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Title: Early Printed Books
Author: Duff, E. (Edward) Gordon
Language: English
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*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "Early Printed Books" ***
Transcriber’s Notes.
The spellings of Schœffer and Schoeffer have been left as printed.
Footnotes were moved to the ends of the text they pertain to and
numbered in one continuous sequence.
Differences in hyphenation of specific words and missing punctuation
have been rectified where applicable.
Other changes made are noted at the end of the book.
[Illustration: FROM SCHOEFFER’S CANON OF THE MASS]
Early Printed Books
By
E. Gordon Duff
[Illustration]
London
Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co., Ltd.
MDCCCXCIII
TO
THE MEMORY OF
HENRY BRADSHAW
ἀποθανὼν ἔτι λαλεῖ
Preface
In the following pages I have endeavoured to give a short account of
the introduction of printing into the principal countries and towns of
Europe, and to bring our information on the subject as far as possible
up to date.
Small books on large subjects are for the most part both superficial
and imperfect, and I am afraid the present book forms no exception to
this rule, but my excuse must be that I have attempted rather to draw
attention to more out of the way information than to recapitulate what
is already to be found in the majority of bibliographical books.
Above all, I have tried as far as possible to confine myself to facts
and avoid theories, for only by working from facts can we help to keep
bibliography in the position, to which Henry Bradshaw raised it, of a
scientific study.
And, in the words of a learned Warden of my own college, ‘if any shall
suggest, that some of the inquiries here insisted upon do seem too
minute and trivial for any prudent Man to bestow his serious thoughts
and time about, such persons may know, that the discovery of the true
nature and cause of any the most minute thing, doth promote real
knowledge, and therefore cannot be unfit for any Man’s endeavours who
is willing to contribute to the advancement of Learning.’
* * * * *
I must express my best thanks to two friends, Mr. F. J. H. Jenkinson,
University Librarian, Cambridge; and Mr. J. P. Edmond, Librarian to
the Earl of Crawford and Balcarres, for very kindly reading through
the proofs of the entire book and making many useful suggestions and
corrections.
E. G. D.
_March 1893._
Contents
PAGE
CHAPTER I
STEPS TOWARDS THE INVENTION, 1
CHAPTER II
THE INVENTION OF PRINTING, 21
CHAPTER III
SPREAD OF PRINTING IN GERMANY, 39
CHAPTER IV
ITALY, 59
CHAPTER V
FRANCE, 78
CHAPTER VI
THE LOW COUNTRIES, 95
CHAPTER VII
SPAIN AND PORTUGAL--DENMARK AND SWEDEN, 113
CHAPTER VIII
WESTMINSTER: CAXTON--WYNKYN DE WORDE--JULIAN
NOTARY, 125
CHAPTER IX
OXFORD AND ST. ALBAN’S, 147
CHAPTER X
LONDON: JOHN LETTOU--WILLIAM DE MACHLINIA--RICHARD
PYNSON, 160
CHAPTER XI
THE SPREAD OF THE ART IN GREAT BRITAIN, 174
CHAPTER XII
THE STUDY OF BOOKBINDING, 185
CHAPTER XIII
THE COLLECTING AND DESCRIBING OF EARLY PRINTED
BOOKS, 201
INDEX OF PRINTERS AND PLACES, 213
Illustrations
PAGE FROM THE CANON OF THE MASS PRINTED BY
SCHOEFFER ABOUT 1458 (_much reduced_), _Frontispiece_
(From the unique copy in the Bodleian.)
PLATE PAGE
I. PAGE 3 OF THE ‘MIRABILIA ROMÆ,’ 11
(From the copy in the British Museum.)
II. THE CATALOGUE ISSUED BY SCHOEFFER ABOUT 1469
(_reduced_), 31
(Reproduced from a full-sized facsimile of the original
in the Munich Library, published in the _Centralblatt
für Bibliothekswesen_.)
III. PAGE 3 OF THE ‘LIBER EPISTOLARUM’ OF GASPARINUS
BARZIZIUS, the first book printed at Paris, 83
(From the copy in the British Museum.)
