#d.l. vervliet

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a london ornament

the first illustration displays digital reissue of monotype’s recutting [english monotype 218] of an arabesque unit, which d.l. vervliet attributes to robert granjon¹. vervliet found its first display in the office of london printer henry bynneman in 1569 [2nd illustration²], & notes: granjon founts had arrived around this time in london; exiled antwerp punchcutter françois guyot was residing in london & «is known to have provided types to printer john day»³. vervliet gets his dates from oastler⁴, but oastler only mentions that day was among the first london printers to use guyot types, & françois’ son, gabriel guyot, «may have been instrumental» in bringing to london the guyot double pica italic. oastler does give evidence that guyot, his family, & servants resided in john day’s house in 1568 (françois returned to antwerp in 1570, where he died shortly thereafter). vervliet dismisses guyot as the ornament’s designer on aesthetic grounds.⁵  as evidenced by his italics guyot was an admirer of granjon; indeed, harry carter views guyot’s types as «revolutionary in effect, bringing an archaic regional typography almost into line with Paris» ⁶. the oldest know type specimen by a founder who was not also a printer⁷ is confirmed by carter to show the types of françois guyot; the sheet survived for having been bound in with a set of elizabethan proclamations—arguably, guyot prepared the sheet as advertisement of his types to london printers⁸: on it appears a solitary ornament, a vine leaf [3rd illustration⁹]. granjon cut many vine leaves—no surprise to find guyot’s version. however, i must disagree with vervliet on one point: bynneman’s ornament i do not find particularly granjonesque, & the engraving of guyot’s vine leaf seems consistent with the hand that cut bynneman’s ornament.  it is conceivable that day held strikes of guyot ornaments—his property or that of guyot—to cast sorts for use in his office or to sell to other london printers, such as bynneman.

¹ hendrik d.l. vervliet, Granjon’s Flowers, oak knoll press, new castle (de), 2016, p99. ² section from the border on the title-page of: st anselm, Epistolæ duæ ... ad Nicholaum Papam primum de cęlibatu cleri., henry bynneman, london, 1569. with thanks to the british library for permitting my examination of their copy [G.11998. 1360.a.16.]. ³ ibid. p95. ⁴ c.l. oastler, John Day | the Elizabethan Printer, oxford bibliographical society, ocaasional publication no. 10, oxford, 1975, pp. 34–5. reprint of oastler’s 1965 oxford thesis [based upon archival records].  ⁵ op. cit., p95. ⁶ harry carter, «The Types of Christopher Plantin», The Library, volume s5-XI, issue 3, 1956, p177. ⁷ specimen of 1565—only known copy, folger shakespeare library. ⁸ op. cit., carter. a tentative attribution was given by a.f. johnson in t.b. reed, A History of the Old English Letter Foundries, ed. a.f. johnson, faber&faber, london, 1952, pp. 91–2. ⁹ section of no. 1 in john dreyfus, Type Specimen Facsimiles, bowes & bowes and putnam, london, 1963.

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granjon arabesque?

