Seventeenth-Century English Bindings I

For the next two weeks I will be showcasing historical English bookbindings from the Center's collection. The images chronicle developments in the decorative styles and tool designs used to embellish leather and vellum book covers in the middle of the hand-press period. Since the majority of our early English bindings date from the seventeenth century, I am limiting my discussion to that era (1600-1650 this week, 1650-1720 next week). These posts are heavily indebted to David Pearson's invaluable English Bookbinding Styles, 1450-1800 (New Castle, DE: Oak Knoll Press and British Library, 2005).

upper cover

spine

lower cover

detail of lower cover

inside upper cover, showing binding structure

Francis Godwin, A Catalogue of the Bishops of England (London: Impensis George Bishop, 1601) 4to; contemporary limp vellum binding, with yapped edges and holes formerly occupied by leather ties; title in manuscript on spine; early seventeenth century (c.1601)

Besides paper wrappers, limp vellum bindings were the most common types of cheap book covers in the early seventeenth century. The vellum binding is "limp" because it is not stiffened over boards (at this time, pasteboard, made from pasting many pieces of paper on top of one another). This piece of vellum isn't particularly nice either. As shown in the last two images, the hair side of the vellum faces outwards, while the flesh side appears on the inside of the upper cover. Hair follicles are visible in the second-to-last image. 

upper cover

lower cover

William Lambarde, Archion (London: Printed for Daniel Frere, 1635); 8vo; contemporary plain sheep binding; framed in blind by double fillets; first half of the seventeenth century (c.1635)

Even the plainest bindings in the sixteenth century featured some element of decoration, be it a roll or pattern made from small tools. But in the early seventeenth century plain (and I mean very plain) calf bindings became popular. Bindings such as the one shown above were decorated with nothing more than fillets (the horizontal and vertical lines) in blind (i.e. without gold), creating an outer frame that formed a single rectangular panel. The binding of this pocket-sized octavo book represents the lower end of leather bindings available in the early seventeenth century: not only is it plainly decorated, but it is also bound in sheep leather, a notoriously perishable material that tears easily and apparently bred worms (Pearson 18-19; 190, n.3).

upper cover

lower cover

Nicolas Faret, The honest man, or, The art to please in court. Translated by Edward Grimeston (London: Thomas Harper for Edward Blount, 1632) 12mo; contemporary plain calf binding; framed in blind by double fillets; one of five copies in North America (others at Folger, Harvard, Yale, Huntington), eleven in the world; first half of the seventeenth century (c.1632)

Here is another cheaply bound pocket-sized book from the 1630s, this time a duodecimo bound in calf leather. Even this book's original spine (ragged as it is), survives and has not been rebacked in the modern era. 

Despite the popularity of the plain leather style, other aesthetic trends in early seventeenth-century English binding called for elaborate stamp designs. As in the cases of the following two books, one is more likely to find gilt decorated stamps on folio volumes than smaller formats, although there are always exceptions to the rule.

upper cover

lower cover

Michel de Montaigne, Essays. Translated by John Florio (London: Melchisidec Bradwood for Edward Blount and William Barret, 1613) folio; contemporary calf; triple-fillet frame in blind, with gilt centerpiece panel; c. first half of seventeenth-century (c.1610s-20s). 

Another popular design in the early seventeenth century, the "centerpiece" style consists of an outer frame composed of blind fillets and a central panel stamp design, usually gilt. The strapwork characteristic of many centerpieces reflects arabesque design trends popular in England at the time. While sixteenth-century English bindings also utilized centerpieces, such work not only employed additional designs in the corners (made from small tools) but also used different types of centerpieces. 

upper cover

detail

lower cover

Guilliaume Du Bartas, Divine Weekes and Workes (Sepmaine). Translated by Joshua Sylvester (London: printed by Robert Young, 1633) folio; contemporary calf, with center- and cornerpiece design framed by gilt single fillets; small tools decorating outside corners of frame; c. 1635-1640 

It was also common for bindings to combine the centerpiece with corner stamps to make even more elaborate designs. The cornerpiece shown in the second image was commonly used from 1590-1655 (Pearson 135, pl. 5.16). The centerpiece and center-and-cornerpiece designs rose to prominence in the 1620s.