IV. FRAGMENT OF AN EDITION OF THE ‘DOCTRINALE’ OF
ALEXANDER GALLUS, one of the so-called ‘Costeriana,’ 98
(Reduced from the copy in the British Museum.)
V. PAGE OF THE FIRST EDITION OF THE ‘SARUM BREVIARY,’ 127
(Printed at Cologne about 1475.)
VI. PART OF A PAGE FROM THE ‘GOLDEN LEGEND,’ 144
(Printed by Julian Notary in 1503. From the copy in
the British Museum.)
VII. FIRST PAGE OF THE ‘EXCITATIO AD ELEMOSINAM
FACIENDAM,’ 152
(Printed at Oxford about 1485. From the unique copy
in the British Museum.)
VIII. PAGE OF THE ‘HORÆ AD USUM SARUM,’ 163
(Printed at London by Machlinia. From the fragment
in the University Library, Cambridge.)
IX. LAST PAGE OF THE ‘FESTUM NOMINIS JESU,’ 167
(Printed at London by Pynson about 1493. From the
unique copy in the British Museum.)
X. STAMPED BINDING WITH THE DEVICE OF PYNSON, 193
(From the original in the British Museum.)
EARLY PRINTED BOOKS.
CHAPTER I.
STEPS TOWARDS THE INVENTION.
When we speak of the invention of printing, we mean the invention
of the art of multiplying books by means of single types capable of
being used again and again in different combinations for the printing
of different books. Taking the word printing in its widest sense, it
means merely the impression of any image; and the art of impressing
or stamping words or pictures seems to have been known from the very
earliest times. The handles of Greek amphoræ, the bases of Roman
lamps and vases, were often impressed with the maker’s name, or other
legend, by means of a stamp. This was the basis of the art, and Cicero
(_De Nat. Deorum_, ii. 37) had suggested the combination of single
letters into sentences. Quintilian refers to stencil plates as a guide
to writing; and stamps with letters cut in relief were in common use
amongst the Romans. The need for the invention, however, was not
great, and it was never made. The first practical printing, both from
blocks and movable type, was done in China. As early as A.D. 593 the
more important texts were printed from engraved wooden plates by the
order of the Emperor Wên-ti, and in the eleventh century printing from
movable type was introduced by a certain smith named Picheng. The
multiplicity of Chinese characters rendered the discovery of movable
type of little economical value, and the older system of block printing
has found favour even up to the present time. In the same way, Corea
and Japan, though both had experimented with movable type, returned to
their former custom of block printing.
It is impossible now to determine whether rumours of the art could have
reached Europe from China and have acted as incentives to its practice.
Writers on early printing scout the idea; and there is little to
oppose to their verdict, with our present uncertain knowledge. Modern
discoveries, however, point to the relations of China with foreign
countries in the fourteenth century having been much more important
than is generally supposed.
The earliest productions in the nature of prints from wooden blocks
upon paper which we find in Europe, are single sheets bearing generally
the image of a saint. From their perishable nature but few of these
prints have come down to our times; and though we have evidence that
they were being produced, at any rate as early as the fourteenth,
perhaps even as the thirteenth century, the earliest print with
a definite and unquestioned date still in existence is the ‘St.
Christopher’ of 1423. This print was discovered in 1769 by Heinecken,
pasted inside the binding of a manuscript in the library of the Convent
of the Chartreuse at Buxheim in Swabia. The manuscript, which is now
in the Spencer Library,[1] is entitled _Laus Virginum_, is dated 1417,
and is said to have been given to the Monastery of Buxheim by a certain
Anna, Canoness of Buchau, ‘who is known to have been living in 1427.’
On the inside of the other board of the binding is pasted a cut of the
Annunciation, said to be of the same age and workmanship as the St.
Christopher. It is worth noticing that there seem to have been some
wood engravers in this Swabian monastery, who engraved the book-plate
for the books given by ‘Dominus Hildibrandus Brandenburg de Bibraco’
towards the end of the fifteenth century; and these book-plates are
printed on the reverse sides of pieces of an earlier block-book, very
probably engraved and printed in the monastery for presentation to
travellers or pilgrims.
