GROLIER BINDING
Castiglione: Cortegiano. Aldine Press, 1518
Laurenziana Library, Florence
The volume displays a pretentious effort to get away from the commonplace. On every page Aldus expended his utmost ingenuity in the arrangement of the type,—the use of capitals and small capitals, and unusual type formations. In many cases the type balances the illustrations in such a way as to become a part of them. Based on the typographical standards of today, some of these experiments are indefensible, but in a volume issued in 1499 they stand as an extraordinary exhibit of what an artistic, ingenious printer can accomplish within the rigid limitations of metal type. The illustrations themselves, one hundred and fifty-eight in number, run from rigid architectural lines to fanciful portrayals of incidents in the story. Giovanni Bellini is supposed to have been the artist, but there is no absolute evidence to confirm this supposition.
Some years ago the Grolier Club of New York issued an etching entitled, Grolier in the Printing Office of Aldus (page [208]). I wish I might believe that this great printer was fortunate enough to have possessed such an office! In spite of valuable concessions he received from the Republic, and the success accorded to him as a printer, he was able to eke out but a bare existence, and died a poor man. The etching, however, is important as emphasizing the close relation which exited between the famous ambassador of François I at the Court of Pope Clement VII, at Rome, and the family of Aldus, to which association booklovers owe an eternal debt of gratitude. At one time the Aldine Press was in danger of bankruptcy, and Grolier not only came to its rescue with his purse but also with his personal services. Without these tangible expressions of his innate love for the book, collectors today would be deprived of some of the most interesting examples of printing and binding that they count among their richest treasures.
The general conception that Jean Grolier was a binder is quite erroneous; he was as zealous a patron of the printed book as of the binder’s art. His great intimacy in Venice was with Andrea Torresani (through whose efforts the Jenson and the Aldus offices were finally combined), and his two sons, Francesco and Federico, the father-in-law and brothers-in-law of the famous Aldus. No clearer idea can be gained of Grolier’s relations at Casa Aldo than the splendid letter which he sent to Francesco in 1519, intrusting to his hands the making of Budé’s book, De Asse:
GROLIER BINDING
Capella: L’Anthropologia Digaleazzo. Aldine Press, 1533
From which the Cover Design of this Volume was adapted