is known to have been printed in France, and that is Les Neuf Preux, or the Nine Champions. The nine champions are divided into three groups: first, classical heroes—Hector, Alexander and Julius Cæsar; next, Biblical heroes—Joshua, David and Judas Maccabæus; and lastly, heroes of romance—Arthur, Charlemagne and Godefroi of Boulogne. The portraits of these celebrities are accompanied by verses. This block-book dates from about 1455.
Other block-books were the Speculum Humanæ Salvationis, the Apocalypse of St John, the Book of Canticles, Defensorium Inviolatæ Virginitatis Beatæ Mariæ Virginis, Mirabilia Romæ; various German almanacks, and a Planetenbuch, this last representing the heavenly bodies and their influence on human life. The last of the block-books, so far as is known, was the Opera nova contemplativa, which was executed at Venice about 1510.
From one point of view the Speculum Humanæ Salvationis, or Mirror of Salvation, is the most curious of its kind. It is looked upon as the connecting link between block-books proper and type-printed books. Its purpose seems to have been to afford instruction in the facts and lessons of the Christian religion, beginning with the fall of Satan. It is founded on an old and once popular manuscript work sometimes ascribed to Brother John, a Benedictine monk of the thirteenth or fourteenth century. Four so-called “editions” of the Speculum are known, two of which are in Latin rhyme, and two in Dutch prose, all four having many points in common and standing apart from the later and dated editions afterwards produced in Germany, Holland, and France.
In these early copies the body of the work consists of a text printed from moveable types, with a block-printed illustration at the head of each page. But one of the Latin editions is remarkable for having twenty pages of the text printed from wood blocks. How and why these xylographic pages appear in a book whose remaining forty-two pages are printed from types is a mystery. They are inserted at intervals among the other leaves, and for this and other reasons it is considered improbable that they were printed from blocks originally intended for a block-book, to help to eke out a not very plentiful stock of type. Moreover, no entirely xylographic Speculum exists to lend colour to such a theory.
The time and place of origin of the Speculum are unknown, and bibliographers are not agreed as to the order in which the several “editions” appeared. But such evidence as exists points to Holland as the home of the printed Speculum, and those who believe that Coster of Haarlem invented typography, credit him with having produced it.
Block-books are nearly all of German, Dutch, or Flemish workmanship. As a rule the illustrations are roughly coloured by hand. The method by which they were printed is generally supposed to have been that of laying a dampened sheet of paper on the inked block, and rubbing it with a dabber or frotton until the impression was worked up. But De Vinne, in his History of Printing, says that there are practical reasons against the correctness of this view, and considers it more probable that a rude hand-press was used.
Those who wish to see some modern examples of block-printing may be referred to the books printed by the late William Morris at the celebrated Kelmscott Press at Hammersmith. The title-pages and initial words of these volumes were executed by means of wood blocks, and are as beautiful examples of block-printing as the texts of the works they adorn are of typography. All the Kelmscott printing, whose history, though most interesting, is nevertheless outside the present subject, was done by hand presses.