upper cover

spine (rebacked)

lower cover

remnant of green linen tie

detail, holes for ties

Thomas Sternhold, The whole booke of Davids Psalmes : both in prose and meeter : with apt notes to sing them withall (London: Co. of Stationers, 1635) 16mo; contemporary calf binding with elaborate gilt panel stamp on both covers; remnants of green ribbon ties; gilt edges; c. 1635-1650; one of four copies in North America (fifteen worldwide) 

Binders also used elaborate centerpiece stamps to decorate small-format books, especially devotional books in 12mo and 16mo (Pearson 57-9). This type of design was common from the late sixteenth century to the first quarter of the seventeenth, and began to decline in popularity from 1625-1650. This elaborately decorated 1630s Psalter appears to feature such a stamp, although the decoration is actually made up from separate small tools. The binding bears remnants of ties made from green linen, which along with leather were the most common materials used for book-ties in this period. Ties made from leather, linen, or (rarely) silk came into use in England around the same time bookmakers began shifting from wooden boards and vellum to pasteboard and paper (the natural expansion of vellum leaves necessitated the use of metal clasps to keep medieval and early printed books closed). 

upper cover

detail of upper cover

lower cover

detail of lower cover

William Cartwright, Comedies, Tragi-comedies, with other Poems (London: Printed for Humphrey Moseley, 1651) 8vo; contemporary plain calf binding, with additional vertical line tooled parallel to spine (creating two panels); small tools used to decorate corners of each panel thus formed; mid-seventeenth century (c. 1651)


By the middle of the seventeenth century a new style of plain leather binding came into fashion; as with those produced in the earlier part of the century, minimalism was the dominant aesthetic for these bindings. Here the basic outer frame of blind fillets is augmented with an additional vertical line, and the two asymmetrical panels thus formed feature small corner decorations. Some bindings dispensed with these small decorations, as can be seen in this example from the 1670s:

upper cover

lower cover

Anyway, the plainer, more spacious designs of the early seventeenth century would greatly influence the dominant binding aesthetic in England from 1650-1720, which I will discuss in greater length next week. 

Incidentally, the copy of William Cartwright's plays and poems discussed above has a wonderful engraved frontispiece depicting the author in his library.
 

The books are shelved fore-edge out, which was the common practice in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. Also note the ties on most of Cartwright's books; as in the example of the 1630s Psalter, these ties were probably made from green linen.

Schoolboys comment on a 17th-century Sea-Prayer

As books have moved and migrated throughout the world across time, passing through different periods of personal and institutional ownership, they frequently accrue the material signs of those owners in the form of inscriptions, stamps, bookplates, and manuscript notes. I find it fascinating when a book displays multiple layers of such material signs, each one being received at a different historical moment and reflecting the unique idiosyncratic tastes or interests of a particular owner. While we are all familiar with the book owner's habit of erasing or obliterating the marks left by the previous readers in order to assert authority over a book as physical property, it is maybe more interesting to find marks in books that interact with or build upon one another, like the layers of commentary on display in many medieval manuscripts, or the multi-generational family record-keeping in bibles. The book I am writing about today contains a similarly multi-layered fabric of inscribed ownership marks.

Limp vellum binding with MS title

title page

Sternhold, Thomas, d. 1549

The vvhole booke of psalmes : / collected into English meeter by Thomas Sternhold, John Hopkins, and others ; conferred with the Hebrew, with apt notes to sing them withall ; set forth and allowed to be sung in all churches, of all the people together before and after morning and euening praier ; as also before and after sermons, and moreouer in priuate houses, for their godly solace and comfort, laying apart all vngodly songs, and balads, which tend only to the nourishment of vice, and corrupting of youth.

London : Imprinted for the Company of Stationers, 1605

[10], 91, [14] p. ; 21 cm. (4to)

Renaissance Center copy is in contemporary (?) limp vellum; in phase box; long ms. note on blank final page, signed Saml. West 1637


The Book of Psalms, often bound with the Bible and Book of Common Prayer, was one of the most popular books in Renaissance England. The sale of this type of book was so lucrative, in fact, that the Stationers Company held a monopoly on its publication for much of the early modern period. The last few leaves of this book (one of the Center's eleven psalters printed before 1700) contains “certaine godly prayers to be vsed for sundry purposes,” including “a prayer to be said at night before going to bed” and “a prayer to be said at the hour of death.” 

more of these prayers, including one "necessary for all persons

Perhaps taking a cue from the text, a man named Samuel West added a specialized prayer of his own to the book's endpapers in 1637. The prayer focuses on merchants and other seafaring people, asking God to protect them from the manifold dangers of the open ocean. 

