Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 444

THE DEVICE, OR IMPRESS

If the various works of useful and ornamental art discovered in the sepulchres of nations long since fallen into oblivion, were of no other value, at the present day, than merely to be applied to the purposes which they were originally intended to subserve; if they did not elucidate the manners, customs, and progressional refinement of men with passions and feelings similar to our own; the labour and expense incurred by their exhumation would be thrown away. It is not, then, for the intrinsic value of the specimens to be produced, neither is it for any very particular admiration of the 'good old times,' but to exhibit and illustrate a very general and exceedingly active phase of our ancestors' minds, that, turning over the refuse materials of history, we proceed to disinter, from their worm-eaten pages, the dead and almost forgotten art of Device—an art that once claimed an extensive literature, and canons of criticism, peculiarly its own. From about 250 to 400 years ago, were the high and palmy days of this 'dainty art.' Then, the learned and subtile schoolmen of the age did not disdain to write upon it, with ink scarcely dry upon the pens with which they had been discussing the most abstruse dogmas of theology; then, not unfrequently, the cureless curate, by the concoction of a happy device for a generous patron, found himself a beneficed bishop. Nor is such preferment to be wondered at. The qualifications considered necessary to constitute a device-maker, were fully equal to those which Imlac described to Rasselas as requisite to form a poet. 'Philosophy and poetry,' wrote Père le Moyne, 'history and fable, all that is taught in colleges, all that is learned in the world, are condensed and epitomised in this great pursuit; in short, if there be an art which requires an all-accomplished workman, that art is device-making.' Ruscelli says: 'It belongs only to the most exquisite wits and best-refined judgments to undertake the making of devices.' Yet, though the learned doctors of Padua, Wirtemberg, and the Sorbonne, engaged in deep disquisitions on the emblematical properties, natural and mythical, of cranes and crescents, sunflowers and salamanders, pelicans and porcupines—the length and language of mottoes—how the wind should be pictorially portrayed, with many other equally weighty considerations, still the chivalrous knights of the tournay, and the fair ladies of their devoirs, attained proficiency in the art. Wolf of Wolfrath, the lute-player, records, that at a grand tournament held at Vienna in 1560, crowns of laurel were awarded to the knights who wore the wittiest devices, as well as to those who excelled in feats of arms.

'But,' the reader very probably exclaims, 'what was this art of device?'

It consisted in translating an idea into a symbol, and illustrating that symbol by a tersely-expressed motto. 'The object of a device,' according to the Lord of Fossez, 'was to express covertly, by means of a picture and words, a conception of human wit;' and it was distinguished from an emblem, inasmuch as the emblem demonstrated something universal, whereas the device was peculiarly appropriate to the person who wore it. The old writers glory in its antiquity, citing many instances of its having been known and used by both Greeks and Romans. Even during the dark ages it was not entirely lost; it merely slumbered until the renaissance, and the invasions of Italy under Charles VIII. and Louis XII., when it awoke to a vigorous existence. Thus, though of much greater antiquity than heraldic blazonry, which only dates from the time of the Crusades, it was not hereditary, could be adopted or changed at pleasure, and did not define the rank of the wearer. Shakspeare, who well understood the nature of the device, distinguishes between it and armorial bearings in the passage where Bolingbroke recounts his injuries:

The old heralds, however, looked upon the device with but little favour. Camden sneeringly says, that 'Armes were most usual among the nobility in wars till about some hundred years since, when the French and Italians, in the expedition of Naples, beganne to leave armes, haply for that many of them had none, and to bear the curtaines of their mistresses' beddes, their mistresses' colours, as impresses in their banners, shields, and caparisons.' Daniel, one of our earliest English writers on the subject, is worth quoting for a definition of the impress, and to shew the exclusive spirit of the age. He says: 'Impresa, used of the Italians for an enterprise taken in hand, with a firm and constant intent to bring the same to effect. As if a prince or captaine taking in hand some enterprise of war, or any other perticulaire affaire, desirous by some figure and motto to manifest to the world his intent, this figure and motto together is called an impress, made to signify an enterprise, whereat a noble mind levelling with the aime of a deep desire, strives with a steely intent to game the prize of his purpose. For the valiant and hautie gentlemen, disdayning to conjoine with the vile and base plebeians in any rustique invention, have procured to themselves this one most singulare.'