john ryder titled a section of his A Suite of Fleurons [charles t. branford, boston, 1957, p21] «A Venetian Arabesque» believing first showing of an arabesque ornament with venetian printer gabriele giolito in 1552; the section opening displays monotype 280 as ryder believed it to be a recutting of this «giolito» ornament [2nd illustration]. ryder cites no source within his text, but his bibliography reveals that he probably got the notion from the seminal paper by francis meynell & stanley morison «Printers’ Flowers and Arabesques» [The Fleuron, vol. 1, 1923]. meynell & morison tell us: «A new Development took place (circa 1550) in Venice. Gabriel Giolito cut a small unit of type-ornament whose pattern may be observed in book-bindings of an earlier date, e.g. those of Grolier.»—their illustration no. 10. meynell & morsison in notes to no. 10 indicate «Venice, Giglio, 1552», but they do not cite a book; also indicated is the monotype recutting, & their no. 10 indeed seems exemplar for monotype 280. so, giolito, circa 1550 in the text, but giglio, 1552 in the notes.  i spotted a similar ornament in the john rylands library on the title-page of Il Petrarca printed in 1551 [MDLI] by venetian printer domenico giglio [3rd & 4th illustrations] ¹: a year earlier than the meynell/morison attribution, indeed at venice, confirming giglio had a similar, though not the same, ornament. hendrik d.l. vervliet attributes this ornament to robert ganjon: it appears as no. 1 in his Granjon’s Flowers [oak knoll press, new castle (del), 2016, p23]—indeed, this may have been granjon’s first foray into arabesque. vervliet places first showing in the paris printing office of denis janot, 1544: parisian not venetian—vide ‹granjon’s first arabesque��. & under venice showings he cites the 1550 edition of boccacio’s Decamerone, printed by gabriele giolito—this must surely be the book erroneously alluded to by meynell/morison in Fleuron. vervliet further cites the meynell/morison giolito attribution for the assymetrical variant—presumably, as being superseded; & erroneously indicates that a matrix for the 1544 version is preserved at oxford university press [ibid., p24]. apparently, meynell, morison, & vervliet were unaware that they were looking at two like-though-not-the-same ornaments.  monotype 280 is not a recutting of granjon no. 1, the 1544 janot ornament, but a copy more diagonally symmetrical [cp. 4th illustration]: the undoubted exemplar for monotype 280 is to be found in oxford university’s fell types, & is shown by stanley morison in his John Fell [at the clarendon press, oxford, 1967, p182]. here again morison erroneously cites venice, 1552—presumably with reference to the 1923 Fleuron article; & further notes: «Plantin had a matrix for this ornament sorting with the Colineus Cursive of Granjon as remodeled by Henri du Tour² in 1575.» if plantin had sorted the asymmetrical-variant matrix with the colineus cursive it is no longer to be found there.

who cut the original asymmetrical unit?

 ¹ with thanks to the john rylands library for permitting my examination of the giglio petrarca. ² hendrik van den keere.

for a composition using 280 vide ‹wardropism no. 2›; for a digital setting vide ‹typographical ex libris›.

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granjon’s first arabesque

illustrated are sections from the title page to Brief discours au vray, du portement es affaires de Piedmont: … by françois de bourbon enghien, printed by denis janot, paris, 1544.* hendrik d.l. vervliet attributes this arabesque unit [flanked by asterisks; 2nd illustration] to robert granjon [Granjon’s Flowers, oak knoll press, new castle (del), 2016, p23].

* with thanks to BnF (bibliothèque nationale de france) for emailing the photo.

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harmony

harmonious of letter & ornament—french renaissance types. copy set in garamont italic [lanston monotype 2481]: frederic goudy’s rendering of a robert granjon italic. headband arabesque composition of monotype’s recutting [english monotype 230-1] of a fleuron pair reliably attributed to robert granjon, circa 1557. vervliet calls the exemplars «Granjon’s two-piece combinable flower on Small Pica» [hendrik d.l. vervliet, Granjon’s Flowers, oak knoll press, new castle (de), 2016, p48].

letterpress on kitakata.

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bona fide nyc

1st illustration: page from theodore low de vinne’s last book, Notable Printers of Italy during the Fifteenth Century  [the grolier club, new york, 1910, p112]: de vinne’s inimitable style—erudite & tasty. composed in types both cut & cast in nyc; seen though the press by the great printer himself at his establishment, the de vinne press—vide ‹point of pilgrimage›.  the woodcut facsimile is from the Hpynerotomachia Poliphili of francesco colonna: «The amatory sentiment is extravagant, yet that is subordinate to the author’s knowledge of art and mythology.» [ibid., p113]. published by aldus, venice, 1499; amongst the most beautiful books ever printed, this was aldus’ only foray into the illustrated book. for the context of the woodcut, in english, vide ‹but tell us of the image›.

