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In his description Esmerian mentions a 1540 binding, that Etienne Roffet made for the King, Francois Ier, at that time he was the official binder of the King.... "Etienne Roffet had by 1537 already made a number of important bindings decorated with small tools, for the King of France . He also made the Royal armorial plaques in two sizes. In 1539 he became the Kings official binder "Relieur du Roy". In 1540 he produced for the King the first binding made of maroquin leathers, a folio sized Bible printed in 1538 by Robert Estienne, among the tools used to decorate that binding we find the same grande arabasque plaque that we see here on this copy of Ordonnances". Fortunately we can see this 1540 binding by Roffet reproduced in Relieures Royales, pg 48, illustration 8a. In Comparative Diagram 1, I show the grande arabesque from both bindings, we can see that they are not exactly the same. however remakably similar. This mysterious second plaque copy is discussed at length by the authors of Relieures Royales, without mentioning Esmerian, but obviously talking about the this same binding of Ordonnances, Item 66. This troubling issue, of who could have made such an exact plaque copy and used it on a binding containing Royal Ordinances printed by Roffet, inspired a lot of new theories but no clear answers... and yet no mention is made of the other tool imprints found on this binding, these appear to be perhaps those of the Salel binder!
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