VII.
THE DECLINE AND EXTINCTION OF THE ART.
Fig. 55.—From "Opera Vergiliana," printed by Sacon. Lyons, 1517.HE wood-engravers of France produced no great works like those of Maximilian, and no single cuts of the artistic value of those by Dürer and his contemporaries. They limited themselves almost exclusively to the illustration of books. The early printers, who had expended so much care in the adornment of their religious books, were succeeded by other printers who were hardly less animated by enthusiastic devotion to their art, as was shown by their efforts to make their works beautiful both in text and illustration. The Renaissance had now penetrated into France, and entered into the arts. Geoffrey Tory (c. 1480–1533), who had travelled in Italy, appears to have been the first to introduce a classical spirit into wood-engraving; from his time two distinct schools may be distinguished in French wood-engraving—one Germanic and archaic, the other filled by the Italian spirit. The most distinguished engravers belonged to the latter school, and their