text & notes are set in condensed form of scotch-face from george bruce’s sons (2nd illustration) [theodore low de vinne, Plain Printing Types, the century co., nyc, 1902, p214]. interesting choice in 1910 as de vinne in 1902 wrote: «The condensed form of Scotch-face is now out of fashion.» [ibid.]. the face sets a monumental page, especially with two-column notes, in composition with the facsimiles of incunabula. de vinne tells us this face was cut in 1854 by james lindsey [ibid.], presumably for the bruce foundry; & embedded within a showing of diamond, or 4½ pt, type de vinne pays biographical tribute to lindsey: «James Lindsey was born in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1825, and was taught the trade in the foundry of Alexander Wilson of Edinburgh [sic*]. He died in Brooklyn on the 20th of September, 1879. He was a thoroughly educated type-founder and a punch-cutter of admitted ability.» [ibid., p103].   further, embedded within a showing of brilliant, or 4 pt, type, de vinne recounts the story of original scotch-face: «Samuel Nelson Dickinson (born 1801, died 1848) was a notable type-founder of Boston. … Unable to get from any type-foundry of his city the types his taste demanded, he undertook to have them made. The style known as the Scotch-face was modelled by him in 1837, but cut and cast to his order by Alexander Wilson & Son, of Edinburgh [sic*]. The matrices imported by him were the first types of the Dickinson foundry in 1839, and were received with marked favor.» [ibid., p104]. if dickinson imported the matrices, one wonders if/why he needed the wilson foundry to also cast for him. on dickinson’s death his foundry was acquired & continued styled in the last instance phelps, dalton & co.; & finally a component of the 1892 merger which constituted american type founders (atf) [ibid.].

*alexander wilson’s foundry was in glasgow. william miller’s foundry was at edinburgh.

captions are set in a face advocated by de vinne for such purpose: light-face. in this case, de vinne selected the broad form from farmer, little & co (3rd illustration) [ibid., p223]. de vinne tells us: «…an extremely light face of decided merit, but which is too thin and too light to be used as a text-type for descriptive matter set solid. It shows to best advantage in leaded or double leaded poetry, or in any work which has broad margins and large space of white. It finds frequent employment in the titles or descriptions of plates when these titles are printed, as in the fashion, on thin paper facing the plate, but in any place it is a strain on ordinary eyesight.» [ibid., p222]. of the broad form, in particular, he continues  «…as broad as it is light, is seldom used as a text-letter for standard books. Its delicacy disqualifies it for general use, but it is an effective letter for pamphlets, catalogues, and ornamental job-work, when the composed lines have been liberally widened with leads. The larger sizes are used for book titles, running head lines, and as a display letter.» [ibid., 223].  henry lewis bullen writing under his nom de plume, quadrat, gives concise lineage of farmer, little & co.: «The present corporation of A. D. Farmer & Son Company, better known as Farmer, Little & Co. (1861), is the direct successor of Elihu White, following a son, H. T. White, and then Charles T. White & Co.» [The Inland Printer, vol. xxxviii, no.1, 1906, p36.] farmer, little & co. was acquired by american type founders (atf) in 1892 [✓].

notes on de vinne’s text in the 1st illustration «Raibollini» is a misattribution: propagated from an attempt by sir anthony panizzi in 1858 to identify aldus’ punch cutter as francesco raibolini, the painter from bologna. «This argument was demolished by Giacomo Manzoni in his Studia di bibliografia analitica, and the matter clinched by the publication by Adamo Rossi in 1883 of a document from which it appeared that Franceso’s family name was Griffo.» [a.f. johnson, Type Designs, grafton & co., london, 1959, p95]. this information, apparently, had not yet reached the cognoscenti of new york, or de vinne was simply unaware. 

the statement «One line of a larger size with slanted capitals appears on plate 28» is not apropos, as plate 28 is a facsimile of a page printed in 1566 by aldus’ son, paolo: not an incunabulum. the face is not aldine: it is a 16th c. french face—the petit-parangon italic cut by robert granjon in 1554 [cf. 298 in hendrik d.l. vervliet, French Renaissance Printing Types, the bibliographical society, london, 2010, p328].