WOOD-ENGRAVING. 



by giving an en-oneous direftion to the public tafte, it 

 operates as the very bane of modern merit, and of all prin- 

 cipled encouragement of the art. 



A man who coUefts thefe early rarities, and thefe only, 

 may be pretty certainly pronounced to be a perfon of no 

 intrinfic relifh for the produdions of art, and by no re- 

 mote analogy may be cafily perceived to be in the predica- 

 ment of Rochcfoucault'3 man of gravity, who affumes a 

 myfterious carriage of the body to cover the defeds of 



the mind. , _ , . 



Between the territories of Error and Truth, there is no 

 neutral ground ; neither can be made to recede without the 

 other's advancing. Among the caufes that, concurrently 

 with the above, have retarded the progrefs of the art of 

 wood-engraving, indifferent and bad printing ought firft and 

 chiefly to be mentioned ; for this evil is feverely felt by 

 all modern defigners and engravers on wood, ( and, hke moil 

 other evils, by far the moft heavily by the beft, ) the delicate 

 parts of whofe moft elaborate performances are fo fre- 

 quently marred by this operation. 



The bad printing of wood-cuts generally proceeds from 

 one or more of the following mitlakes, to ufe the mildeft 

 term that occurs to us : Printers being unable of them- 

 felves to judge of the effeft required in an impreflion ; 

 their being generally too much relirifted in price by the 

 publilhing-bookfellers to afford the neccffary attention, even 

 were they better informed ; the falfe refped exafted by 

 opulence, which renders them too ignorantly proud to fub- 

 mit to the direftion of artifts, who are generally poorer men 

 than themfelves ; with which caufe, prejudice in favour of 

 old methods of praftice is always ready to unite itfelf ; 

 the praftice of over-damping Englith, French, and even 

 India paper. To which may be added the ufe of blanketing, 

 and the neglefting to have the engravings properly made 

 ready under the direftion of the artift : all of which 

 lead to the general coroUary, or inference, that the en- 

 graver fhould always fuperintend the printing of his own 

 works. 



Wood-Engraving, Origin and Ancient Hi/lory of. 

 Father Du Halde adduces very fatisfaftory reafons for 

 our believing that the art of engraving on wood ex- 

 ifted and was praftifed in China for feveral centuries be- 

 fore its appearance in Europe. Whether it is of Chinefe 

 tranfplantation, or fpontaneous European growth ; whether 

 it was introduced by the Venetian traders and travellers 

 to India, or was re-invented, as the baron Heinnekin fup- 

 pofes, in Germany, by the Briefmalers and Formfchnieders, 

 who fabricated playing-cards, and the miferable legends 

 of monkifh fuperllition ; or whether it was not difcovered, 

 as Papillon has afferted, at Ravenna, as early as the year 

 1285; have been examined with great critical attention, 

 and at leaft as much perfeverance as the public will fym- 

 pathize with, by the abbe Zani, Mr. Ottley, and others. 

 To the works refpeftively of the Italian abbe, and the Eng. 

 li(h hiftorian and connoiffeur, we refer thofe who may be 

 defirous of obtaining more local and detailed information 

 concerning the early curiofities of the art than belongs to 

 the plan of our Cyclopcedia. The ftory of the two Cunio, 

 which they have repeated at great length from Papillon, and 

 lUuftrated by their own more profound knowledge of the 

 fubjea, is romantic in the extreme : fo much fo, that the 

 antiquarian intereft which the reader may feel with us on 

 the fcore of the curious wooden blocks from " the life of 

 the great and magnanimous Macedonian king," merges in 

 the chivah7 and fine art, the poetic and pidoral fervour, 

 and the tragic fate, of the twin brother and lifter, the ancient 

 pride of Ravenna, and of the illuftrious houfe of Cunio. 



