Hours of the Virgin, Use of Rome

Hours of the Virgin, Use of Rome

Beginning in the 1480s, Parisian printers, working in close quarters booksellers began to produce Books of Hours for the open market. To create the miniatures of such books, artists initially trained as painters and illuminators provided designs for metalcuts, which combined the surface printing of the woodcut technique with the durability of a copper printing plate. The present edition was issued by Gilles Hardouyn, who, along with his brother Germain, formed a printing business that was active in Paris for a half century, from 1491 to 1541 and dominated the market for mass-produced Books of Hours. The major illuminator and artist responsible for the metalcut images in this book, Jean Pichore, produced twelve sets of metalcuts for Parisian printers between 1504 and 1514. These images, which frequently draw from works by Dürer and other engravers, continued to be employed for several decades.

Printer: Gilles Hardouyn

1516

Printed using woodcuts and illuminated on parchment, 113 fols.

La Salle University, Connelly Library, Special Collections, BX2080.A2 1516

Paris, France