Untitled - Monoskop

EXTENSION OF THE PRIVILEGE-SYSTEM
found in other fields connected with the book-trade. The grant of privileges for
maps is foreshadowed in La Male et vraie description
des Gaules et Ytalies of
Jacques Signot (PA 1515, 4), where a pull-out map of Italy has the publisher's
name and 'Cum priuilegio' printed at the bottom, and the Parlement
expressly included the map as well as the book itself in the arret ('lesdictz livres
& carte'). Later, a map by itself might qualify for a privilege, such as the Vraye
description de la ville et chasteau de Guines, which prints the statement that it is
'Extraict du desseing de Nicolas de Nicolay, geographe du Roy, avec privilege
de sa majeste' (BN Est. Va 148); this was published in Paris after the capture
of Calais in January 1558. The privileges obtained by Geofroy Tory
(CH 1524, 2 and 1526, 2), which were in part to protect the original designs
contained in these books for illustrations and decorations, were followed in
1530 by a book entirely of designs and patterns which appeared 'Cum
priuilegio regis'. This was Lafleur de la science de Portraicture. Patrons de broderie
facon arabique et Ytalique, by Francesco di Pellegrino, a Florentine artist who
had come to France to work with Rosso at Fontainebleau. 1 The artists who,
with their engravings, made the work of Rosso at Fontainebleau familiar to a
wide public, were possibly the first in France to obtain privileges for their
productions. Pierre Milan, for instance, was able to put 'Cum priuilegio regis'
at the bottom of his engravings of the Danse des Dryades and Les Parques masquees,
both after Rosso, in 1 545 at the latest, of the famous Nymphe de Fontainebleau,
and of table silver. 2 Pierre Attaignant won a six-year privilege in 1531 from
Francis I for his improved method of printing music and for the music books
he printed, 3 and Robert Granjon a ten-year privilege in 1557 from Henry II
for a new type-design, the so-called Civilite type, imitating handwriting. 4
Pierre Hamon, the king's scribe, obtained Letters Patent in 1561 granting him
the exclusive rights in an engraved collection of specimens of calligraphy, the
Alphabet de I'invention des lettres en diverses escritures, and he also had a privilege for
a second and different Alphabet in I566. 5
Privileges had never been confined to printed books, but their presence in
books probably brought this way of seeking protection to the attention of
artistic and technical craftsmen who might otherwise not have thought of it.
1 The
only copy is in the Arsenal, 4". Sc.A.4544 Res. Exhibited in Paris, 1972, at the Ecole de
Fontainebleau exhibition, no. 685 in the catalogue, with an illustration.
2 Ecole de Fontainebleau, catalogue nos. 419, 421, 423, 438.
3 D. Haertz, Pierre Attaignant, royal printer of music (Berkeley/Los Angeles, 1969), p. 174.
4 Harry Carter and H. D. L. Vervliet, Civilite types (Oxford, 1966), pp. 19-21.
5 Elizabeth Armstrong, 'Deux notes sur Pierre Hamon: i Ses deux alphabets et son privilege',
Bibliotheque d'Humanisme et Renaissance, xxv (1963), pp. 543-7.
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