Papillon relates, that when he was a young man, he " dif- 

 covered an epoch of engraving prints and charafters on 

 wood, certainly much more ancient than any hitherto 

 known in Europe;" and the ftory of his difcovery is, that 

 being employed about a century ago in papering a clofet 

 for a Swifs captain of the name of De Greder, in the 

 village of Bagneux, near Mont-Rouge, the captain, find- 

 ing he poffelted a tafte for fuch matters, (hewed him two 

 or three very ancient volumes, and they converfed toge- 

 ther concerning the prints contained in them, and the 

 antiquity of engraving on wood. Papillon proceeds to 

 give the defcription of the principal, i. e. the moft ancient, 

 of thefe volumes, as follows : — Upon a cartouch, or fron- 

 tifpiece, decorated with fanciful ornaments, and meafuring 

 about nine inches in width by fix in height, with, at the 

 top of it, the armorial bearings no doubt of the family of 

 Cunio, are rudely engraven the following words, in bad 

 Latin, or ancient Gothic Italian, with many abbreviations, 

 which were rendered and explained to him by M. de Greder. 



" The heroic aBions reprefented in Jlgures, of the great artd 

 magnanimous Macedonian king, the hold and valiant Alexander ; 

 dedicated, prefented, and humbly offered to the mojl holy father 

 pope Honorius IV., the glory and fupport of the Church, and 

 to our illujlrious and generous father and mother, by us, Alef- 

 fandro Alberico Cunio, cavaliere, and Ifabella Cunio, tiuin 

 brother andjijler : Jirjl reduced, imagined, and attempted to be 

 executed in relief, with a fmall knife, on blocks of -wood, made 

 even and poliflied by this learned and dearjifier, continued and 

 finijhed by us together, at Ravenna, from the eight pidures of our 

 invention, painted fix times larger than here reprefented ; en- 

 graved, explained by verfes, and thus marked upon the paper to 

 perpetuate the number of them, and to enable us to prefent them to 

 our relations and friends, in teflimony cf gratitude, friendfhip, and 

 affeSion. All this ivas done and Jini/hed by us tohen onlyjixteen 

 years of age." 



The cartouch mentioned above is enclofed in a fquare 

 formed by a fimple black line, one-twelfth of an inch in 

 thicknefs ; a few light hatchings, irregularly placed, and 

 executed without precifion, indicate the fhadows of the or- 

 naments. " Immediately following this frontifpiece ( fays Pa. 

 pillon ) are the eight piftures, engraved in wood, of the fame 

 dimenfions, and furrounded by a fimilar fillet : they have 

 alfo a few faint hatchings, to indicate the fhadows. At the 

 bottom of each of thefe prints, between the broad hne or 

 fillet which bounds the fubjeft, and another parallel line dif- 

 tant from it about the breadth of a finger, are four Latin 

 verfes engraved upon the block, which poetically explain the 

 fubjeft ; and above each is its title. The impreflions of all 

 of them are of a grey tint, and fpotty ; as if the paper had 

 not been damped or wetted before it was laid upon the en- 

 graved blocks. The figures, which are paifable in refpeft 

 to their outlines, although of a femi-gothic tafte, are fuffi- 

 ciently well charafterized and draped ; one may perceive by 

 them that in Italy the arts of defign were then beginning by 

 degrees to experience melioration. The names of the prin- 

 cipal perfonages reprefented are engraved under their figures, 

 as Alexander, Philip, Darius, Carapafpe, and others." 



Papillon next defcribes the eight engravings feverally, 

 which bear the names refpedlively of the twins Alexander 

 and Ifabel Cunio, and it would appear from his defcriptions 

 that Ifabel was the fuperior artift of the two. 



Upon the blank leaf which follows the laft print, badly 

 written in old Swifs charafters, and with ink fo pale as to 

 be fcarcely legible, is the following memorandum. 



" This precious book was given to my grandfather, 



Jan. Jacq. Turine, a native of Berne, by the illuftrious 



count di Cunio, magiftrate (podefta) of Imola, who ho- 



5 noured 