MS Sea-Prayer

The prayer reads as follows (according to my transcript, in which I have supplied many of the words missing due to material losses on the left-hand margin):

                                                                               on the Seas:/

[Alm]ightie god thy power is wonderfull both vpon the Sea and Land &

[how]soeuer thou pleasest that workest thou in them both, sometimes thou

[mak]est the earth fruitfull, sometimes barren, also sometimes the Seas calme

[&] pleasant, sometimes rough and boisterous, for that whether they bring

[valu]able or prosperous thinges vnto vs all come from thee o Lord god, that

[thy?] power maie be serived [served] in thy creatures to the praise and glorie of thy

[blesse]d name seeing thou art ruler both of earth and sea wee most humblie

[des]ire thee to blesse all those that travell both by sea and land in the waie

[of] truth especiallie for the marriners and shipping of this our towne,

[w]hoe are for the getting and maintenance of their liuing compelled

[to] trauell on the seas and to committ themselues to vnto the dangers

[th]ereof o Lord though the surges of the Seas are maruelous yet art

[....] which sittest on high more maruelous though the windes are strong

[and] vehement, yet doest thou excell them in power for thou hast

[giv]en a commaundment to thy creatures and none can goe beyond

[...] fire, haile, Ice, Snowe and vapours, stormie windes and tempestes

[acc]omplish thy will thou alsoe when the shipp whereon thou and thy

[disc]iples weare grieuouslie tossed with the waues and at the point

[of] drowning causedest at the desire of thy disciples the Sea to be

[....]et the stormes to cease and a great calme to follow in soe much

[a]s they which weare in the shipp marueiled and saide what

[ma]nner of man is this that both the windes and Seas obeye him;

[Gra]nt o most gentle Sauiour, that whensoeuer any troublesome tempest,

arise vpon the Seas soe that such as are in danger by calling

[on] thy holie name with true faith maie find fauour at thy

[me]rcifull handes to be deliuered out of all perills and dangers and

[bein]g preserued by thy heauenlie power maie make happie and

[pros]perous voiages, soe shall it come to passe that they being saflie

[l]ed out of all perills and dangers maie praise and glorifie

[thy] holie name all the daies of their life graunt this o most mercifull

[Sa]uior and Redeemer./

                                                                                    Sam. West  1637

The title "on the seas" is only a partial one, since it is clear that additional writing once existed at the top margin of the page. I suspect this part of the leaf was brittle or otherwise damaged, forcing an owner to cut down the margins when fitting the book to its current limp vellum binding. Based on context clues within the prayer, it is probable the title is something along the lines of “A Prayer for those who travel on the seas.” The prayer's allusion to "the marriners and shipping of this our towne"suggests Samuel West lived in a port settlement, probably in the South of England. So far I have been unable to identify Samuel West and in any case it is likely the common nature of his name will preclude a confident identification. Nonetheless, the prayer affords an interesting devotional perspective on the dangerous and risky oceanic voyages conducted by merchants and mariners in early modern England. 

Yet a second set of annotations effectively undermines the gravity of the prayer. At some point well after the early seventeenth century, two boys had access to the psalter, perhaps in an educational context of some kind. Their crudely written and ink-smeared annotations suggest the boys’ comparative ability to read the prayer provided a source of some good-natured ribbing: “Jim cannot read this...you cannot say that George for I can read it better than you can.” On a basic level, these comments are funny and evocative, conjuring the image of a stuffy schoolroom and two bored pupils trying to amuse themselves (is that a drawing of a boat too?). Since it is likely these sentiments would have been exchanged orally rather than in writing (the comments definitely have a conversational or bantering tone to them), I think it likely the two boys wrote them at a time of imposed silence, maybe during a school lesson. Why these boys were entrusted with a rare seventeenth-century Psalter--exposing it to use as a scribbling-pad--is another story altogether. All in all, this amusing and unlikely set of manuscript annotations demonstrates the potentially surprising combination of written marks a book accumulates as it passes through generations or owners and readers.