Het drukkers jaarboek 1906 (The Printer’s Yearbook, 1906)

Between 1906 and 1911 four yearbooks about printing were published in Amsterdam. They were intended to stimulate a broader and more logical interpretation of the art of printing. J.W. Enschedé, a member of a printing family, authored four out of 9 articles for this first volume, including a text about the American printer Theodore Low de Vinne. Other topics in this issue include decorated initials, modern book art in Germany, matters of typefaces, and more.

Hardcover, 1906, 202pp. + approx. 30pp. ads., countless illustrations, and amazing chapter decorated openers.

As usual, the book is already available to our patrons at Patreon with pledges of $5 per month or more. Or you can buy this book separately on our Issuu page.

The volume is in Dutch, but multiple amazing illustrations make it interesting for a wider audience. Below we share some of the scanned elements from the chapter, devoted to decorated initials:

Two pages with initial from Dante Gabriel Rossetti ‘The House of Life’ printed by the Elston press, Mr. Clarke Conwell, New York, 1901. Ornaments and letter by H. M. O’Kane

Page with initials from ‘Pomponius Mela, Cosmographi de situ orbis’, printed by Bernardus Pictor and Erhardus Ratdolt, Venice, 1478

Page with initial from Thomas Cantipratensis ‘Here beghint der byen boeck’ printed by Jan Seversz, Leiden, 1515

Page with initial from ‘Story of the Glittering Plain’, printed by the Kelmscott Press in 1894

Title page with initial from ‘Die vertroestinghe der ghelatenre menschen’. Antwerpen, Adriaan van Bergen, Naast den grooten mortier, 1504

Title page with a pretty traditional initial from Thomas à Kempis ‘Qui sequitur me’, printed by Jan Seversz, Leiden 1519

Initial by Walter Crane from Spenser’s ‘Faerie Queene’, published by George Allen in 1896

Decorated initial in red, blue, green, and gold from a 15-century gospel

There are some modern initials as well:

Initial designed by J.G. Veldheer for ‘Hollandsche Dorpen aan de Zuiderzee’, published by Erven F. Böhn, Haarlem

Initial designed by H. P. Berlage Nz. for the memorial book of the Delagoa railway

Initial designed by H. P. Berlage Nz. for the memorial book of the Delagoa railway

Initial designed and cut in wood and by K.P.C. de Bazel, for the Christmas issue of the Tijdschrift van den Hotelhoudersbond, 1895

Initial by Charles Ricketts for ‘The Early Poems of John Milton’, published by the Vale-press in 1896

The book was digitized with the use of our book scanning frame:

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