Nový pohled na dějiny renesančního knihtisku v Čechách a na Moravě

A new perspective of the history of Renaissance typography in Bohemia and Moravia. -- Present Czech researchers have either not explored the beginnings of Renaissance printed books at all, or they have tried to colour a quite idyllic image of the period before the White Mountain Battle as a whole. Despite these apparent apologies, the Czech typography of the Jagello-period was of an irregular character. The main reasons for this we can attribute back to a weak potential of the craft as well as of the writer and translator communities. There had been no specialized publishing region and the editions were influenced by imports. The influence of Nuremberg during this period is especially noteworthy. The period when the domestic post-incunabula lost late Gothic outlines was longer than in other great typographic powers such as Germany, France or Italy. Most Bohemian typographers and cutters revived the older illuminative repertoire ad hoc during the entire first decade of the 16th century. Mikuláš Konáč (1514) and Pavel Olivetský (1520) were the first who broke free of that late Gothic style. The next generation could already be called the early Renaissance, even though the intensity of their affection was influenced by the economical aspects of particular crafts. We see less consideration in the work of the poorer Mikuláš Klaudyán (from 1518) and Oldřich Velenský (1519) while more precision can be seen through the reach of Pavel Severin (from 1520) and Jiří Štyrsa (1521). The period of early Renaissance typography lasted in Bohemia two decades longer than in Germany, Austria or Poland. The end of this period could be seen in the 40’s when Bartloměj Netolický in Prague and Jan Günther in Prostějov accepted, for the first time, the German blackletter and when the Prague typographer Jan Had started to use an antiqua of Venetian type instead of Schwabacher for a typography of a whole-Latin text. It meant the end of the third phase of typographic transformation, when Bohemian typographies were finally equipped with typeface comparable to other countries. At the same time (1541) we can trace the first proof of cooperation of an artist with a typographer, in such a way as we know it, from the Nuremberg collaboration of Wolgemut – Koberger. This occurred in the cutter’s studio of Severin’s typography in Prague. Despite its late beginning, this studio is very important as it is no longer under the influence of German typography and book preparation wasn’t done accidentally as was the habit up to that time, but according to Renaissance typography – a conjunction of typeface, decoration and illumination. Translated by Markéta Tomanová