Gold-TooledBookbindings

AndContemporaryCollectables.1500 – 1800.

Chaper 2: Border Structures andDecoration

By Ian Andrews

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September 2013.

ianandrews00@gmail.com

50, Wellhouse Lane, Mirfield

West Yorkshire WF14 0PN

Border Structures and

Decoration

Construction of borders: the earlier centuries

From around the eighth century, carved plaques of ivory were

mounted as decoration on the cover boards of holy books of the

Christian Church. Since the raw material from which these

panels were cut had come from the tusks of elephants or

mammoths whose remains had been preserved buried in the

permafrost, the size of the tusks imposed a natural maximum

limit on the panels. Panels of carved ivory were inevitably

smaller than the size of the book cover and, since at this

time books were hand-written on parchment, and heavy boards of

thick wood were needed to keep the book in shape, this left a

space around the centre panel, usually of bare wood, which

needed to be disguised with additional decorative material.

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The usual practice was for additional strips of carved ivory

to be placed around the central carved plaque to complete the

decoration. This technique was referred to, rather

derogatorily, though accurately, by Libri, as ‘botching’.i The

design challenge was to create a balanced field using smaller

pieces to fill the space around it. The most common

arrangement was for single strips of full width to be pinned

across the top and bottom of the board, above and below the

central panel, and two or three smaller, square ones to each

side. (Figure 1)

Perhaps the most important aspect of the decoration on the

cover of a holy book was its visibility. Given the central

importance of the word of God in the rituals of the medieval

Church, it was inevitable that Gospel books and Bibles should

be adorned with the most valuable materials that could be

acquired.ii Plaques of carved ivory were still considered

essential for the centre piece, but these would be set within

plates of solid gold embedded with precious jewels and

gemstones. (Figure 2) The value of these materials was

enhanced by the way they scattered light. Carved ivory plaques

might look and feel exquisitely beautiful when close to, and

in good light, but in churches, where most of the light was

from candles of beeswax, they could not be seen to advantage.

Plates of gold, especially with filigree surface decoration,

together with quantities of cabochon jewels and polished

gemstones could be relied on to catch the flickering lights

from the candles, and to sparkle in a most magnificent manner.

It was to the advantage of churches and monasteries to invest

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all their resources in such ornamentation of their precious

books, because it impressed their congregations and attracted

pilgrims who could be persuaded to contribute to their

coffers. Moreover, when times were bad, these valuable

ornamental pieces could be sold.

.

Figure 1

An assembly of carved ivory panels from an eighth to ninth-century

ecclesiastical book cover. Here it is possible to distinguish the five

panels from which the cover decoration was constructed, and also the heads

of the pins used to secure the panels to the baseboard.

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Figure 2

The jewelled ‘treasure binding’ of the evangelary of St Aegidien

demonstrates how the assemblies of ivory strips developed into plates of

gold encrusted with jewels and gemstones in the eleventh and twelfth

centuries.

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Figure 3

An English binding of c1526decorated with a central panel and smaller

panels forming the border around it, in the same construction style as was

used in the earlier ivory plaque designs and those of the ‘treasure

binding’ period.

Borders on leather bindings

By the beginning of the sixteenth century, the construction

and binding of books was of a very different order. They were

printed, usually on paper rather than vellum, with paste-board

covers, since a page-block of paper did not require heavy

wooden boards to keep it in shape. Books were covered with

leather, either goat-skin or calf. Leather was the most

versatile material of the time, combining the dual attributes

of strength and flexibility needed for covering a book. Alan

Thomas, when describing a late fifteenth-century calf binding

over wooden boards, made in the Celestine monastery at Oybin

in Saxony, rightly asserts that bindings of this sort were

intended to preserve the books ‘for all time’.iii Leather

possessed one other remarkable property: it could be moulded.

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While very strong, and extremely resistant to changes in shape

when dry, leather loses its memory of its original form when

thoroughly soaked in water. It is this facility that makes it

possible to create a ‘full-leather’ binding. With the pages

sewn together, and on to cords, and the cords threaded into

the boards, the entire entity could be wrapped in leather,

soaked in flour-and-water paste, with all the edges neatly

turned in. When dry, the leather would retain its shape, thus

unifying the book. This ‘mouldability’ of the material could

be used to advantage by bookbinders in other ways. A moulding

tool pressed into wet leather, and kept in place until the

leather had dried, leaves a lasting impression, as does a

heated tool impressed into dry leather.

The pristine expanse of leather on the cover of a book must

have presented an irresistible invitation to impress it with

moulded decoration, which, due to the similarity of thickness,

would produce a result remarkably similar to that of carved

ivory. In this era of the first flush of mass-produced books,

cover designs moulded in the style of the original carved

panels of ivory proved an effective process for mass

production. The bindings of many books of the later fifteenth

and early sixteenth centuries have impressed designs on their

covers that appear remarkably similar to those earlier

fashioned from carved ivory.iv (Figure 3)

Border compartments

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The extension of the outline of the central panel to the edges

of the cover established the basic set of permissible shapes

for the border elements. These four construction lines divided

the cover into nine rectangular compartments. While the

original version of these lines occurred simply from the gaps

between the ivory panels, on a leather binding they needed to

be imposed either by a knife or by use of a heated tool. On

bindings decorated in cuir-ciselé, where the technique involved

cutting through the ‘flesh’ before moulding the design into

low relief in moistened leather, it would have been necessary

for the frame lines to be terminated within the board area to

prevent the decorated section peeling away. When such lines

were impressed using a heated roll tool, the leather was

permanently compressed, thereby enabling multiple lines to be

impressed close together. However, the tool itself tended to

dictate the optimum design arrangement, since it was far

easier to run it right to the edge of the cover than it was to

make a clean start or stop part-way across. It is common to

find bindings of the late fifteenth and early sixteenth

century demarcated in this way.

