Hoefnagel was also commissioned by Emperor Rudolf II to illustrate the "Mira calligraphiae monumenta" (the Model Book of Calligraphy) (now in the Getty Museum). He began the work around 1590, more than 15 years after the death of the calligrapher, Georg Bocskay. Like the Musterbuch, this book was originally made by Bocskay to illustrate various calligraphic scripts and also included a constructed alphabet. When the book had come in the possession of Emperor Rudolf II, Hoefnagel added illuminations primarily of plants, fruit and flowers but also included small animals and insects and city views. His illustrations thus provided a survey of the natural world. He further illustrated the minuscule letters of the constructed alphabet with hybrid creatures and fanciful masks. Using his extensive resources of pictorial illusionism, Hoefnagel aimed to demonstrate with his illustrations the superior affective power of images over the written word. It thus argued the superiority of one art form over another. The book is one of the last important examples of European manuscript illumination, produced at a time when printed books had virtually replaced manuscripts.