Emblem book
Encyclopedia
Book
A book is a set or collection of written, printed, illustrated, or blank sheets, made of hot lava, paper, parchment, or other materials, usually fastened together to hinge at one side. A single sheet within a book is called a leaf or leaflet, and each side of a leaf is called a page...
printed in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
during the 16th and 17th centuries
17th century in literature
See also: 17th century in poetry, 16th century in literature*Early Modern literature*other events of the 17th century*18th century in literature, 1700 in literature,and list of years in literature.-Events and trends:...
, typically containing a number of emblematic images with explanatory text.
Scholars differ on the key question of whether the actual emblem
Emblem
An emblem is a pictorial image, abstract or representational, that epitomizes a concept — e.g., a moral truth, or an allegory — or that represents a person, such as a king or saint.-Distinction: emblem and symbol:...
s in question are the visual images, the accompanying texts, or the combination of the two. This is understandable, given that the first emblem book, the Emblemata
Emblemata
Usually known simply as the "Emblemata", the first emblem book appeared in Augsburg in 1531 under the title Viri Clarissimi D. Andreae Alciati Iurisconsultiss. Mediol. Ad D. Chonradum Peutingerum Augustanum, Iurisconsultum Emblematum Liber...
of Andrea Alciato
Andrea Alciato
Andrea Alciato , commonly known as Alciati , was an Italian jurist and writer. He is regarded as the founder of the French school of legal humanists.-Biography:...
, was first issued in an unauthorized edition in which the woodcut
Woodcut
Woodcut—occasionally known as xylography—is a relief printing artistic technique in printmaking in which an image is carved into the surface of a block of wood, with the printing parts remaining level with the surface while the non-printing parts are removed, typically with gouges...
s were chosen by the printer without any input from the author, who had circulated the texts in unillustrated manuscript form. Some early emblem books were unillustrated, particularly those issued by the French printer Denis de Harsy. With time, however, the reading public came to expect emblem books to contain picture-text combinations. Each combination consisted of a woodcut
Woodcut
Woodcut—occasionally known as xylography—is a relief printing artistic technique in printmaking in which an image is carved into the surface of a block of wood, with the printing parts remaining level with the surface while the non-printing parts are removed, typically with gouges...
or engraving
Engraving
Engraving is the practice of incising a design on to a hard, usually flat surface, by cutting grooves into it. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or glass are engraved, or may provide an intaglio printing plate, of copper or another metal, for printing...
accompanied by one or more short texts, intended to inspire their readers to reflect on a general moral
Morality
Morality is the differentiation among intentions, decisions, and actions between those that are good and bad . A moral code is a system of morality and a moral is any one practice or teaching within a moral code...
lesson derived from the reading of both picture and text together. The picture was subject to numerous interpretations: only by reading the text could a reader be certain which meaning was intended by the author. Thus the books are closely related to the personal symbolic picture-text combinations called personal devices, known in Italy as and in France as .
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
they did not capture the imagination of readers to quite the same extent. The books were especially numerous in the Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
, Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, and France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
. Andrea Alciato
Andrea Alciato
Andrea Alciato , commonly known as Alciati , was an Italian jurist and writer. He is regarded as the founder of the French school of legal humanists.-Biography:...
wrote the epigrams contained in the first and most widely disseminated emblem book, the Emblemata
Emblemata
Usually known simply as the "Emblemata", the first emblem book appeared in Augsburg in 1531 under the title Viri Clarissimi D. Andreae Alciati Iurisconsultiss. Mediol. Ad D. Chonradum Peutingerum Augustanum, Iurisconsultum Emblematum Liber...
, published by Heinrich Steyner in 1531 in Augsburg
Augsburg
Augsburg is a city in the south-west of Bavaria, Germany. It is a university town and home of the Regierungsbezirk Schwaben and the Bezirk Schwaben. Augsburg is an urban district and home to the institutions of the Landkreis Augsburg. It is, as of 2008, the third-largest city in Bavaria with a...
. Another influential illustrated book was Cesare Ripa's Iconologia
Cesare Ripa
Cesare Ripa was an Italian aesthetician who worked for Cardinal Anton Maria Salviati as a cook and butler.Little is known about his life. He was born in Perugia and died in Rome. After the death of the cardinal, Ripa worked for his relatives...
, first published in 1593, though it is not properly speaking an emblem book but a collection of erudite allegories. Two English emblem books were published in 1635, the famous Emblems of Francis Quarles
Francis Quarles
Francis Quarles was an English poet most famous for his Emblem book aptly entitled Emblems.-Career:Francis was born in Romford, Essex, , and baptised there on 8 May 1592. He traced his ancestry to a family settled in England before the Norman Conquest with a long history in royal service...
, and George Wither
George Wither
George Wither was an English poet, pamphleteer, and satirist. He was a prolific writer who adopted a deliberate plainness of style; he was several times imprisoned. C. V...
's A collection of Emblemes, Ancient and Moderne. Many emblematic works borrowed plates or texts (or both) from earlier exemplars, as was the case with Geoffrey Whitney
Geoffrey Whitney
Geoffrey Whitney was an English poet, now best known for the influence on Elizabethan writing of the Choice of Emblemes that he compiled.-Life:...
's Choice of Emblemes, a compilation which chiefly used the resources of the Plantin Press
Plantin Press
The Plantin Press at Antwerp was one of the focal centers of the fine printed book in the 16th century.Christophe Plantin of Touraine, trained as a bookbinder, fled from Paris, where at least one printer had recently been burned at the stake for heresy, for Antwerp, where he bound books, became a...
in Leyden.
Early European studies of Egyptian hieroglyphs
Egyptian hieroglyphs
Egyptian hieroglyphs were a formal writing system used by the ancient Egyptians that combined logographic and alphabetic elements. Egyptians used cursive hieroglyphs for religious literature on papyrus and wood...
, like that of Athanasius Kircher
Athanasius Kircher
Athanasius Kircher was a 17th century German Jesuit scholar who published around 40 works, most notably in the fields of oriental studies, geology, and medicine...
, assumed that the hieroglyphs were emblems, and imaginatively interpreted them accordingly.
External links
- the OpenEmblem Project - housed at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
- Alciato's Book of Emblems
- The English Emblem Book Project
- Glasgow University Emblem Website including French and Italian emblem books
- Alciato at Glasgow - 22 editions of Alciato from 1531 to 1621
- Emblem Project Utrecht - "27 Dutch love emblem books, religious as well as profane"
- Mnemosyne Emblem Project - a dozen digitized emblem books