The obvious result of laying in these four construction lines

is that a significant band of space has been defined between

the centre of the cover and its perimeter. The inner edge of

this border is usually contrived to be parallel with the edge

of the board. When an outer edging line is included, the

design area is bounded by a rectangular, box-like, frame,

divided into long strips along its edges, and with squares at

each corner. Two main options are available for utilising

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areas of such space. These are either to introduce a pattern

structure that by its nature can be continued along the main

axis to fill the entire space available, or the space can be

divided into small separate sections each of which can then be

ornamented in whatever manner may be considered appropriate.

The former concept had been developed for floral motifs in

Persian designs of the first half of the sixteenth century,

and its nearest equivalent in Western Europe was the

ubiquitous sinuous vine stem design from Roman art. This is

occasionally seen, but before the availability of sizeable

stamping presses, the requirement for special tooling to make

appropriate impressions must have been a serious factor in

limiting its attraction. The structure that did prove

effective for filling long sections of a border might best be

described as a ‘totem pole.’ Only seen on bindings of the very

early sixteenth century, it appears as if a series of

decorative elements have been placed one above the other in an

endless pile, as for example in the two bindings of Figure 4.

Artistic precedents for the ornamentation of such borders with

blocks of decoration were available to be appropriated from

manuscript painting and ‘treasure bindings.’ These divided the

space into a series of small rectangular panels, which on

treasure bindings would have been gold or silver-gilt plates

secured to the baseboard by pins. These plates were themselves

decoratively tooled, highly polished and embellished with gold

filigree, enamelwork and precious stones. In the latter case,

precious jewels and gemstones were placed in groups of five, à

la quincunx, and often arranged in a running pattern that

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continued all around the border. This pattern was not commonly

employed for the decoration of leather bindings, since there

could be no equivalent to the exhilarating sparkle of precious

stones.

At their simplest, the compartments or ‘boxed sections’ of

borders were adorned with individual motifs, as had been the

practice on Spanish Mudejar bindings. For larger compartments,

however, this was not visually satisfying, and the use of an

individual frame for each one, with some internal ornament,

was more appropriate. Stages in the evolution of this process

can be found from the division of the border into a series of

short sections, merely with a set of dividing lines, through

to elaborate definition by ribbon framing of ever-increasing

sophistication, and with the compartments being attached

together with various linkages. The other two styles, the

filigree and figurative ornaments, however, both transferred

very successfully to the medium of gold-tooling. Multiple gilt

impressions easily realised effects approximating to enamelled

figures, and the gold-tooling technique was even more suited

to the production of the sinuous and delicate scrolling of

filigree work. Early forms often appear to have copied styles

from the illustration of illuminated manuscripts, with

sequences of pictorial scenes closely abutted around the

entire border, while alternative forms evolved into less

segmented ‘totem pole’ structures.

After the mid-sixteenth century, bindings in the Persian style

featured elegantly decorated, discrete panels of gold. (Figure

5) As cartouche border designs continued to evolve, the 34

individual panels began to be connected, and ultimately linked

in the style of strapwork designs. The most elaborate of these‘strapwork’ borders date from the seventeenth century, those

of a more extravagant, roccoco style from the eighteenth.

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Figure 4. Two examples of border decoration on bindings ofc1525, showing ‘totem pole’ designs. These indicate the way

gold tooling was used to create an impressive resemblance to

the style of ornamentation of illuminated manuscripts.

Multiple borders

The first quarter of the sixteenth century was a transition

period for the design of borders. Many of the designs of this

time reflect the stylistic techniques emanating from the

blind-tooled patterns of the previous century. The Spanish

fifteenth-century Mudejar v bindings, so influential in the

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subsequent development of European bookbinding, were

characterised by both the number of their borders and by their

content. While it had been the practice for borders to be

narrow, it was equally usual for there to be multiple borders,

each one conncentric within its neighbour, and binding

designs having up to seven tiers of such narrow borders are

not uncommon. (Figure 6) It would appear that the technique

employed for the laying out of these borders relied on the use

of diagonals from each corner, since these construction guide-

lines, in blind-tooling, can often be seen in bindings of this

type. Having impressed tools along one section of a border,

for example the top, it is an easy task to continue it down

each side in the knowledge that the diagonals bisecting the

lower angles will ensure that the tooling at the bottom will

be identical to that of the top. Spanish Mudejar bindings from

the fourteenth century are characterised by the profusion of

these tiered borders, and by the fact that they are ornamented

with the repetition of only a comparatively small number of

tools. It has been suggested that it is these tiers of

borders, rather than the subjects portrayed by the tooled

impressions, that were considered the more important feature.

Within the tiered borders, a small central rectangle

inevitably remained, and it was usual practice to enhance this

with further blocks of tooling, either in linear or

rectangular groupings. Though early sixteenth century bindings

with several tiers of gilded impressions are only rarely seen,

the repetitive appearance of single rectangular tools to

develop a border was a very common technique.

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Figure 5

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The style of binding described by Nixon as, ‘Venetian Oriental’ c1574..

Bindings of this style were made for Commissions issued by the Doge to his

newly-appointed governors of Venetian possessions on the mainland and

overseas, and were handed over in person by the Doge to the recipient. The

design is in the style of contemporary Persian and Turkish book covers. The

design consists of deeply sunk compartments blocked in gold, leaving

sections of raised floral pattern, which were enamelled.

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Figure 6 French 16th century binding with successive, concentric

borders in the Mudejar style. The design is laid out using a double-line

roll in the ‘noughts and crosses’ style. Designs in the outer and inner

borders are based on the Arabic Motif. The motif immediately below the

dragon in the central panel is surrounded by a ring of flames, indicating

that it was bound in the first half of the century if not earlier.

