Jean Grolier
The text of this short biography is
adapted from a pamphlet printed by or for the Grolier Club
soon after its founding. The circumstances of its
publication are obscure. It was issued without title or
imprint, and the text is signed at end simply with the
initials "C. A." On the fly-leaf of the Grolier Club copy is
the inscription: "Written for the Grolier Club by Charlotte
Adams, 1884"--Editor. In the history of bookmaking, no more
interesting and brilliant figure is to be found
than that of Jean Grolier de Servières,
vicomte d'Aguisy. Treasurer-General of France,
ambassador to the Court of Rome, and bibliophile,
his life forms a complete, epitomized expression of
the higher literary feeling of his time. Grolier
was born at Lyons in 1489 or 1490. (1) His family
was of Italian descent, originally from Verona; his
father, Étienne Grolier, a gentleman of the
Court of Louis XII of France, and Treasurer to the
King in the Duchy of Milan. At an early age,
Grolier was introduced at the French Court by his
father, where he soon attracted notice, both by his
learning and by his talents as a financier. Under
François I he held the position of intendant
of the army in the Milanese country. He returned to
France after the battle of Pavia, and was appointed
ambassador to Pope Clement VII in 1534. In this
capacity he conducted certain diplomatic
negotiations with so much delicacy and skill that
he won the personal friendship of the Pontiff, who
gave him substantial proof of his favor.
Jean Grolier in the Printing
House of Aldus Manutius (1890), after the
painting by F. Flameng in the Club's
possession
During his stay at Rome, Grolier began collecting
a library. Upon his return to France he was first appointed
Treasurer of the King for the districts of Outre-Seine, and
L'Ile-de-France, and afterward Treasurer-General of Finance,
an office which he held until his death, displaying ability
and integrity in his administration of the public money,
and, notwithstanding the malicious accusations which were
brought against him, completely triumphing over his enemies.
He died at Paris on the 22nd of October, 1565, at the age of
about seventy-five years, and was buried in the Church of
St. Germain des Prés, near the great altar.
The interest attached to the name of Jean Grolier in the
mind of posterity has far less to do with his distinction
and personal merits as a financier than with his passion for
books. He loved books as a man of letters, as an artist, and
as a dilettante. Both at Paris and in Italy, he had many
warm friends among the learned men and the men of letters of
his time, to whom he accorded a generous and delicate
protection. He was linked also by ties of common interest
and sympathy of pursuits with the most famous printers of
the epoch. Garuffi, Étienne Niger and Budé
dedicated books to him. It was Grolier who caused
Budé's treatise De Asse to be printed by the
Aldines in 1552. An example on vellum of this volume, that
which was presented to Grolier and brought 1500 francs in
1816 at the MacCarthy sale, afterwards found its way to
England. Dedications to Grolier are also seen at the
beginning of a Suetonius printed at Lyons in 1518, of a book
by Étienne Niger on Greek literature (Milan, 1517),
and of different other works. In many writings of the time,
Grolier is spoken of in terms of the highest commendation.
Erasmus bestowed great praise upon him. Coelius Rhodigimus,
Aldus Manutius, Baptiste Egnazio, and various other persons
dedicated works to him. It is Egnazio who related that
Grolier, having invited several learned men to dinner, at
the close of the repast set before the guests gloves, in
each of which was wrapped a considerable sum in gold.
The historian De Thou compares the famous library of Grolier
with that of Asinius Pollio, the most ancient library of
Rome. Only such books were included in it as were remarkable
for their intrinsic literary value and their beauty of form.
The Greek and Latin classics, the works of contemporary
philosophers and learned men, historians, geographers,
archaeologists, composed a great part of it. By the side of
these figured the modern Latin poets, which were read at
that time, and the literature of Italy. For this library
Grolier selected the best copies procurable of the different
works, and frequently caused several copies of a book to be
printed especially for him on fine paper. He had the
frontispieces and the initials painted in gold, and in
colors. The covers bore ornaments in the most exquisite
taste, and were gilded with remarkable delicacy. The
compartments were painted with various colors, were
perfectly well-drawn, and all were designed in different
figures. Grolier even went so far as to have new margins
carefully added to the leaves which had been left too short
in the folding, in order to possess copies with very wide
margins. But it is particularly in the bindings which he
caused to be made, that Grolier gave the most positive
proofs of his admirable good taste. The art with which they
were executed was no less remarkable than the beauty of the
ornaments which he himself designed.
|
Most of the books of Grolier's library bore on
one side his personal motto, Portio mea, Domine,
sit in terra viventium [Lord, let my
portion be in the land of the living--paraphrase
Psalm 141, v. 6], and on the other the words,
Io. Grolierii et amicorum [of or
belonging to Jean Grolier and his friends].
This latter inscription has given rise to the
theory that Grolier was a bibliophile of an
uncommonly generous disposition, and regarded his
books as the property of his friends as well as of
himself. Another theory, upheld by authenticated
facts, is that Grolier, possessing several copies
of the same book, all richly bound, was in the
habit of reserving the finest copy for himself and
distributing the others among his friends. |
|
|
|
The famous library remained intact for a
century, and was not scattered until 1675. The
cabinet of medals belonging to the
Treasurer-General was at the same time about to be
transported to Italy, but Louis XIV caused it to be
purchased at a high price, being unwilling that the
French nation should lose so valuable a collection.