Paul Jovius, a celebrated Italian historian and bishop, in his treatise on devices, says, that the figure or emblem, which he terms the body of the device, must be exactly fitted to the motto, which he terms its soul; and though it should not be so obscure as to require a sibyl to explain it, yet the motto ought to be in a foreign or dead language, so that it may not be comprehended by the vulgar—'such dainties not being intended for vulgar appetites.' The human figure, also, should never be introduced into the emblem, and the motto ought not to contain more than three or four words. These rules, however, were not strictly adhered to, even by Jovius himself. The treatise is written in the form of a dialogue between the bishop and his secretary; its gossipping manner, quaint style, and the great importance attributed to the subject-matter, remind us exceedingly of the Complete Angler of our old English friend Izaak Walton. As an example of a perfect device, Jovius mentions one worn in the Italian wars by Antonio Colonna, the friend of Michael Angelo. It represented a branch of palm laid across a branch of cypress, with the motto, Erit altera merces (There will be another reward.) Another, highly praised by the old device-writers 'for being of subtle invention, and singular in outward view,' was assumed by a Spanish knight, Don Diego Mendoza, to signify the slight encouragement he received from the fair lady who was mistress of his affections. It represented a well, with a circular machine for raising water, full buckets ascending and empty ones going down, the motto, Los llenos de dolor, y los vazios de esperanza (The full one is grief; the empty, hope.) By the way, we find a similar figure in Richard II., where the unfortunate monarch says:

Jovius also warmly commends a device worn by Edward Stuart, Lord of Albany, a famous captain of tried valour in the French army, during their Italian campaigns. Of the blood-royal of Scotland, being cousin to James IV., he wore, as his arms, a lion rampant in a field argent; and as his device, a buckle, with the motto, Distantia jungit; 'thereby implying that he was the bond which held united the kings of France and Scotland, to countervail the forces of their natural enemy, the king of England.'

A quaint bit of romance, in connection with a lady's device, is perhaps worthy of notice. Hippolita Fioramonda excelled all the ladies of her day in beauty and courtesy, and wore, as her device, moths, embroidered in gold, on a sky-blue robe—a warning to the amorous not to approach too closely the light of her beauty, lest, like moths attracted by a lamp, they should be burned. There being no motto, one of her admirers, the Lord of Lesui, a brave knight, famous for his horsemanship, asked her for an explanation of such a singular and imperfect device. She replied: 'It is to use the like courtesy to gentlemen who call to see me, as you do to those who ride in your company; you being accustomed to put on the tail of your horse a small rattle, to make him more fierce in kicking, so as to warn any who may approach you of the danger of his heels, thereby causing them to keep aloof.' Notwithstanding this repulse, the knight persevered, though unsuccessfully, in his suit, until he fell mortally wounded at the battle of Pavia. Then the lady Fioramonda relenting, had him sought for on the sanguinary field, and carried to her own house, where, to his great contentment, he died in her arms. Such imperfect devices, however, were considered unworthy of the name, unfit for men of gravity, and suited but to make sport with ladies. Of this description was that of Augustine Porco, a gentleman of Verona, who, being in love with a lady named Bianca, wore in his scarlet cap a small, real, white wax-candle, and perseveringly followed the lady to every place of public resort she visited. To the inquiries of his friends respecting this extraordinary device, he merely replied, that it signified Candela bianca (A white candle), and, consequently, doubts were entertained of the eccentric gallant's sanity. At last, though love is proverbially blind, the lady—probably she had a prompter—discovered that the true meaning was Can de la Bianca (The dog of Bianca), and with her hand rewarded the ingenuity and perseverance of Signor Porco.

Through devices we obtain glimpses at the morals, as well as the manners, of a foreign people and a bygone age. The amorous devices of many ecclesiastical dignitaries afford a capital reason for the rule, that the motto should not be comprehensible 'by the vulgar.' That of Cardinal Medici, who loved the lady Julian Gonzago, was a comet surrounded by stars, the motto, Micat inter omnes (It shines among them all), from the lines of Horace:

The allusion to the star of Julius in connection with the lady's name renders this device, in our opinion, rather neat and classical.

