Noter Grundlæggende essays om bogtrykkets historie A. F. Johnson: Selected Essays on Books and Printing. Ed. by Percy H. Muir. Amsterdam, Van Cendt & Co., 1970. Pris ikke oplyst. Én af de boghistorikere der videreudviklede D. B. Updikes teorier, var Alfred Forbes Johnson, bib­liotekar ved British Museum fra 1919. Et monu­mentalt bind, der omfatter 40 udvalgte artikler af A. F. Johnson, skrevet i tidsrummet 1922­1957, er nu udkommet. Bogen er en parallel til et lignende værk af Victor Scholderer fra 1966, men medens sidstnævnte var inkunabelforsker, kon- Et opslag fra Johnsons bog, originalen måler 30 X 52 cm. Side 43 viser titelbladet til Trissinos af­handling om hans forsøg på at forbedre det itali­enske sprogs bogstavering ved at udvide det la­tinske alfabet med nogle græske bogstaver; ne­derst kan man ane Arrighis kursiv. (Bogens op­lysning om at det er titelbladet til Dantes De la volgare eloquenzia er forkert). 4a PRINTING IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY of the fint iulic. but also of thr Gmk nul roman typei of AUut, ind consequendy he ukes hu pUce in typognphical history in the ranks of the ieading dcagnen. It is well known that the cunive Greck types of Aldus are the source of almost all succeeding Greek types: of the importance of the Aldine roman we ihall have to speak funher in connecnon with the Garamood roman. Our knowledge of Griffb is dehved mainly from three contemporary books. Fint of all, Aldus himself gives him due credit in the prchm inariesof the Virgil of 1501. GerooimoSoncino, a member of a well-known fåmily ofHebrcw printers, med a second itaiic, cut by Gnifo, at Fano in 1)03. In the dedica­non of Soncino's Petrarch, the faet is recorded and Aldus's obligations to Gnfib are emphasizcd. Lasdy, GnfTo himself, in another Petrarch, pnnted at Bologna in 1516 in another of his italics, again tells the story.' His career ended in disaster in 151I, in which ycar he kiiled his son-in-law in a quarrel and henceforth disappcan from history." Aldui'i itaiic and his pocket series were soon copied. The Giunta at Florence, for example, had a similar itaiic by ijoj, and there were also anonymous copies in Italy. Two printers of Lyons. Balthazar da Gabuno and Barthélemy Trot. copied not only the itaiic. but also the series of books issued by Aldus in the new letter, and the Venemn pnntcr'i pnvilege and protests availed him nothing. An obscure printer at Erfurt. Se­bald Stnblitza, was the fint to introduce the new letter into Germany. in 1510. and about the same dme we find italics at Pans at the prea of Guillaume Lerouge. Johann Froben at Hasle used itaiic fint in 1519. but it was not until 152« that u reachcd England, imported from the Nether lands by Wynkyn de Worde. The Aldine iulic was not a handsome letter, and if there had been no funher dc­velopmcnt one can hardly imagine that the new type would have had such a lascmg history. It was a more formal variety of the chancery hand which was to ensurc us success. This Later version was cut for a wntmg master at Rome, Lodovico degli Arnghi of Vicenza. himself a w riter of briefr at the Papal Chancery. In 152a he published a specimen book of his hånds, the first wntmg master'i manual,1 and in 1524 began to print at Rome in a new cunive type based on his own senpt, Unlike Aldus. Arrighi did not require a condensed type. since his intention was to print vene and short tracts m an ele­gant format. In his type there were few ligaturcs, cach letter being carefully formed. ase endmg letten were bent over at the top and not finished off with serifi. ascendert were tall and descenden long. The result was something ve ry unlike the niggardly Aldine iulic, in spite of the fået that both were den ved from the same senpt. Amghi pnnted about a score of (mail books in this cunive in 1524 and 1515, in par tnen hip with Launzio de Bartolomeo dd Rotelli, an engraver and posubly the actual punch­cutter of the firm. Af ter 1525 the fount appean to have been sold to the well-known author Gian Giorgio Tnssino. or to his printer Tolomeo Janicolo of Bresda. In 1529 Janicolo rcpnnted Tnssmo'i works at Vicenza in Arrighi's cunive. and it is in these handsome folios embellished with a device of Jasons Golden Fleece, that Arnghi's cunive is most familiar to book collecton of today (fig. 1). centrerede A. F. Johnson sig fortrinsvis om bog­trykkets udvikling i 1500-tallet. Hans artikler herfra er resultatet af nogle af de første syste­matiske undersøgelser af denne periodes bogtryk. Af bogens 444 sider er de første 280 koncen­treret omkring 1500-tallets bogtrykkerkunst, mens de tre følgende århundreder må dele de sid­ste 166 sider. Forklaringen på, at Johnson netop har valgt 1500-tallet, findes i indledningen til ar­tiklen A Short History of Printing in the Six­teenth Century: »Bogtrykkets historie er for 1500-tallets vedkommende interessant og afveks­lende. Det var en tidsalder med bogtrykkermestre som opretholdt en høj klasse på det udførte ar­bejde -Aldus-familien i Italien, Estienne og Si­mon de Coline i Paris, Jean de Tourne i Lyon og Christophe Plantin i Antwerpen. Det er en perio­de som er særlig vigtig for udformningen af skriftformer, hvoraf mange stadig øver indflydel­se på vore dages typografi. Ikke alene er mange af vor tids typer baseret på former fra 1500-tal­let, men bogens udseende, som vi kender det, er i de fleste detaljer udviklet af den tids bogtryk­kere.« PRINTING IN THE SIXTEENTH (PISTOIA DEt TRfS5fNO ØE LB LETTERE N