An Essay in the History of Gold-Tooled
Bindings by Herbert P. Horne
London 1894
produced, in great numbers by the stationers, with the aid of stamps, or blocks. Having been
principally produced by the stationers of Lyons, they are known as Lyonese stamped bindings:
but they issued, also, from Italy and from other parts of France. In point of design, both these,
and the tooled, painted binding, are often very Italian in character: although a great number of
t~em must have undoubtedly been produced in France. The stamped bindings were not
invariably coloured, but sometimes only gilt: and they show a great variety in their treatment. In
some instances, the binding was first stamped in blind, and the colour and gilding afterwards
applied by hand; on others, the stamped work was supplemented with tooled borders, to adapt
it to the size. of the book; on others, the whole field of the stamp is azured, in which case it is
generally worked in gold, without colour. MM. Marius-Michel, who discuss, and illustrate, the
matter of stamped bindings at length, in their book, La Reliure Franfaise Commercia/e, are of
opinion, that eighty out of every hundred of the smaller and elaborately-bound books, of the
second half of the sixteenth century, have stamped bindings. The South Kensington Museum
possesses an interesting series of these small octavo books, bound in this manner, among
which are a Cicero in three volumes, Lyons, 1555 [229, 229a, 229b-'66.], a Florus, Lyons, 1548
[5770-'59.], and a Psalter, Lyons, 1542 [33-'65.]. Although not always of considerable artistic
value, these books are worth a careful study, showing, as they do, what may be done by
legitimate means, with good materials, in producing rich and effective bindings at a low rate of
expense. Historically, they carryon the traditions of the Venetian work~en, and the binders of
Grolier's books; and form a link, in this regard, between the art of Italy, and the art of France.
I have described only the principal characteristics of early Italian binding; and there is a method
of decoration, frequently employed by Italian binders during the first half of the sixteenth
century, in the adornment of their books, which I have not alluded to, and which consisted in
stamping the leather with dies, cut in intaglio, whereby impressions in relief, imitative in some
sort of antique cameos, were produced. Bindings treated in this manner are known as
cameo-bindings: and an early and exceedingly fine example may be seen in the Grenville Library,
on a copy of Celsus, De Medicina, Venice, 1497 [G. 9026.], in which Grolier has written his name:
'Est mei J o. Grolier Lugd. & amicorum.' In this instance a cameo is stamped on either cover, as if
suspended by a ribband, within a panel formed by a double border, executed in blind tooling.
These cameos are exquisitely modelled, and are painted in gold and colours: that on the upper
cover, represents Curtius leaping into the gulf: while that on the lower board, the fight of
Horatius Cocles on the Sublician bridge. The latter, which contains a great number of minute
figures,