Claude Paradin

Claude Paradin (c. 1510 – 1573), was a French writer, collector of emblems or "devises", historian, and genealogist.

[1] Paradin was born in Cuiseaux (Saône-et-Loire), spending his adult life as canon of the Collegiate Church in Beaujeu, between Mâcon and Lyons.

These emblemata[3] became commonly used as markers or models of royal, aristocratic or moral ownership as well as decorative pattern books applied in a variety of crafts including, heraldry, masonry, sculpture, painting, woodcuts or textiles.

[7] The new wood blocks for the 1557 edition may be by Bernard Salomon who worked closely with Jean de Tournes.

[13] The design shows a raven drinking from a large cup and the initials ES and GS for Elizabeth and George Shrewsbury.

Devises heroïqves (1557). This illustration on page 216 bears the Latin motto "Vunius compendium, alterius stipendium" (The one profits, the other loses). Claude Paradin adds an explanation in French: Si un Serpent ne mangeoit l'autre, iamais ne deuien-droit Dragon. Ainsi les Riches & puissant, croissent au dommage d'autrui. (If a Serpent did not eat another, it would never become a real Dragon. Thus do the Rich and powerful grow by harming another.)