- description
- # Field’s device.
## Overview - What this is (type, form, dates, scope)
This is a section extracted from a text file, labeled "Field’s device." It discusses a printer's device used by Field, specifically in the context of Shakespeare's poems. The section is part of the "VENUS AND ADONIS" chapter within a larger text file, which is part of the "PDF Workflow Main Test 2026-01-30T00:26:53" collection. The text was extracted on January 30, 2026.
## Context - Background and provenance from related entities
This section is extracted from the file [pdf-01KG6Q7Q25RHMFT3SJXPV18VFF.txt](arke:01KG6S2X2EBB305ENM00G16GWA), which is part of the [PDF Workflow Main Test 2026-01-30T00:26:53](arke:01KG6NWQ2H2K4PGG7H4ZHYCZ3Y) collection. The section is part of the "VENUS AND ADONIS" chapter ([01KG6S4BKQ65P7DTQM82TXFB34](arke:01KG6S4BKQ65P7DTQM82TXFB34)). It follows the section "Field’s career before 1593." ([01KG6S5NCEJPGBQ46HV7NX4BBC](arke:01KG6S5NCEJPGBQ46HV7NX4BBC)) and precedes "The ownership of the copyright of Shakespeare’s *Venus and Adonis* underwent a third change in the author’s lifetime in the summer of 1596, just two years to a day after Harrison acquired it." ([01KG6S5NXAT9AWHQD8W2DZNT2D](arke:01KG6S5NXAT9AWHQD8W2DZNT2D)).
## Contents - What it contains, key subjects and details
The section describes the printer's device used by Field, which he borrowed from his master Vautrollier. The device is an anchor suspended from a hand emerging from clouds, with leafy boughs and a motto. The text notes that Field used this device on the title pages of Shakespeare's poems and that there were variations in the device's design across different editions of *Venus and Adonis* and *Lucrece*. The text mentions specific editions of *Venus and Adonis* (1593, 1594, and 1596) and *Lucrece* (1594).
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- description_title
- Field’s device.
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- text
- Field’s device.
The title-pages of the four issues of Shakespeare’s poems which Field printed are all distinguished by a large printer’s device, which Field had borrowed of his master Vautrollier. It consists of a suspended anchor, of which the ring is grasped by a right hand issuing from clouds. Two leafy boughs cross each other about the anchor, and the whole is enclosed in a heavily scrolled and ornamented frame of oval shape, within the top of which hang capital letters forming the motto *Anchora Spei*. Vautrollier possessed at least four forms of this device, and Field seems to have employed as many. Those appearing on the title-pages of the *Venus and Adonis* of 1593 and 1594 are from one plate; that on the *Lucrece* of 1594 is from another of somewhat different design. Both are of good workmanship. The discrepancies, although slight, are well marked; the chief is that the intertwined boughs cross each other behind the shaft of the anchor in the first two
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VENUS AND ADONIS 45
editions of *Venus and Adonis*, and in front of the shaft in the first edition of *Lucrece*; the inner beading of the oval frames also differs.¹ The device assumes quite a new form in the third edition of the *Venus* of 1596: the pattern is simplified and far more roughly engraved.²
- title
- Field’s device.