Johann Gutenberg, already involved in printing experiments during the 1430s, is usually credited with producing the first printed book, using moveable type, at Mainz in 1454 or 1455. This was the 'Gutenberg' or 'Forty-two Line' Bible, consisting of 643 pages arranged in double columns of forty-two lines. Of some 200 copies, forty-eight have survived: the survival of printed texts is more likely than that of manuscripts.
Increased literacy and the slow production rate of manuscript copiers ensured that printing spread rapidly throughout Germany and (from 1464) Italy, and to Paris and Seville by 1470. Printing was introduced to the Low Countries from 1474, England from 1476 and most other European countries by 1500, though not until 1507 in Scotland.
Being commercial enterprises, presses initially concentrated on printing 'best sellers', especially Bibles, popular religious works (such as the mystical treatise, the Imitation of Christ, by Thomas a Kempis) and school books (such as Donatus' Grammar). The availability of paper, increasing use of spectacles and printing of books (albeit in limited quantity) further stimulated a growth in that literacy which had partly provoked the initial spread of printing. Indeed, the towns in which printing flourished (usually commercial rather than ecclesiastical centres) were often relatively well provided with schools.
Co-operation between humanists and printers stimulated the Bible-oriented concentration of reformers like Erasmus and Luther, an emphasis which was subsequently adopted by Catholic reformers too, the Complutensian Polyglot Bible published at Alcala under the patronage of Cardinal Cisneros being a celebrated example.
A professional copier of manuscripts working under pressure could produce some four hundred folios in six months. In comparison some 6 million books (representing thousands of different titles) had been printed by the start of the sixteenth century. Scholars could obtain a vast array of texts from one bookshop instead of tramping round many different manuscript shops or monastic libraries. Princes, too, succumbed to the attraction that influenced others: the Emperor Maximilian, for example, had himself portrayed in a printer's workshop.
A. MacKay and I. Beavan
Journeys of Major Italian Artists Between c. 1250 and c. 1400
The establishment of the actual presence of artists in specific centres of artistic activity at various times is important for our understanding of the way aspects of art, such as style, technique, iconography and prestige, might be assessed in their historical context. Very often tantalizing similarities exist between the work of two artists in style or iconography, for example, and the temptation has always been to assume that there must have been some direct contact between them. However, with the development of more systematic art-historical scholarship this tendency has been modified so that such spontaneous assumptions have been called into question, unless firm documentation makes the connection quite clear. Emphasis has been placed on known chronological facts so that it might be seen at what period during an artist's development he may have affected or been affected by the work of another. Consequently, whatever knowledge we have of journeys or visits made by artists to centres where others were working is of distinct value.
In terms of the effect of one artist's work on another, it is not always necessary to show their presence in particular places as panel paintings and also small sculptures may well have been transported from one place to another. However, with fresco painting and large-scale sculpture the presence of the artist in a particular place must be assumed and it is of great help to know the dates of such visits.
In the list as set out the purpose is to record these visits when they are securely known, and also, where a question mark is added, to record fairly well-substantiated visits.
As might be expected, there is a great deal of movement between centres in the various regions of Italy. This is important to establish, as Italy was at that time an accumulation of different states with quite widely divergent cultural backgrounds, so that the interchange of artistic ideas between them is in itself significant. However, the most striking journeys were made to other parts of Europe, for example that of the Florentine artist Stamina to Spain or that of the Sienese Simone Martini to Avignon. The natural barrier of the Alps may have restricted travel, but we have one reference to a Sienese architect, Ramo di Paganello, who returned from somewhere beyond the Alps to Siena in 1281, and the Sienese painter, Duccio, may well have been in Paris in 1296 and 1297. Indeed, we know that the Roman mosaicist Filippo Rusuti was working as a painter for the French king in Poitiers in 1308.
As the list shows, individual artists, perhaps for reasons of reputation, or possibly through lack of work, travelled more or less widely. Giotto, for example, travelled the length and breadth of Italy and may also have been as far afield as Provence. Others, however, seem to have stayed put, like his pupil, Taddeo Gaddi, who may never have moved out of Tuscany. It is also possible to speculate on the itinerary of journeys like, for example, one by Tomaso da Modena who painted frescoes in Treviso which would have demanded his presence there, and who, around 1360, was commissioned to make some panels for Charles IV's palace at Karlstein outside Prague. Although he could have sent these pictures, Treviso is on the way, as it were, from Modena to Prague, and so it is not impossible that he made what would have been at the time a quite adventurous journey.
Useful though the known evidence is, it must always be borne in mind that, like any historical evidence, it may not give the whole picture. No doubt there was much more interaction and contact than has come down to us and we must assume that artists made more journeys and travelled more often than the surviving records enable us to know for certain.
R. Tarr
ARTISTS (BIRTH) AND DATES OF THEIR SOJOURNS IN THE VARIOUS CENTRES
Sculptors and Architects
Nicola Pisano (c. 1210, Apulia?) Capua 1240s; Lucca 1258; Pisa 1260; Siena 1265-8; Pistoia 1273; Perugia 1277-84?
Giovanni Pisano (c. 1250, Pisa) Siena 1265-8; Perugia 1277-84?; Siena 1284-96; Massa Marittima? 1287; Pisa 1298; Pistoia 1300-1; Pisa 1302-10; Padua? c. 1305-6; Prato c. 1312; Genoa? 1313; Siena 1314.
Arnolfo Di Cambio (c. 1245, Florence) Siena 12658; Rome 1276?-7; Viterbo? 1276; Perugia 1281; Orvieto? 1282?; Rome 1285, 1293, 1300; Florence 1296, 1300-2.
Tino Da Camaino (c. 1280-5) Pisa c. 1306-15; Siena 1319-20; Florence 1321-3; Naples 1323/4-37.
Lorenzo Maltani (c. 1275, Siena) Orvieto 1310-30; Perugia 1317, 1319-21; Siena 1322.
Andrea Pisano (c. 1290, Pontedera, near Pisa) Florence 1330-40; Pisa? 1343-7?; Orvieto 1347-8.
Nino Pisano (c. 1315?) Pisa? 1342?; Orvieto 1349-53; Pisa 1357-8.
Andrea Orcagna (c. 1308, Florence) Florence 1343/4-57; Orvieto 1358-60; Florence 1364-8.
Giovanni Di Balduccio (c. 1300, Pisa?) Pisa 131718; Bologna 1320-5?; Sarzana? 1327-8; Milan c. 1334-60.
Bonino Da Campione (c. 1330, Campione, L. Lugano) Cremona 1357; Milan 1363; Verona 1374.
World History
