Plainly an anticipation of the “Io: Grolierii et amicorum.”
Another signature of Rabelais exists in a book which was presented to the school of medicine of Montpellier in 1776 by a lawyer, one Mons. J. Grosley. This resembles generally the one already described.
The name of Jean Grolier is one of the earliest and most famous in the history of French Bibliolatry and Bibliopegy. Jean Grolier, Vicomte d’Aguisy, was born in 1479 in Lyons, and died in Paris on October 22nd, 1565. He was treasurer of France, and collected a library of about 3,000 volumes (an enormous number in those early days of printing), all of which he had sumptuously bound, and generally with the Grolier arms richly emblazoned on the sides. His books had also various mottoes on them, sometimes written in his own hand on blank pages or on the title, sometimes printed in letters of gold around the edges of the binding.
The most usual of these mottoes is one that is constantly referred to, and has been often borrowed by other book-lovers and collectors:
“Io Grollierii et amicorum.”
Others that occur are:
“Mei Grollierii Lugdunens, et amicorum.”
“Portio mea, Domine, sit in terra viventium.”
“Tanquam ventus est vita mea.”