Pastoral Typography: Sigmund von Birken and the "Picture-Rhymes" of Johann Helwig

Abstract

This paper argues that European figured poetry of the Renaissance and Baroque periods is a distinctive art form, which combined aspects of Greek and Latin art into a new synthesis. The result was a specifically typographical style of literature, exemplified here in the theoretical comments and the cyclical collections of "picture-rhymes" by Birken and Helwig.