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Show 6 OLD~PAPERMAKIN with the symbolic significance of the old printers and papermalers' marks It is not entirely out of the way to suggest tha theold watermarkswere nothing more thanamer fancy with the papermalkers who made the design or emblems to satisfy their own artistic natures In the entire craft of papermaking there is nothin more interesting or fascinating than to mould sheetof paper, and as it is couched watch the mar become clear and distinct as the water evaporates o matter what the origin or use of the papermarks, the many thousands of devices which w have inherited from the early papermalkers are s varied that they almost form an encyclopaedia o designand furnisha multitude of mediaeval object and utensils that might not have been otherwis recorded The most common supposition regarding th use of the early watermarks is that the old workmen could not read and it was necessary to appea to them by means of pictures or symbols. Th watermarks, therefore, might have been used t designate one size of paper from another and giv ita name. To simply have marked a mould wit letters or figures would bave meant little to th artisans of the fifteenth century; it was necessar to convey the meaning to them by the aid of illustrations. Such papermarks as foolscap, hand, post pot,and crown were ultimately used to distinguis Digital image© 2004 Mariot Libary, Universty o Uta. All right reservd |