To-day the richest public libraries account it an
honor to possess books bound by Grolier;
bibliophiles seek for them with an eagerness which
is constantly on the increase, as is abundantly
proved by the high prices certain of these volumes
have brought in recent years at the public sales in
Paris. In 1854 the Adages of Erasmus (Aldus,
1520, in folio) were sold for 1,729 francs; the
Virgil of 1527 (Aldus in 8vo.), at 1,600 francs;
the treatise of Marsile Ficin De Sole (1490
in fol.) brought 1,500 francs; the Letters
of Pliny (Aldus, 1508, in 8vo.), 1,106 francs. In
March, 1856, at the Hebbelinck sale, the Catullus
of Aldus, 1515, brought the then enormous price of
2,500 francs. The Cicero of the Giunti, 1536 to
1537, five volumes in folio, violet antique
morocco, sold for 1,485 francs at Decotte's in
1804, but was sold again for only 902 francs at
Didot's, in 1810. A volume purchased for 1,600
francs in 1853 was sold for 1,905 francs in 1860,
and 2,850 in 1863. A simple octavo volume has been
sold at the price of 3,750 francs. Many other
single volumes have brought from 400 to 800
francs. |
Jean Grolier de Servières may be regarded as one of the typical figures of the French and Italian renaissance. He belonged to both countries by ancestry, by residence, by achievement, by love and protection of art and letters. Fate made him a Frenchman, but he drew his inspiration from Italy and the Italy of the cinque cento. He had more in common with the great nobles of Florence, Venice and the Verona of his ancestors, than with the courtiers of the French capital. His influence on the French revival of art and literature was incalculable. His travels and residence in Italy and the knowledge of men, of books, of art and of places acquired in that country made his judgment in such matters valuable to the king, Henri II., whose name is identified with the renaissance in France. Grolier formed an important link between France and Italy in art and letters, as well as in diplomacy, finance and arms. The character of the Treasurer-General of France offers a singular mingling of the positive and the ideal. A little more of the positive element in his composition, and his love of art and letters would have been entirely lost in political ambitions and the cares of state. A slight preponderance of the ideal element would have made of him a man of letters and a poet, perhaps a painter or a sculptor, for the age of art frenzy in which Grolier lived set nobles and peasants side by side in the passion of artistic creation. Being what he was, an evenly balanced, symmetrical individuality, Grolier has left his mark on history as a brilliant, successful man of the world, of broad and generous sympathies, whose business in life was finance and diplomacy, whose recreation was art and letters. He was equally at home in palace, camp, council chamber, treasury, studio and printing room. His list of friends and acquaintances began with kings and popes and ended with artisans and toilers among the people.
The external conditions of his life were such as only the sixteenth century could show, but its inner mainsprings of action were of no country and no age. Stripping off the brilliant outer garment of his many-sided life, the nineteenth century might claim lawfully Jean Grolier as the representative of its own mingling of complex forces and interests. The type presented by the figure of Grolier, of successful, practical manhood, using the fruits of its serious labors to adorn its leisure hours with the charms of art and literature, is one essentially contemporary and modern. Grolier's cosmopolitanism, too, was that of the nineteenth century.
The fruition of this noble existence, compounded of so many varied and significant elements, is to be found in the results attained by Grolier in his efforts to give a worthy, tangible form to human thought and its literary expression. He loved books, not only for what they contained, but what they were. In clothing the masterpieces of literature in sumptuous garments, the impulses of art and literature within him, which were not strong enough for original creation, found an eloquent utterance.
Grolier was a princely protector of men of letters, but still more was he a protector of the men who gave to literature its enduring form. He was a patron of art, but it was art as contributing to the glorification of the printed word, which found the greatest favor in his eyes. No mere dilettantism taking its ease among its treasures, could have gathered the magnificent examples of the book-binder's art, that have been handed down to posterity with the stamp of Grolier upon them.
He gave to the book, in its most sumptuous form, a lofty and lasting position in the world of letters. To posterity, Grolier represents the spirit of the renaissance, in all its proud, splendid materialism. His personality stands out in bold relief among the many significant figures of sixteenth century France and Italy, presenting a long, busy and useful life; the life of a cultivated gentleman, the influence of which is still felt after the lapse of three centuries and has reached the new world.
C. A.
(1) The traditional date of 1476 is now known to be incorrect; for resolution of the long-standing scholarly debate on Jean Grolier's date of birth, cf. Anthony Hobson, Renaissance Book Collecting: Jean Grolier and Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, Their Books and Bindings (Cambridge University Press, 1999), p. 6.
(2) The Astor Library is now part of the New York Public Library. The Grolier Club, which takes Jean Grolier as its patron, has a number of Grolier bindings in its collection, as well as other objects connected with the great bibliophile.