CHAPTER II.--Date of the Origin of Typography in

Europe.--Alleged Early Engravings.--Playing Cards.--Block-books.--Mr. F. Holt’s Hypothesis.--Evidence of Costume.--German “Brief-malers.”--Decree of Government of Venice.--State of Europe in the Middle Ages.--Cultivation of Classical Literature at the close of the Fourteenth and commencement of the Fifteenth Century. 35