A still more startling sign of the times is exhibited by the device-loving bishop. He relates that one Mattei, a man of noble courage, when waiting with dissimulation and patience an opportunity to murder a person by whom he had been insulted, applied to him (Jovius) for an appropriate device; and the bishop, 'wishing to shew that a noble mind has power to digest, with time, every grievous injury,' designed an ostrich devouring a nail, with the motto, Spiritus durissima conquit. Mattei wore the device, and ultimately succeeded in assassinating his victim; and 'so much was this noble revenge commended,' that the pope promoted the ruffian to be captain of his guard—the family of the murdered man signing an agreement to cancel all future quarrels.

Great care was requisite, when framing a device, lest any part of it could be turned into ridicule by a witty or spiteful enemy. Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, bore a flint and steel, with the motto, Ante ferit quam flamma micet (As he strikes, the fire flashes); and when defeated, and slain at the battle of Nancy, the day being cold, with snow on the ground, his triumphant enemy, the Duke of Loreno, said: 'This poor man, though he has great need to warm himself, has not leisure to use his tinder-box.'

However puerile the 'art' may appear to us now, there can be little doubt, that the construction of devices, as an incentive to the acquisition of general knowledge, and as a kind of mental training, was not altogether useless in its day, and formed a link, were it ever so slender, in the development of the human mind. Estienne, a noted French device-author, observes, that 'to express the conceptions of our own mind in the most perfect device, there is nothing so proper, so gentile, so powerful, or so witty, as the similitudes we discover when walking in the spacious fields of Nature's wonderful secrets; for the grace of a device, as well as the skill of him who makes it, consists in discovering the correspondence of natural qualities and artificial uses with our own thoughts and intentions.'

The old scholastic logic was freely employed in the arguments by which the device-authors advanced their own opinions, or attacked those of their contemporaries. Ammirato condemns the unphilosophical definition of Jovius—that the emblem is the body, and the motto, the soul of a device. With long, and, we must acknowledge, to us at least, not very intelligible argument, he maintains, that 'the motto is the major part of a syllogism, and the emblem the minor; from the conjunction of which the conclusion is drawn.' Unprofitable and uninteresting are these discussions. We shall, in preference, mention the canons of device-criticism, which were of most general prevalence.

Comparison was considered an essential property of a perfect device. Thus the Pillars of Hercules, with the motto, Plus ultra (More beyond), adopted by Charles V., in allusion to the Spanish discoveries and conquests in America, and still to be seen on the coin of that nation, was, by the connoisseurs, termed a mere conceit. The scholar's two pens, with His ad aethera (By these fame), being also devoid of comparison, was equally inferior. Not more than three figures were permissible in the emblem, unless the greater number were of the same species. A device portraying an elephant, with a flock of sheep grazing quietly around, the motto, Infestus infestis (Hostile only to the wicked), was strictly correct, as the sheep, being all of one species, were recognised merely as one figure. Metaphor was not allowed in the motto: a device faulty in this respect, represented a ball of crystal, the motto, from Plautus, Intus et in cute (The same within and without); crystal being devoid of skin (cutis), the expression was metaphorical. The introduction of negatives into the motto was considered good: as a sundial, with Ne aspiciatur non aspicitur (Unless looked upon—by the sun—it is not esteemed, or is of no use), a good device for a king's favourite; a flame of fire, with Nunquam deorsum (Never downwards); a gourd floating on a stream, with Jactor non mergor (Abandoned, but not sunk.) When the motto was taken from a well-known classic, fewer words were required: thus in a device representing a flame blown upon by the wind, with Lenis alit flammas, grandior aura necat (A gentle wind nourishes flame, a stronger, extinguishes), the words, grandior necat (a stronger, extinguishes) would have been sufficient. Nice discrimination was required in selecting the most suitable language for a motto. According to Contile, the Spanish was most suitable for love-matters; the Italian, for pleasant conceits; the Greek, for fiction; and the Latin, for majesty. Household furniture, and implements of husbandry, were considered improper subjects for the emblem of a device; consequently, that of the Academia della Crusca was set down as decidedly vulgar, it being a sieve, with Il piu bel fior ne coglie (It collects the finest flour of it)—a play on the word crusca (bran), assumed as the title of the Academy, from its having been instituted for the express purpose of purifying (sifting) the Italian language.