Descrizzione de l'ordine della processione fatta la vigilia di san Giovanni Batista, l'anno MDLXXVII, dalle compagnie de giouani Fiorentini, per l'allegrezza del natale del serenissimo gran prencipe di Toscana
A 1577 Florentine printed account by Francesco Dini da Colle of the procession of young men's companies on the vigil of Saint John the Baptist, celebrating the birth of the Grand Prince of Tuscany, printed in Florence by Bartolomeo Sermartelli. The four pictured initials are woodcut decorative capitals in the sixteenth-century Italian style, with floral scrolls, acanthus leaves, and animal heads set inside letterforms. A designer could take from them dense interlaced foliage, pierced ornamental letters, and the rhythm of black letter shapes against pale ground for display type or borders.