Another technique sometimes seen employed as a border

decoration and which often produces a design layout in

multiple tiers, was the use of ornamental text. Lettering, on

or around sculpted panels, had been employed in Rome but was a

purely functional usage since it was included solely for

information purposes. The potential of text as a vehicle for

ornamentation originated with the accentuation that Islam put

on the decorative potential of writing and its aversion to

images of anything that casts a shadow. This emphasis resulted

in the development of the very beautiful Arabic scripts,

the beauty of which is primarily due to the structure and

balance of the characters. The natural choice for much Islamic

art was Kufic script. Panels of artistically constructed Kufic

script are visually very satisfying designs. This attribute of

inscriptions in Kufic script appears to have been well

appreciated from early times since there are many examples in

the arts of Western Europe where Kufic usage has been

inadequately copied that the term, ‘Kufesque’ or ‘Mock

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Kufic’vihas been given to these attempts to simulate its

appearance. Kufic script on western European bookbindings is

occasionally observed on bindings between the late 1560s and

the end of the century with only an occasional example in the

first quarter of the seventeenth century. The earliest

indications of Kufic-style decoration are on bindings from the

1540s and it is appropriate to contemplate the significance of

these dates since the first printed version of the Koran, in

Arabic Kufic was made by Alessandr Paganino in Venice between

1537-38vii. In contrast, the Roman uncials, used in formal

inscriptions, are stark and devoid of any natural

appurtenances to facilitate interlinking between letters or

inviting of decorative embellishment. Whereas words written in

most of the Arabic letter sets may readily be formed into

visually pleasing entities, there are no equivalent

possibilities with Roman uncials. No matter how the letters

were drawn the words do not make visually pleasing fluidic

structures. Conversely, the character set of the traditional

high German textura script, whilst more closely related in

appearance to the Roman alphabet and reliant upon a

preponderance of strong verticals, does however, epitomise

aspects of the overall decorative effect of Arabic script.

Like Arabic, because of their exaggerated serif-like

connections many of the letters in textura fit together

closely to form seemingly homogeneous groups while others

include looping elements that invite embellishment to form

flourishes.

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Figure 7. A German binding of the sixteenth century, its design based onconcentric rectangles similar to the Spanish Mudejar style except that the

main border together with the central panel both consist of lettering in

close-packed textura script.

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Two-Ring Frames

In fourteenth and fifteenth-century Spain, under Arab rule, an

original style of ornament evolved, known as Hispano-Mauresque or

Mudejar.viii So important was the production and binding of books

that whole streets were given over to binders and booksellers

in Cordoba and Seville. Abderrahman III, Caliph of Cordoba,

possessed a library of 400,000 volumes. Goldschmidt suggests

that the impetus for this formidable level of production was

not only from the Arabs but through their trading from the

Orient, where scholars and craftsmen were producing work

incomparably superior to anything in Europe. Of particular

interest in this connection is that a catalogue still survives

in which 353 volumes of the library of Isabella the Catholic

were meticulously described, with full details of their

titles, miniatures and bindings.ix

The characteristic feature of Mudejar designs is the

construction of tiers of concentric rectangular frames, each

the result of repetitive impression of a single tool, as if it

were the frames that were important, rather than the emblems

used to produce them. This was a practical way of achieving

wide bands of decoration. This technique formed the basis of

the Italian ‘two-ring’ border designs of the early sixteenth

century. All the borders in this design are built from the

repeated use of a two-ring element. Its design consists of a

mirror image pair of rings, each with a large split palmette

and various other additional small leaf ornaments. Their

arrangement is such that the pair of split palmettes combines

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to create the form described by Meynell and Morrison as the

‘Arabic Motif’.x

Borders of this style can be observed on Italian bindings

throughout the sixteenth century, though its period of

greatest usage was from around 1510 to the mid-1530s. (Figure

7) In the early second quarter this pattern became generally

replaced by a more complex double version. Instead of the

tooled impressions being placed in-line sideways, as in Figure

6, they were arranged vertically, one above the other,

producing a ‘totem pole’ arrangement of Arabic motifs.

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Figure 8

The two-ting pattern on a Persian tombstone of about 1300 AD.

This clearly shows the main parts of the design element: the

two rings and the mirror image arrangement of split palmette

leaves that create the form of the Arabic Motif.

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Figure 9. An example of the two-ring pattern on an Italianbinding of c.1514. The same detail in the gold tooling can be

seen around the border of this bookbinding as in the tombstone

in Figure 8.

Figure 10. A short section of the double-width border

style based on a vertical arrangement of the two-ring design

element. This shows the production of a vertical sequence of

Arabic motifs aligned on the central axis of the column.

Defining the border

Designs based on borders consisting of single lines were

popular in the early sixteenth century, when plain,

rectangular frames were often decorated with circular inserts

at their mid-points. Curiously, this style was revisited, at

least by some Parisian binders, at the time of the Revolution.49

In general, though, they soon became tramlines, enhanced with

small additional ornaments of gouge work and odd little

motifs, invariably tooled ‘in solid’. These borders frequently

supported an inner lozenge, normally of undulating shape. The

principles of the complex interaction between the central

ornament and its frame, whereby through a sequence of cross-

overs, the outline of the central lozenge becomes that of the

border, and vice versa, had been devised by c1540. The full

potential of this pattern structure, however, was not reached

until the lines were replaced with bands or ribbons.

The resulting ‘strapwork’ borders incorporate two common

features: decorative corners and decorative enhancements

between the corners. Three early decorative enhancements to

corners were based on circles, squares and mitres. Designs of

the 1540s based on rectilinear linkages and mazes exhibited

the greatest complexity, but lacked precision of execution.

