“Ligato alla greca”. Greek-style bookbindings in early modern Venice and beyond

Abstract

Binding books “in the Greek manner” (“alla greca”, but also “al greco”, “alla grechessa”), imitating and replicating Byzantine techniques, was one of the practices associated with “Greekness” in Italy and other parts of western Europe in the early modern era. This book analyses the trends, patterns, and contexts associated with making Greek-style bindings in early modern Venice and elsewhere in western Europe between the 1450s and the end of the sixteenth century. It considers how techniques evolved over time as well as production and consumption practices: what kinds of manuscripts and printed books received Greek-style bindings, who made them, who collected them, and what meanings the bindings themselves conveyed. Coming into fashion at a time of major changes (coinciding with the fall of Constantinople, the Greek diaspora, and the coming of printing), in western Europe Greek-style bindings at times signified antiquarianism, exoticism, luxury, or a proximity to Greek culture. Through the analysis of several hundred specimens in the style and of documentary and visual sources, this book explores how a specific instance of material culture served a number of purposes and self-fashioning strategies for bibliophiles, collectors, and intermediaries alike within the context of Renaissance cultures; it also features a census of all known bindings in the style made in western Europe.