ADVERTISEMENT. J. JOHNSON embraces this opportunity of filling up the present page, by announcing to the Admirers of the Typographic Art, and the Profession in general, that he has now a subject in hand, which he flatters himself will not only eclipse all his former productions, but likewise any piece that has ever yet appeared before the Public as a Typographic Specimen; it will consist of an arch, in perspective, supported by ten pillars, in the centre will be a monument to the memory of William Caxton, as the father of printing in this country, together with the names of the principal early nursers and improvers of our Art; the whole will be executed with brass rules and flowers: the size will be eighteen and a quarter, by thirteen inches, which will be printed on fine drawing paper. The above will appear in the course of the present Summer. EXPLANATION OF THE ENGRAVED TITLE. The design surrounding the inscription is a rich ancient screen placed before a chapel or shrine, the windows and ornaments of which are seen above. Upon the canopies which crown the screen, appear the Rose and Portcullis, the badges of King Henry VIII., who, in the year 1535, authorized the printing of the first English Bibles Vide Vol. I. page 465. Beneath is a representation of the Court of King Henry, taken from the frontispiece of Grafton's edition of Halle's Chronicle of 1548; with the Sovereign delivering Bishop Coverdale's Bible above alluded to into the hands of Archbishop Cranmer, and Thomas Cromwell Earl of Essex to publish it abroad. This group of figures is imitated from Hans Holbein's frontispiece to the Great Bible by Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, published in 1539. Between this scene and the inscription of the Title are four panels, containing the Armorial Ensigns of celebrated Printers, namely, John Guttemburg, John Faust, the family of the Elzevirs, and that of the Aldí. At the sides of the inscription tablet, stand the effigies of John Guttemburg, the received inventor of printing, on the left; and Aldus Manutius, the inventor of Italic letter on the right. Below the inscription are the Armorial Ensigns of the Cities of Mentz, Strazburg, and Haerlem, the three places which lay claim to having had the most ancient printing executed in them. Beneath these shields is shewn the interior of a Library particularly rich in early Typography, the Bodleian at Oxford; and on the sides of it are the arms of four of it's most eminent patrons, namely, Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, son to King Henry IV.; Sir Thomas Bodley, John Selden, and Richard Gough, Esqs. |