BOOKS ON ARCHITECTURE

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Transcribed version of the text

French

     In his Bibliographie lyonnaise Baudrier indicates that five large folio plates entitled Les cinq ordres des colomnes de l’architecture, c’est à savoir, la Tuscane, Dorique, Yonique, Corinthie et Composite... nouvellement pourtraicturées et mises en lumière, au service et proufit des peintres, massons, tailleurs de pierres, orfèvres, etc., published in 1562 by Jean Lemaistre exist, and he refers us to a sale catalogue of the publisher Potier. The book is certainly mentioned in this catalogue (Nouveau catalogue de livres choisis en divers genres à vendre à la librairie de L. Potier, Paris, L. Potier, 1860, section Sciences et arts, notice 692), but with no provenance indicated. The catalogue of engravings at the Bibliothèque nationale de France mentions it in chapter "Lemaistre", for information, probably based on the word of Baudrier. The title also appears in the Berlin catalogue (Katalog der Ornamentstich-Sammlung der Staatlichen Kunstbibliothek Berlin, reprint HES 1986, 2 vols., n° 1938), but the copy has since disappeared. Up to now we have not been able to locate another copy of this edition, in which, it must be repeated, the name Blum is not mentioned.
     Nevertheless it is possible to get an idea of the book thanks to a re-issue published in Lyons by François Demasso around 1650 with the same title, and all of whose characteristics (the style of the plates, the spelling and typography) are indicative of the 16th century. This second French edition had nonetheless some influence on the trattatistica. In the appendix on the orders added by Mathurin Jousse to his Théâtre de l'art de charpentier published in La Flèche for the first time in 1627, the plates are obviously inspired by Blum, and the author quotes among his sources "les cinq ordres des colonnes qui se vendent en feuilles, imprimées à Lyon", all of which could indicate the 1562 edition alone.

Yves Pauwels (Centre d'études supérieures de la Renaissance, Tours) – 2009

Critical bibliography

H.-L. Baudrier, Bibliographie lyonnaise: recherches sur les imprimeurs, libraires, relieurs et fondeurs de lettres de Lyon au XVIe siècle, Paris, de Nobele, 1964, 1, p. 244.

Y. Pauwels, “Les éditions françaises du traité de Hans Blum aux Pays-Bas (XVIe et XVIIe siècles”, In Monte Artium (Journal of the Royal Library of Belgium), 1, 2008, p. 123-134.

Y. Pauwels, “Hans Blum et les Français, 1550-1650”, Scholion. Mitteilungsblatt der Stiftung Bibliothek Werner Oechslin, 6, 2010, p. 77-88.