Bookplate
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
an English name for labels of ownership frequently placed on the inside covers of books. The use of bookplates is of some antiquity, and mention has been made of one dated in the middle of the 15th century, but at present the fine bookplates of Bilibaldus Pirckheimer (1470-1530), designed by Albert Dürer, hold the foremost place in point of time. Engraved English bookplates are not found of so early a date, but an old folio volume from Henry VIII.'s library, now in the British Museum, contains an elaborately emblazoned drawing which formed the bookplate of Cardinal Wolsey, with his arms, supporters, and cardinal's hat. The earliest English engraved bookplate at present known is that of Sir Nicholas Bacon, father of Lord Chancellor Bacon, which is dated 1574. Samuel Pepys had several bookplates; those with his own portrait could not have been engraved before 1685, because he is described therein as Secretary to the Admiralty under Charles II. and James II., but the one with his initials and the crossed anchors was probably engraved as early as 1668. les of design adopted by book The styles collectors for their bookplates have been very diverse. Some of these labels have contained merely the name of the possessor, but the majority are armorial, some are allegorical in design, and others are ornamented with miniature land scapes. Many distinguished artists have condescended to produce bookplates. The name of Albert Dürer has already been mentioned as the designer of Pirckheimer's two plates-one in which the allegorical and the armorial elements are united, and the other consisting of a large and bold portrait of the once celebrated senator of Nuremberg. Of English engravers, William Marshall and Robert White may be especially mentioned. Hogarth engraved a bookplate for John Holland, heraldic artist, and another for George Lambert, the scene painter. The earliest bookplates were of large size, as if made especially for folios, but a smaller size soon became general, a size which was used for both large and small books. The fashion of collecting bookplates is a very modern one.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
The factual spine of Collier's 1921 account has held up: Sir Nicholas Bacon's plate of 1574 is still cited as the earliest dated English engraved bookplate, and the German plates of Willibald Pirckheimer are still the celebrated early examples, though modern scholars are more cautious than Collier's about handing every one of them to Dürer himself and generally date the first bookplates proper to German woodcut labels of the 1470s. What has changed is the practice. Collier's called bookplate collecting "a very modern one" and wrote at the tail end of its boom -- the London-based Ex Libris Society had been founded in 1891 and folded in 1908 -- and while societies of collectors survive, the armorial plate pasted inside a gentleman's folio is now an antiquarian curiosity rather than a living fashion. Cheap mass-market books, library barcodes and, since the 2000s, e-books have removed most of the occasions for a label of ownership, leaving bookplates to fine-press enthusiasts, artists and the great institutional collections such as the British Museum's Franks bequest.
Written for this edition, 2026.