Prior to 1540, frames were significantly less complex, with

simpler, mitred or round scoop- corners and circular linkages,

and were usually of single line construction instead of

ribbons. By the end of the 1540s, the quality of ribbon

definition was superior and the linkages frequently included

circular knotting. From comparable designs in other art forms,

it appears likely that the round scoop corner, giving the

appearance of a ‘round bite’ having been removed from it, may

well have been a vestige of the ‘centre-and-corners’ design,

in which the adornments were often coins or coin-shaped.

A similar usage, based on a square or ‘box’ shape, occurs in a

wider range of variations than does the ‘round bite’ corner. 50

On a binding of Homer’s Odyssea for Thomas Mahieu in the early

mid-century, the ornament of the outer frame consists of large

constructs in the ‘Greek Key’ style, which, in the manner of

its convolutions, makes it the rectilinear equivalent of the

roller-bearing. The third type of corner, the mitred, is found

on bindings from the mid-first quarter of the sixteenth

century to about 1550, and is usually of comparatively simple

design, based either on a diagonal bisector of the corner or

else on a diagonal fold across it. An indication of the degree

to which the features of the mitred rectangular frame could be

developed is apparent in an Italian binding of c1544 from

Bologna. Not only has the border been doubled, but a third

tier has been inserted in the centre and an enormous number of

small compartments created from a profusion of cross-overs and

linkages between the frames. (Figure 11)

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Figure 11. An Italian binding of c1545, believed to be from Bologna, and displaying the incredible degree of complexity introduced by binders at

that time. This design can be considered to have been developed from

numerous inter-changes between four narrow tramline frames. The central,

octagonal medallions, the traditional representation of heaven and earth,

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while partly created by this structure, required the additional central

floating frame for their completion.

Linkages between frames

By the late 1520s the appearance of the frames was often

elaborated by the addition of circular extensions, usually in

the centres of each of the four sides. These may well have

originated in the ubiquitous half-knot which was so common on

the blind-tooled bindings of the previous century, especially

those from Spain, and is often seen as an item of jewellery,

particularly necklaces, in painted portraits of that period.

Whereas the earlier ones tended to consist of pairs of semi-

circular excursions, from one line of the frame towards the

other, their use rapidly turned into the cross-over, or

‘scissors’, linkage, which became the most common appearance

of this device. The most complex form, apparently based on a

roller-bearing, provided a decorative contrivance that could

be used to interlock two or more complete border structures,

and was by far the most impressive. (Figure 11)

In the 1530s and early 1540s, strapwork-like frames developed

that were essentially a non-linear departure from the

parallel-ribbon forms more usual at that time. They tend to be

more intricately interwoven, more closely packed and usually

more extensive than the ‘endless knot’ forms, and often

include animal heads, claws and leafy tails with something of

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a reptilian incestuousness about their appearance, recalling

the ‘basket of eels’ and other vestiges of the Viking Mammen

and Ringerike styles. Elements of these designs often depart

significantly from the strict geometry that characterises most

of the strapwork decorations, with the inclusion of foliate

enhancements and three-dimensional roll-overs in the style of

heavy metal engineering. The so-called ‘black on white’ style

in which the strapwork design appears to have been produced by

squeezing black pigment from a tube on to a white leather

binding, and was apparently such a favourite of Grolier, Henry

II, Diane de Poitiers and Samuel Pepys, was another ‘heavy’

style of strapwork, with clear ancestral relations to the

polychromed designs of Mudejar Spain.

By the mid-1540s, strapwork frames were being designed with

ever-increasing complexity. Corners based on ‘square’

interlaces grew in complexity to form twists and mazes.

Diamond shapes forming incestuous mazes, and knots of

sometimes massive dimensions, were exploited to ornament

corners and the mid-sections of frame edges. Draughtsmanship,

however, was still far from perfect: lines were rarely

parallel and angles not square until the mid-century.

Borders with round scooped corners quite often include round

frames which are often used as roller bearings to hang

supplementary panels. By the mid-century, the incestuous

ribbon patterns are observed to incorporate a lot more

circular involvements than during the earlier period. By the

1540s, curving mazes and elements of ever-greater complexity

may be observed in the strapwork frames. Initially this was 54

mainly localised to particular areas but as the decade of the

1550s progressed, so the extent of these curling patterns

proliferated, interlinking not only the elements of the

rectangular frame but also the lozenge or ellipse within it,

until the entire board area was involved, with the sole

exception of a central region that was always reserved for

titles, crests or coats of arms. As these border structures

expanded into the main board area, so they changed from simple

curvilinear forms to include branching, elaborate and

eglomerate designs in which an infestation of horned, vine-

like curves and crescents intermingle, entirely filling the

board area. Designs of this type are all mid-century, the

recti-linear ones mainly Italian, particularly from Bologna,

and the others French, usually bound in Paris. They are all

characterised by a ribbon with single outline, and not

infrequently show instances of the threading of one part of

the ribbon through another - a most unusual feature of

strapwork designs. Volutes, snow-flake backgrounds, small

indications of perspective and fantasy leaf tools are common

elements incorporated into these designs. The likelihood of a

derivation of the knotwork constructions of this period from

some Arabic origin may perhaps be inferred from the frequent

location of knotwork structures above and below the central

medallion - a layout that typified many bindings from the

Middle East.

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Figure 12. A binding of the mid-sixteenth century showingclear use of roller-bearing linkages within an otherwise

completely rectilinear border structure. Apparent also are

four circular extensions from the central frame which

interleave through the various rectangular sections of the

main border, securing them all together.

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Figure 13. The cover of a copy of Cicero, bound by Claude de

Picques in Paris c1550. This design exhibits complex corner

assemblies with diamond knots intermediate between them,

together with the massive tour-de-force diamond that is developed

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entirely from extensions of the central triangle and is

suspended between it and the diamond knot above it.

Figure 14. An example of a highly ornamented, curvilinear cornerassembly on an early 16th century binding.The ribbons from which the design

has been contrived are not of uniform width throughout their length. At

their widest the ribbons exhibit large circular notches which are a typical

enhancement of this period.

