An Essay in the History of Gold-Tooled
Bindings by Herbert P. Horne
London 1894
designed in a very decorative manner, being interspersed with minute roundels in red and gold,
and painted in a blue colour. Another example of great beauty, but of rougher workmanship, is
figured in Mr. Quaritch's illustrations [Nos. 8 and 9.]. This book, which is a copy of Joannes
Grammaticus In Arzstote/em, Venice, 1504, is bound in citron morocco, and bears 'a painted
cameo on the centre of either board, which is also tooled with figured borders in gold. Both the
cameos, and the borders, differ from one another in design: on the lower lid, Orpheus is
represented with his lute. The edges of this book are painted with a Greek fret, in red and blue.
The name, which is chiefly associated with this kind of decoration, is that of Demetrio Canevari,
physician to Pope Urban VIII., who appears to have inherited a library of books bound in this
manner, which remained intact in the Vico Lucoli, at Genoa, until the year 1823. The bindings of
these books were probably executed by Venetian workmen, between the years 1535 and 1560;
and they could not, therefore, have been made for Demetrio Canevari himself, who was not born
until 1559. They bear, stamped in the centre of both the upper and lower boards, a cameo of
Apollo driving a chariot with two horses, over the sea, towards a rock, on which is Pegasus. The
cameo is of an oval form, and is surrounded by the legend: open KAI MH AOSI!l~. The dies, with
which this cameo are stamped, varied according to the size of the book: on the larger volumes,
the greater diameter of the oval is set upright; on the smaller, lengthways. A fine example of the
larger volumes bound in this manner, a copy of the English Histones of Polydore Vergil, Basle,
1534, is preserved in the Grenville Library [G. 4762.]. . This volume is covered in brown morocco;
and the cameos are painted in green, silver, and gold. An interlaced and flowered border is
worked with solid tools, similar in character to those of the Aldine bindings, about the panels of
the boards: and the title is lettered, not only upon the upper lid, but, also, upon the back of-the
book [Fig. 1.]. This is one of the earliest instances of a back bearing the title of a work, although
Le Roux de Lincy notices that some of Grolier's books are thus stamped with his name. An
example of one of the smaller volumes of Canevari, may be seen in the South Kensington
Museum, II Petrarcha Spirituale [93-'66.]: and some unusually elaborate examples are figured
among Mr. Quaritch's illustrations. The solid Venetian tools are an invariable characteristic of
these bindings.