The earliest date which appears on a book in which the head-piece, containing the device of the light A and dark A is found, is 1563. The book is "De Furtivis Literarum Notis Vulgo. De Ziferis," Ioan. Baptista Porta Neapolitano Authore. Cum Privilegio Neapoli, apud Ioa. Mariam Scotum. MDLXIII. (Figure VIII.)
It is only used once—over the dedication Ioanni Soto Philippi Regis. There is no other head-piece in the book. John Baptist Porta was, with the exception of Trithemius, whom he quotes, the first writer on cyphers. At the time at which he wrote cypher-writing was studied in every Court in Europe. It is significant that this emblematic device is used in the earliest period in which head-pieces were adopted, in a book which is descriptive and is in fact a text-book of the art of concealment. This has, however, now been proved to be a falsely dated book.
The first edition of this work was published in Naples in 1563 by Ioa. Marius Scotus, but this does not contain the A A design. In 1591 the book was published in London by John Wolfe; this reprint was dedicated to Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland. After the edition had been printed off, the title-page was altered to correspond with the 1563 Naples publication. The dedication was taken out, and a reprint of the original dedication was substituted, and over this was placed the A A head-piece; then an edition was struck off, and, until to-day, it has been sold and re-sold as the first edition of Baptista Porta's work. It is difficult to offer any explanation as to why this fraud was committed.
The first occasion upon which this device was used appears to be in a book so rare that no copy of it can be found, either in the British Museum or the Bodleian Library. Unfortunately, in the copy belonging to the writer, the title-page and the two first pages are missing. The work is called "Hebraicum Alphabethum Jo. Bovlaese." It is a Hebrew Grammar, with proof-sheets added. It is interleaved with sheets of English-made paper, containing Bacon's handwriting. Bound up with it is another Hebrew Grammar, similarly interleaved, called "Sive compendium, quintacunque Ratione fieri potuit amplessimum, Totius linguæ," published in Paris in 1566. The book ends with the sentence: "Ex collegio Montis—Acuti 20 Decembris 1576"; then follow two pages in Hebrew, with the Latin translation over it, headed "Decem Præcepta decalogi Exod." Over this is the design containing the light A and the dark A, and the squirrel and rabbits. (Figure IX.) One thing is certain, that the copy now referred to was in the possession of Bacon, and that the interleaved sheets of paper contain his handwriting, in which have been added page by page the equivalents of the Hebrew in Greek, Chaldæic, Syriac and Arabic.
In 1577 Christophor Plantin published an edition of Andrea Alciat's "Emblemata." On page 104 is Emblem No. 45, "In dies meliora." This has been re-designed for the 1577 edition. It contains at the back the pillars of Hercules, with a scroll around bearing the motto: "Plus oltre." These pillars stand on some arches, immediately in front of which is a mound or pyramid, two sides of which are seen. On one is to be found the light A and on the other the dark A. The design was appropriated by Whitney, and appears on page 53 in the 1586 edition of his Emblems. From this time forth, A A devices are to be found in numbers of books published in England, and on some published on the Continent. Amongst the former are the first editions of "Venus and Adonis," "Lucrece," the "Sonnets," the quarto editions of Shakespeare's plays, the folio edition (1623) of his works, and the first quarto and octavo editions (1612) of the Authorised Version of the Bible.
There are fourteen distinct designs, in all of which, varying widely in other respects, the light A and the dark A constitute the outstanding figure. The use of the two letters so shaded must have had a special significance. In nearly every case it will be observed that the letter A is so drawn as to make the letter C on the inside. Was its significance of general knowledge amongst printers and readers, or was it an earmarking device used by one person, or by a Society?
A possible interpretation of the use of the light and dark shading, is that the book in which it is used contains more than is revealed; that is to say, the overt and the concealed.
A copy of "Æsopiphrygis vita et fabellæ cum latina interpretatione" exists, date 1517. The book is annotated by Bacon. On one side is the Greek text and on the opposite page the Latin translation. On pages 102 and 103 are two initial letters printed from blocks of the letter A. These are coloured so that the one on the left hand side is a light A, and that on the opposite page a dark A.
There are other designs which are used apparently as part of a scheme. The identical block (Figure X.) which was used at the top of the title page of "Venus and Adonis" (1593) and "Lucrece" (1594) did service on the title page of the Genealogies in the quarto edition of the Authorised Version of the Bible, 1612. This design was, so far as can be traced, only used twice in the intervening nineteen years—on "An Apologie of the Earl of Essex to Master Anthony Bacon," penned by himself in 1598, and printed by Richard Bradocke in 1603, and in 1607, on the "World of Wonders," printed by Richard Field. It was of this book that Caldecott, the bibliophile and Shakespearean scholar, wrote: "The phraseology of Shakespeare is better illustrated in this work than in any other book existing." The design which is found on the title page of the "Sonnets of Shakespeare," 1609, is found also in the first edition of Napier's "Mirifici Logarithmorum," 1611, but printed from a different block. The design with archers shooting at the base of the central figure is to be found in a large number of the folio editions of the period. Amongst these are the Authorised Version of the Bible, 1611, the "Novum Organum," 1620, and the 1623 edition of Shakespeare's works.
There are other designs which are usually found accompanying the light A and dark A and the other devices before referred to.