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Figure 15. Binding design in the eglomerate style in whichthe ribbons of the border form a general complex between the

rectangular outer frame and the elliptical centre. The use of

ribbons in these designs is significantly different to that in

whole-field strapwork designs, since there is no intention to

create compartments. The complex meanderings of the ribbons

seem purely to fill the space with decorative activity.

Chinoiseries

In the literature on bookbinding history, the bindings

attributed to John Baumgarten have been noteworthy on account

of his employment of gold decoration in a ‘Chinese’ stylexi.

Baumgarten was a German binder who had moved to London in the

1760s to take advantage of the enthusiasm for fine bindings in

England at that time. He lived in London until his death in

1782. His skill was renowned and he specialised in elegant

bindings in the ‘Chinese taste’ in vogue at that time. While

Baumgarten’s name has been particularly associated with books

bound in London between about 1760 and 1780 with decoration in

the Chinoiserie style, he does not appear to have been the

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sole progenitor of the style. A binding entitled, Das Neue

Testament, which displays the same structures and constituents

that characterise the later Chinoiserie style was bound by

Andreas Linde, also a German binder working in Londonxii. Linde

styled himself, Buchbinder zu Ihro Kőnigl. Hoheit Printz George in Katherine –

Street in den Strand. His bindings included garlands and the

latticework inserts that were so characteristic of the

Chinoiserie style but on this binding the gilding of the

lattice appears as the inverse of the normal lattice. Instead

of a net appearance, it is composed from a set of tiny solid

lozenges, as if achieved with a flat polished tool whose face

had been divided by two sets of saw cuts. Chinoiserie bindings

bound between 1760 and 1780 appear to contain lattice inserts

defined with straight lines and only occasionally with

additional internal ornamentation. To the outside they are

edged with acanthus foliage or rococo swags and there are

often additional compartments in the design in which these

swags and scrolls delineate small compartments of irregular

shape.

Not only were these designs an obvious attempt to capture

something of the Oriental atmosphere to which most of European

aristocracy of the time was so addicted , but when examined

more closely, the designs contain several features that were

new to the gold decoration on book covers and it is through

the exploration of these and their origins that it becomes

possible to begin to interpret aspects of the influence of

Eastern art and culture on Western Europe. Specific features

of the Chinoiserie bindings that have proved of particular

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significance include, garlands and chains especially those

involving husks, areas of ornamented latticework and curving

arcs that appear to be on fire. During this period, from 1760

to 1780, the value of European imports of furniture and

lacquerware from China increased from 85kg to 450kg weight of

silver but European enthusiasm for products of the East was

not unique to this period and had in fact been aroused many

years previously around the time of the Restorationxiii.

The death of Oliver Cromwell without a constitutional process

in place to guarantee continuation of the Commonwealth, made

it possible for Charles I’s son to return and claim his right

to inherit the throne as King Charles II. The restoration of

Charles II as king of England in 1660 was less of an influence

on the decoration of book covers than was that of his new

wife, Catherine of Braganza, Infanta of Portugal and the Seven Islands of

Bombay and whose position also brought trading rights to

Brazil and the East Indies. She had also arrived in England

with a personal fortune of some five hundred thousand pounds.

After so many years of parsimony, the exotic luxuries,

furnishings and decorative artefacts Catherine and her retinue

of craftsmen brought with them from Portugal provoked a

spontaneous explosion of artistic creation. The London East

India Company that had been founded by Elizabeth I on 31st

December 1600 with the intention of benefiting from the silks,

spices, tortoise shell and jewels that might be acquired from

the Indian continent had never prospered since until the

arrival of the new Queen, the Company had had no rights of

access to any Indian port. Catherine’s title to Bombay made

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possible access to the fabulous treasures known to come from

the East though until the end of the seventeenth century, ‘The

East’ was perceived as a single empire and people in Europe

did not distinguish those from China from those of India,

Japan or Siam. All were valued for their glitter, extravagance

and the luxury of their appearance. Catherine’s arrival

heralded an infatuation in England for all things exotic. In

France, the court of Louis XIV at Versailles has been

described as, “the vortex of fashion, not just for France but for all of Europe.

There Chinoiserie was given the Royal imprimatur and from there it spread as a

court style to Germany, the Scandinavian countries and to Russia.”xiv Entire

buildings were decorated à la manière de la Chine and in 1666 the

firm of Spinks opened in London as an importer of products

from China.

Embassies bearing extravagant gifts of gold and lacquer,

embroidered silks and crates of porcelain were received at the

French Court in 1684 and 1686 and stimulated a popular craze

for all things Eastern. Increasing quantities of such luxuries

and the general demand was such that artists and craftsmen all

over Europe began to produce their own versions. As a result,

as Dawn Jacobson expressed it, “Chinoiserie is an oddity. It is a wholly

European style whose inspiration is entirely Oriental.”xv Chinoiseries became a

key element in design until the last part of the eighteenth

century. The vogue for Chinoiserie reached a peak in the

middle of the eighteenth century, particularly in England,

helped by the publication of many books on Chinese designs for

buildings, dress and furniture, such as those by William and

John Halfpenny in 1750, by Darly and Edwards in 1754 and Sir

64

William Chambers in1757 and coincides incidentally with the

beginning of the period in which Chinoiserie designs on London

bookbindings came into fashion. Society had turned collector

with a mania for whatever took its fancy. Everything was

collected, drawings, paintings, porcelain, sea-shells and

people not rich enough to own a genuine Chinese vase could

have one copied in lacquered papier mache. By the 1760s the

craze had reached its height.

