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main printed feature: imprimatur

Donne, Juvenilia, 1633 (F1v, raking light)

Imaged under a raking light, this blank page reveals a great deal more texture than images usually do, including wrinkled (or cockled) paper, vertical wire lines, the bite of type as it pushes out the paper from the other side, and the bite into the paper from some uninked (or blind) type in the middle of the page ("These eleven Paradoxes"). Some copies of this edition have this imprimatur inked and legible; others, like this one, seem not to have included it, although the type was clearly left in the forme even if it didn't print. (Compare this image to the one under usual flat lighting to see how different lighting shapes what we see.)

Kats, Ma’aseh Toviyah, 1708 (40.2v)

This imprimatur, the only page in Italian in this Hebrew encyclopedia, verifies that the book may legally be printed because the Inquisitors have found it to contain no anti-Catholic, anti-government, or immoral content.

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Browse by going through all the images or all the tags, or by following the main tags below. To learn more about what the various features mean, click on the tag and read the description at the top of the page.

main printed features

  • advertisement
  • blank
  • book making
  • colophon
  • correction
  • error
  • form
  • frontispiece
  • imprimatur
  • index
  • initial letter
  • intaglio
  • movable parts
  • music
  • press figure
  • printed marginalia
  • printer's device
  • printer's ornament
  • privilege
  • register
  • signature mark
  • subscribers list
  • title page
  • two-color printing
  • woodcut

date published

  • 1450-1499
  • 1500-1549
  • 1550-1599
  • 1600-1649
  • 1650-1699
  • 1700-1749
  • 1750-1800

place printed

  • Belgium
  • Czech Republic
  • England
  • France
  • Germany
  • Italy
  • Mexico
  • Netherlands
  • Peru
  • Poland
  • Russia
  • Scotland
  • Spain
  • Switzerland
  • Ukraine
  • United States
Sarah Werner. "main printed feature: imprimatur." Early Printed Books. https://www.earlyprintedbooks.com/feature/imprimatur/. Version 20210726.
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