ERHARDUS RATDOLT.
Erhardus Ratdolt may be regarded as one of the earliest, if not actually the first Venetian printer to adopt a Mark. From 1476 to 1478 he was in partnership with Bernardus Pictor and Petrus Loslein de Langencen, but from the latter year to 1485 he was exercising the art alone. (It is not altogether foreign to our subject to mention that this firm printed the “Calendar” of John de Monteregio, 1476, which has the first ornamental title known.) In 1487, Ratdolt was at Augsburg, and perhaps his claims as a printer are German rather than Venetian, but as his best work was executed during his sojourn in Venice, it will be more convenient to include him in the present chapter. Like so many others of the early printers, he regarded his own performances with no little self-complacency, for in his colophons he describes himself, “Vir solertissimus, imprimendi arte nominatissimus, artis impressoriæ magister apprimè famosus, perpolitus opifex, vir sub orbe notus,” and so forth. To him is attributed the credit of having invented ink of a golden colour; and he was the first to employ the “flourishes,” (“literæ florentes”) or initial letters formed of floral scrolls and ornaments borrowed from the Italian manuscripts, and sometimes printed in red and sometimes in black. Joannes and Gregorius de Gregoriis, 1480–1516, and Gregorius alone, 1516–28, make a very good show in the way of printed books, one of the most notable being the first quarto edition of Boccaccio, 1516, and another the “Deutsch Römisch Brevier,” 1518, which is printed in black and red Gothic letter with numerous full-page woodcuts and borders. Contemporary with these two brothers and also famous as a prolific printer comes Ottaviano Scotto, “Civis Modoetiēsis,” 1480–1500, and his heirs, 1500–31, of whose Mark we give an exact reproduction. Baptista de Tortis, 1481–1514, also issued a number of interesting books, more particularly folio editions of the classics, copies of which are still frequently met with, and of whose Mark we give a reduced example on [p. 25]; and the same may be said of Bernardinus Stagninus, 1483–1536. The Mark, also, of Bernardinus de Vitalibus, 1494–1500, is sufficiently distinct to justify a reduced example. Bartholomeus de Zanis, 1486–1500, was not only a prolific printer on his own account, but also for Scotto, to whom reference is made above. The Marks, on a greatly reduced scale of Dionysius Bertochus, 1480; of Laurentius Rubeus de Valentia, 1482; of Nicholas de Francfordia, 1473–1500; and of Peregrino de Pasqualibus, 1483–94, who was for a short time in partnership with Dionysius de Bertochus, are all interesting as more or less distinct variations of one common type (see [p. 25]). Of Petrus Liechtenstein, 1497–1522, who describes himself as “Coloniensis,” and whose very fine Mark in red and black forms the frontispiece to the present volume, it will be only necessary to refer to one of his books, the “Biblij Czeska,” 1506, which is the first edition for the use of the Hussites. Of this exceedingly rare edition, only about four copies are known. It is remarkable in not having been suppressed by the Church, for one example of its numerous woodcuts (which are coloured) at once betrays its character, viz., the engraving to the sixth chapter of the Apocalypse, in which the Pope appears lying in hell. As illustrative of some of the more elaborate and pictorial Marks which one finds in the books of the Venetian printers during the sixteenth century, we give a couple of very distinct examples, the first being one of the Marks of the Sessa family, whose works date from 1501 to 1588; and the second example distinguishing the books of the brothers Paulum and Antonium Meietos, who were printing books in 1570.
OTTAVIANO SCOTTO.
MELCHIOR SESSA.
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