Handpicked emblems from the beautiful 17th century book, Devises et Emblemes Anciennes & Modernes, which shows various emblems with mottos described in German, Latin, French and Italian. The European fascination with Emblems, which stretched from the 16th century to the 18th, began in 1531 with the publication in Augsburg of the first emblem book, the Emblemata of the Italian jurist Andrea Alciato. The emblems from Devises et Emblemes Anciennes & Modernes are of a simple design, compared to the often more elaborate depictions to be found in some books, and without the accompanying clue of the motto are often wonderfully enigmatic as regards to meaning.