Note 388 — Chapter IX · THE LATER FOUNDERS OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.

From this assertion we except, of course, the letter of the first printers, which, if not imitating the actual handwriting of one particular scribe, was a copy of the conventional book-writing hand of the period. Some of the earliest scripts, italics and cursives are also reputed to have been modelled on the handwriting of some famous caligrapher or artist. One of the first instances of printing with facsimile types was the copy of the famous Medicean Virgil, produced at Florence in 1741. The types are for the most part ordinary Roman capital letters with a certain number of “discrepants” or peculiar characters. The title of this fine work is:—P. VergiliI Maronis Codex Antiquissimus . . qui nunc Florentiæ in Bibliotheca Mediceo-Laurentiana adservatur. Bono publico Typis descriptus Anno MDCCXLI. Florentiæ. Typis Mannianis. 8vo.