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Fascinating post, Caroline. If I might ask you a question that’s only marginally related to this, how common are cases where there’s *no* information either in the text or on the pages containing the images that would indicate where they are meant to go? I’m specifically thinking of John Derricke’s “Image of Irelande”, which has a set of woodcuts that are numbered, so it’s clear what sequence they are supposed to be in, but that’s it. In the only complete copy, those images have all been placed at the end of the book, but some of them do depict scenes that echo passages of the poem, so you could potentially have made a case for inserting them earlier – if it weren’t for the fact that the first one has what looks like a second title page. Would you take that as an indication that they weren’t necessarily meant to be bound up together and/or that the woodcuts may have come first and the book was written as a supplement to the images rather than the other way around?
(You can view the title page and the woodcuts here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Image_of_Irelande,_with_a_Discoverie_of_Woodkarne)
The woodcuts in John Derricke’s “Image of Irelande” indeed form a visual entity and look like they don’t need to be bound with the text they relate to. I was just reading about a map printed in the 1590s with a similar title layout as in the first Derricke woodcut, of which 2 copies are extant in a book and the others are extant as single sheet prints. This makes me think that the Derricke set may have been sold with or without the text (after all publishers were very good at offering their books with different features at different prices to their customers). One explanation for this business strategy (a bit unusual for this type of subjects I would think) may be that the woodcuts took longer to produce than planned (this was not unusual). As a result there was no time to print the text with the images. Another explanation could be that although the woodcuts were designed to go along with the text, because of their quality they started to have an independent life after their printing, i.e. owners chose to not bind them with the text.
These are just hypotheses to be further tested. Let me know if you do.
Thanks for your reply, Caroline. As far as I know, the most common theory is that the woodcuts were probably sold separately because they are of such good quality and would have seemed attractive to buyers in their own right (especially since they can be understood on their own, thanks to the broadsheet-like verses underneath). But basically it’s impossible to tell. The title page of the book claims that it was published three years after it was written, though, so I’m not sure whether waiting a couple of extra months for the woodcuts to be finished would have made such a difference to the author or the printer…
Comments
Fascinating post, Caroline. If I might ask you a question that’s only marginally related to this, how common are cases where there’s *no* information either in the text or on the pages containing the images that would indicate where they are meant to go? I’m specifically thinking of John Derricke’s “Image of Irelande”, which has a set of woodcuts that are numbered, so it’s clear what sequence they are supposed to be in, but that’s it. In the only complete copy, those images have all been placed at the end of the book, but some of them do depict scenes that echo passages of the poem, so you could potentially have made a case for inserting them earlier – if it weren’t for the fact that the first one has what looks like a second title page. Would you take that as an indication that they weren’t necessarily meant to be bound up together and/or that the woodcuts may have come first and the book was written as a supplement to the images rather than the other way around?
(You can view the title page and the woodcuts here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Image_of_Irelande,_with_a_Discoverie_of_Woodkarne)
Elisabeth Chaghafi — April 29, 2019
These are fascinating questions Elisabeth.
The woodcuts in John Derricke’s “Image of Irelande” indeed form a visual entity and look like they don’t need to be bound with the text they relate to. I was just reading about a map printed in the 1590s with a similar title layout as in the first Derricke woodcut, of which 2 copies are extant in a book and the others are extant as single sheet prints. This makes me think that the Derricke set may have been sold with or without the text (after all publishers were very good at offering their books with different features at different prices to their customers). One explanation for this business strategy (a bit unusual for this type of subjects I would think) may be that the woodcuts took longer to produce than planned (this was not unusual). As a result there was no time to print the text with the images. Another explanation could be that although the woodcuts were designed to go along with the text, because of their quality they started to have an independent life after their printing, i.e. owners chose to not bind them with the text.
These are just hypotheses to be further tested. Let me know if you do.
Best,
Caroline
Caroline Duroselle-Melish — May 6, 2019
Thanks for your reply, Caroline. As far as I know, the most common theory is that the woodcuts were probably sold separately because they are of such good quality and would have seemed attractive to buyers in their own right (especially since they can be understood on their own, thanks to the broadsheet-like verses underneath). But basically it’s impossible to tell. The title page of the book claims that it was published three years after it was written, though, so I’m not sure whether waiting a couple of extra months for the woodcuts to be finished would have made such a difference to the author or the printer…
Elisabeth Chaghafi — May 7, 2019