Word & Image:
The Trevelyon Miscellany of 1608

Proverbs

Proverbs, or short sayings expressing truths familiar to all, are scattered throughout the Trevelyon Miscellany. Some of the proverbs are secular, based on common observations and beliefs relating to aging and household responsibilities. Others are scriptural, gathered from various books of the Bible to depict specific temptations. Trevelyon often grouped proverbs together under individual illustrated topics, such as "usury" or "malice."

Thomas Trevelyon
Miscellany, fol. 20r
(Proverbs from Tusser's Five hundreth points of good husbandry)
©

Trevelyon took his text from one source and his decorations from another for these two pages. The adages come from Thomas Tusser's oft-printed manual, Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry, while the ornamental compartments are copied from other books. The compartment on the right was used on title pages by the printer John Day in the mid to late sixteenth century, including his edition of the Bible (1551). The printer John Wayland used the same block in the book shown below, Bieston's The Bayte and Snare of Fortune (ca. 1557).

Thomas Tusser (1524?-1580)
Five hundreth points of good husbandry
London, 1610
©

Trevelyon copied this architectural title-page border as a compartment for the proverb "The Ape, the Lyon, the Fox, the Asse." The border was first used by the printer John Day and later was adapted by others, including John Wayland, printer of The bayte & snare of fortune seen here. Day's printer's mark at the base of the border was a visual pun on his name: a sleeper being awakened before a rising sun, illustrating his motto, "Arise, for it is Day." Trevelyon copied only the sleeper being awakened.