Designs on bookbindings in the Chinoiserie style are an

eighteenth century style and have a very particular

appearance. Nothing similar has been observed on bindings of

the later seventeenth. Chinoiserie designs are pseudo-

pictorial and while appearing to be essentially border

constructions they characteristically encroach into the

central area. Designs in this style were mainly bound in the

third quarter of the eighteenth century. Those in which the

Chinoiserie effect is most spectacularly achievedxvi include

complex structures defined by flaming rococo scrolls

supporting pedestals and bridges with birds and assorted

figures some of whom appear very Chinese while others more

traditionally European. By the beginning of the fourth quarter

although designs were still in the Chinoiserie style they tend

to be less capricious and more constrained to the space of a

border. While many of the same features and motifs continued

to be employed in their designs, in those of this period the

characteristic feature is the profusion of small areas of

trellis work. In all cases, the trellis work appears to have

been constructed from sets of lines, diagonal to the edges of

65

the binding, some just single lines and others of an

ornamental nature. These areas of trellis work are very

different to the compartments in strapwork designs. They are

in no way linked to other compartments as is the nature of

strapwork and it is a major feature of these that they are

framed with scrolls of extravagant rococo.

Had the time periods been more convenient it might have seemed

feasible for the stimulus for these areas of trellis work to

have been the chairs brought to England by Catherine in 1662.

Of all the items she brought, the chairs with seats and backs

made from rattan cane, “gave so much satisfaction to all the Nobility, Gentry

and Commonality of this Kingdom for their durableness, lightness and cleanness

from dust, worms and moths which inseparably attend Turkeywork, serge and other

stuff-chairs and couches to the spoiling of them and all furniture near them.”xvii

Though initially restricted to the aristocracy, the

destruction in four days of some 13,200 houses during the

Great Fire of London in 1666 resulted in a demand for chairs

that could only be met by these chairs with their woven cane

panels. Manufacture began in 1664 but did not reach peak

production until the 1680s. Most of these were made in

workshops clustered around St Paul’s Churchyard which

coincidentally was the location of many of the bookbinders at

that time so the binders would inevitably have been familiar

with the cane patterns used for the seat and back panels of

the chairs. Yet trellis patterns on bookbindings, which

arguably have some similarity with the chair panels, did not

appear until the middle of the eighteenth century, by which

time cane chairs were considered to be “now almost out of use.”

66

Indeed, amongst the aristocracy, the popularity of cane

furniture had reached its peak by about 1690 by which time

cane chairs were considered to have become too cheap and too

common. Trellis work inserts were a feature of Viking

artefacts such as those known as the Gripping Beasts from the

Oseberg Treasure. Closer in time is the possibility of the

inspiration having been passed from the ‘wire ground’ or ‘Kat

stitch’ that formed the lattice-work of French Point-de-Paris

lace or from Valenciennes lace which had similar features.

Another contemporary potential source could have been the

excavations at Pompeii. In this context it is significant that

bamboo trellis appears in the garden scenes in the frescoes of

Pompeii and that serious excavations there began in 1763.

Also, in those cases where the lines which form the trellis

patterns on bookbindings are

ornamented, their adornment

might best be described as in

the style of bamboo.

Figure 16. The ‘GrippingBeasts’ artefact from the

Oseberg Treasure.xviii

67

Figure 17. A book bound by John Baumgarten, c 1757 orlater, in the Chinoiserie style with numerous Chinese motifs.

The trellis inserts are of three different mesh sizes, the top

68

pair being curvilinear and the lower side ones embellished

with central ornaments. The edging around all the trellis

inserts are in the rococo stylexix.

69

Figure 18. Riti Funebri di Roma Pagana by Guasco,bound in Rome

1769-74.

Although the inclusion of inserts of trellis work was

retained, the entire style of this binding is different to

that of the previous one. This one reflects the transition to

the neoclassical style that became the vogue in the later part

of the century and proclaims an air of more elegant simplicity

which contrasts with the rather cluttered frippery of the

Chinoiserie style. The trellis work in this design are

significantly more refined and elegant than the earlier style.

The threads are in cable-stitch instead of simple line work,

the inserts are in the shape of tulip or lotus flowers not

just polymorphic and they are edged with scrolls of acanthus.

Chains of husks were a major feature of this fashion and are a

very noticeable feature in Robert Adam’s hanging girandoles

and fire screens, Brussels Lace, Stapleton’s design for the

ceiling of Belvedere College, Dublin and as enhancements to

the ornamental panels of fine furniturexx . On bookbindings,

designs of the mid-eighteenth century, in the Chinoiserie

style positively abound and drip with chains of husks and as

the vogue for this style evolved to Rococo and to the

70

neoclassical in which everything in France had to be, à la

Grecque, husk chains never lost their allure.

Figure 19. A section of the cover design on a bookbound for the Empress Marie Theresia in 1746xxi. In this book

cover, which dates from the time when the vogue for

Chinoiserie was at its height, the centre and corners

arrangement created from densely tooled areas filled with

numerous oriental style motifs. A major contribution to the

visual effect of this design is the result of the profusion of

71

short chains of husks. All parts of the design drip with husk

chains as if adorned for a festival.

Figure 20. The design on a thesis bound in Edinburgh c1784for G. Mercer. At this time only Scottish Universities

followed the Continental practice of printing and binding

theses to be defended. There were no theses in England or

Ireland that were required to be bound. The design on this

72

thesis consists of short catenaries of husk chains repeated in

scalloping style around the coverxxii.

In the ‘Greek’ neoclassical style, by the early 1760s foliated

adornments were replacing the Chinese style with festoons and

garlands of acanthus ornamented with trophies, swags, baskets

of flowers and gilded frames.

Two other decorative elements that appear on bindings from the

very late 1740s to early 1760s appear to have had Chinese

origins. One of these looks like a spider’s web and the other

a long and rather contiguous form, as if made as a concertina

from folded paper and perhaps based on the Chinese Cloudbands.

