The most complete work on German book-plates that has yet made its appearance is Herr Warnecke's _Die Deutschen Bücherzeichen_, Berlin, 1890; but a work properly classifying the different styles of German book-plates, and affixing to these styles covering dates, has yet to be written.
THE BOOK-PLATES OF FRANCE AND OTHER COUNTRIES
FRANCE, so far as a generally descriptive account of her book-plates is concerned, is certainly more fortunate than her neighbour Germany. French book-plates received attention, in the shape of a capital work upon them, before those of any other country were similarly honoured. M. Poulet Malassis's _Les Ex libris Français_ made its first appearance in 1874, and bears evident testimony to the fact that the author had for many years previously made an attentive study of his native book-plates.
Since the appearance of M. Poulet Malassis's work, book-plate collecting in France, as well as in other countries, has been vigorously carried on, and earlier examples of dated French book-plates than those then known have come to light. The most ancient of these is one dated 1574 (the same year, it will be noted, as that of the plate of Sir Nicholas Bacon), but it is simply typographical, having no kind of design whatever. It reads: 'Ex bibliotheca Caroli Albosii E. Eduensis. Ex labore quies.' No Armorial book-plate bearing an engraved date appears in France until thirty-seven years later, when we, at last, meet with that of Alexandre Bouchart, Vicomte de Blosséville, engraved by Léonard Gaultier, and, in the copy in the Bibliothèque Nationale, dated 1611. A variety of this book-plate, undated, unsigned, and probably not by the same hand, exists in the collection of Sir Wollaston Franks. The field in the Bouchart arms is gules, though the lines shown in the engraving of the undated plate would, according to the present system, represent it as azure (see remarks on this point at p. 22). After the Bouchart book-plate, we have, in 1613, that of Melchior de la Vallée, Canon of Nancy, given by M. Poulet Malassis as dated in 1611, and then, in 1644, a roughly-executed anonymous book-plate signed 'Raigniauld Riomi, 1644.' The arms are untinctured, and leaflike mantling falling from the helmet surrounds the shield; there is no crest. Raigniauld--or, as the modern spelling of the name is, Regnault--is not a known engraver. Riomi is an old-fashioned town of Auvergne.