Shapes remarkably similar are observed on Chinese wallpapers

of this period. Jacobson has given examples of these and

explains that they were made in China especially for export to

the ‘Orient bewitched’ Europe of the eighteenth century.

Seemingly European interest in Chinese wallpapers developed

from the habit of the Chinese merchants presenting gifts of

such papers to their European contacts after a sale was

completed. European enthusiasm for these wallpapers quickly

led to orders being placed specifically for them and later for

similar papers being designed and printed in Europexxiii.

73

74

Figure 21. A French mosaic binding in the ‘Regency’ style,believed to have been bound by Padeloupxxiv.

This design, which has been considered to be reminiscent of

the fanfare style of the sixteenth century, is defined by

strapwork and includes snails and three-dimensional scrolls.

It is possible to hypothesise that the top and bottom

structures might be derived from cottage roofs. The feature

that has been referred to as a, ‘Spider’s Web’ appears four

times in the design, in each case both the structural threads

that support the web as well as the fine internal weavings are

readily discernable.

75

76

Figure 22. A panel of Chinese wallpaper c1760. Jacobsonwrote that these were hand-coloured and produced in China

specifically for the ‘Orient-bewitched’ Europe of the

eighteenth century. The arching form around the head at the

top of this piece has the appearance of being a concertina of

folded paper in the style of the traditional cloudband.

Edgings

From the early seventeenth century, narrow strips of

decorative effect began to appear as part of the border

structure. One of the simplest, yet most frequently occurring,

of these consists of a sequence of tiny triangular forms,

sometimes done as a tight group of dots, which is generally

known as ‘dente de rat’ due to the perceived similarity of its

shape with that of a rat’s teeth. It is used rather in the

manner of a ‘seaming lace’ to enhance the lines that define

the edges of the border. Occasionally observed on bindings

throughout the seventeenth century, and until the end of the

first quarter of the eighteenth, it later becomes much more

common. It was especially in vogue throughout the period from

1730 to 1780, peaking in the1750s.

Lacy edgings of ever more sophisticated form are observed

adorning the border edges from the late sixteenth century

through to the later eighteenth. In the earlier period these

were often just of a single band of braid lace. A popular

style consisted of a hoop with a cross on top, occurring in

77

many variant forms, ranging from starkly linear to circular.

The appearance of these edgings evolved following the latest

fashion fad, and may often be observed proliferating into

several tiers of lace within or around the main border

construction. During the period when ‘punto in aria’ lace was the

vogue, these edgings were usually shaped to consist of a

series of triangular panels of lace. Panels of similar shape

are commonly observed on bindings of the eighteenth century,

but with panels composed of pyramids of scales instead of

lace.

Border designs of the majority of the eighteenth century are

dominated by foliage constructions of the dentelle variety. Most

of these consist of large numbers of petit fers impressions, often

arranged in several layers, and with the description referring

to the inner boundary. ‘Dentelle’, as a descriptive term, has

usually been understood as relating either to the French word

for lace or to the ‘denticulated’, tooth-like protrusions,

though it has also been interpreted as having a varying

contour around the inner boundary that is symmetric about one

or more axes. Towards the end of the eighteenth century,

decorated borders tended to become much more rectangular,

though still with intense, fine ornamentation. One of the

major styles of this time was that described heraldically as,

‘flutings’. Borders in this style have the appearance of a

continuous run of leaves wrapped around a real or imaginary

central pillar. Yves Devaux has described them as, la fameuse

roulette ornée, once known as, dentelle du Louvre.xxv

78

Certain new geometrical structures became increasingly common

as the century progressed. The earliest of these is the curve

of the hanging chain, known as a catenary, and the other the

endless wave-like shape of the sinusoid. Scalloped edges around

the outer part of a border are one form in which this element

was widely used. It was, for example, a significant feature of

the border of one of the two surviving books from Oliver

Cromwell’s library.xxvi Catenary curves were also used in pairs,

described as citrons and, in a few bindings of the eighteenth

century, designs are dominated by large, heavily embellished

shapes of this type. From around the mid-century, borders are

often observed to be edged with hanging chains of husks or

wheat-ears. Occasionally these may be enhanced in the style of

leafy festoons but, while chains of husks may be quite long,

the only leafy festoons detected in the author’s extensive

study of bookbinding designs were of seriously miniature

proportion. In the later years of the century, some very

elegant designs featured chains across the corners, consisting

of strings of small motifs, all very precisely tooled in solid

gold.

79

Figure 23. A dentelle, garland border on a binding designof the eighteenth century showing the kind of usage of foliar

chains that was typical of the mid-century. Close examination

reveals that the foliar chains consist of repeated segments of

a flower and two pitcher shape motifs.

80

Certain new geometrical structures become increasingly common

as the century progressed. The earliest of these was the curve

of the hanging chain, known as a Catenary, and the other the

endless wave-like shape of the Sinusoid. This was sometimes

understated and the impression conveyed with a series of hints

instead of a blatantly continuous garland-like element.

Garlands are a feature of eighteenth century designs. The

smallest tend to appear like scalloped edgings while the

largest extend right around the cover usually acting as the

inner definition for the border decoration. They are seen on

bindings beginning in the 1730s right through to the 1790s,

with particular peaks in the 1750s and from 1770-90. Prior to

1770 cover designs which include garlands appear to be

entirely either English or French whereas after 1770 they

occur on Austrian, German, Italian, Scottish and Spanish

bindings as well.

Garlands usually consist of fairly basic chains of small,

uniform ornament such as baubles, husks or wheat-ears. The

more flamboyant form, the festoon which in the world of

floristry, consists of a lavish hanging creation of leaves and

flowers, is rarely seen as a decorative device in the gold-

tooling on bookbindings, though a few isolated examples have

been seen. The essential shape of a festoon is that it hangs

like a catenary and is most sumptuous at its centre. It

differs therefore from cresting which describes a decorative

construction of similar overall shape but which was based on

the type of ornamental metalwork structures placed over 81

gateways and the like. The distinguishing feature is the base

line, in cresting the structure is contrived to rest on a flat

support while the festoon sags between its two end supports.

The design on a binding for the Empress Marie Theresia by Jean

Bérain, 1746, positively droops with garlands and hanging

chains of husks.xxvii

Scalloped edges around the outer part of a border are one form

in which catenaries were widely used. It was for example a

very significant feature of the border of one of the two books

that have survived from Oliver Cromwell’s library.xxviii Catenary

curves were also used in pairs, described as Citrons and a few

bindings of the eighteenth century designs are dominated by

large, heavily ornamented citrons. From around the mid-century

borders are often observed to be edged with hanging chains of

husks or wheat-ears. Occasionally these may be enhanced in the

style of leafy festoons but while chains of husks may be quite

long, the only leafy festoons detected in a large study of

bookbinding designs were of seriously miniature proportion. In

the later years of the century, some very elegant designs

featured chains across the corners consisting of strings of

small motifs, all very precisely tooled in solid gold.

82

83

Figure 24. A late eighteenth century binding with adentelle style border defined by a long undulating chain of

baubles and husks supplemented with shorter ones in tiers

beneath it. English 1780.

During this review of the decoration of borders it has become

apparent that artistic exploitation of this space has proved

to be a major constituent of the overall design effect rather

than merely a supporting subsidiary. Decoration of the outer

parts of the cover area on bindings from the early years of

the sixteenth century tended to consist of very basic

rectangular frames with small finials at each corner. The

frame structure became increasingly elaborate and the space

defined by it increased to provide opportunities for ever more

sophisticated ornamentation. We have drawn attention to the

similarities between the design impressed into some of the

sixteenth century leather bindings and those of the panels of

carved ivory favoured by the early Christian Church. The

degree to which the moulded leather bindings seriously

resemble those of carved ivory suggests that it was the

intention to exploit the malleability of leather to recreate

their appearance. The octagonal symmetry of the four-ring

frame however has shown that designs in this period were

equally influenced by structural elements acquired from other,

more remote, religious origins. The original single line 84

borders of the early sixteenth century, having developed

through many phases of incestuous complexes of incredible

strapwork, had, by the end of the eighteenth century, returned

to their fundamental sparseness, albeit with slightly more

refined styling but nevertheless exactly the same simplicity.

85

i Wheatley, quotes Libri re expanding Treasure bindings with borders as, ‘botchings’. The History of the Art of BB, H B Wheatleii Suger quote on materials iii Thomas A G, Great Books and Book Collectors, Wiedenfeld & Nicolson, London, 1975 fig. 56 p 67.iv Hobson G D Parisian Bindings pl V p 415. and …………..v R Miquel y Planas, Restauracion del Arte hispano-arabe en la Decoracion exterior de los Libros, Barcelona 1913. This same style of construction and decoration of borders was not original to e Spain however since exactly the same arrangement and repetition of small motifs mat beseen in a 7th century BCE floor design from the Palace of King Assurbanipal at Nineveh.vi Irwin R Islamic Art, Laurence Ki9ng Publishing, London 1997 p 228.vii Nuovo A, The Library 6th Series, Dec 1990 vol 12(4) p 273-92. viii Goldschmidt W. Spanish Bookbindings from the XIIIth to the XIXth Century, Apollo Dec. 1934 vol xx No 120 p 329-30.ix Goldschmidt W. p330.x Meynell and Morison S xi Miner D Early Bookbindings – Report on an Exhibition at the Walther’s Art Gallery, Baltimore, Burlington Magazine August 1968 p 462.xii Nixon H M English Bookbindings XCII: A London Binding by Andreas Linde c1751The Book Collector vol 24(1) 1975 p 160-2.xiii Paludan A Chronicles of the Chinese Emperors Thames & Hudson, London 1998 p 200.xiv Dawn Jacobson. Chin pi para 1 ixv Dawn Jacobson Chinoiserie Phaidon Press London 1993 p 7.xvi Howard M Nixon English Bookbindings XCII The Book Collector vol 24(1) p160 1975. Nixon wrote that two bindings by Andreas Linde c1751 in this style were, ‘undeniably hideous’.xvii Drury 1969xviii Wilson D M, The Art of the Vikings, Apollo Jan-Jun 1980 p 315ff.xix Miner D, Walters Art Gallery No 58…………………..xx Gloag J, English Furniture in the French Taste pt II: The Last Third of the Eighteenth Century, Antiques Oct 1968, 586-93. For details of lace designs, Reigate Emily p 152. Formention of the ceiling design at Belvedere College, Dublin by Michael Stapleton,Burlington Magazine, May 1991 fig 35 p336. xxi Egger G, Viennese Bookbindings, Apollo vol LIII (315) May 1951 p 120-23.xxii Collins J, An Edinburgh Thesis Binding by Charles Cleland c1784, The Book Collector vol 36(3) Autumn 1987 p 372-4.xxiii Chine wallpapers ordered by Europexxiv The Art of the French Book ed. André Lajard, pub. Paul Elek, London 1947 p144 & plate 172.xxv Devaux Y p 134.xxvi Nixon H M Five Centuries of Bookbinding, Scolar Press, London 1978 pl 32. The book described isFrancis Sandford’s Scuta suprema, the binding of which is signed, ‘Lewis fecit’ and dated 1656. xxvii Egger G Viennese Bookbindings Apollo vol LIII (315) May 1951 120-23. Fig VI p121.xxviii Nixon H M Five Centuries of Bookbinding, Scolar Press, London 1978 pl 32. The bookdescribed is

Francis Sandford’s Scuta suprema, the binding of which is signed, ‘Lewis fecit’ and dated 1656.