[1] The Spencer Library has now passed into the possession of Mrs.
Rylands, of Manchester; but as many of the early printed books in it
are described in Dibdin’s _Bibliothecá Spencerianá_, and as it is so
widely known under the name of the Spencer Library, it has been thought
best, in order to avoid confusion, to refer to it under its old name
throughout the present book.
The date on the celebrated Brussels print of 1418 has unfortunately
been tampered with, so that its authenticity is questioned. The print
was found by an innkeeper in 1848, fixed inside an old chest, and it
was soon acquired by the Royal Library at Brussels. Since the date has
been touched up with a pencil, and at the same time some authorities
consider 1468 to be the right reading, it is best to consider the St.
Christopher as the earliest dated woodcut. Though these two are the
earliest dated prints known, it is, of course, most probable that some
others which are undated may be earlier; but to fix even an approximate
date to them is in most cases impossible. The conventional way in
which religious subjects were treated, and the extraordinary care with
which one cutter copied from another, makes it difficult even for a
specialist to arrive at any very definite conclusions.
In England, wood engraving does not seem to have been much practised
before the introduction of printing, but there are one or two cuts
that may be assigned to an earlier period. Mr. Ottley, in his _Inquiry
concerning the Invention of Printing_, drew attention to a curious
Image of Pity which he had found sewn on the blank leaf at the
beginning of a manuscript service-book. This cut, of which he gives
a facsimile in his book, is now in the British Museum. Another cut,
very similar in design and execution, and probably of about the same
date, was found a few years ago in the Bodleian, also inserted at the
beginning of a manuscript service-book. In the upper part of the cut
is a half-length figure of our Lord, with the hands crossed, standing
in front of the cross. On a label at the top of the cross is an
inscription, the first part of which is clearly O BACIΛEVC, but the
second part is not clear. In the British Museum cut it has been read
‘hora 3ª;’ and though this interpretation is ingenious, and might be
made to fit with the Museum copy (which has unfortunately been touched
up), the clearer lettering of the Bodleian copy, which has evidently
the same inscription, shows that this reading can hardly be accepted.
Below the figure we have the text of the indulgence—
‘Seynt gregor’ with othir’ popes & bysshoppes yn feer
Have graunted’ of pardon xxvi dayes & xxvi Mill’ yeer’
To theym that befor’ this fygur’ on their’ knees
Deuoutly say v pater noster & v Auees.’
Ottley was of opinion that his cut might be of as early a date as
the St. Christopher; but that is, of course, a point impossible to
determine. From the writing of the indulgence, Bradshaw considered
it to belong to the northern part of England; and the subject is
differently treated from other specimens of the Image of Pity issued
subsequently to the introduction of printing, for in them the various
symbols of the Passion are arranged as a border round the central
figure. Inserted at the end of a Sarum Book of Hours in the British
Museum is a drawing of an Image of Pity, with some prayers below, which
resembles in many ways the earlier cuts.
The woodcut alphabet, described by Ottley, now in the British Museum,
has been considered to be of English production, because on one of the
prints is written in very early writing the two words ‘London’ and
‘Bechamsted.’ There seems very little reason beyond this for ascribing
these letters to an English workman, though it is worth noticing that
they were originally bound up in a small volume, each letter being
pasted on a guard formed of fragments of English manuscript of the
fifteenth century.
In the Weigel Collection was a specimen of English block-printing which
is now in the British Museum; it is part of some verses on the Seven
Virtues, but it is hard to ascribe any date to it. Another early cut
is mentioned by Bradshaw as existing in Ely Cathedral. It is a cut of
a lion, and is fixed against one of the pillars in the choir, close to
the tomb of Bishop Gray, whose device it represents. This bishop died
in 1479, so that an approximate date may be given to the cut. It is
very probable that these last two specimens of block-printing are later
than the introduction of printing into England, and the only ones that
should be dated earlier are the British Museum and Bodleian Images of
Pity.
A good many single woodcuts were executed in England before the close
of the fifteenth century. They were mostly Images of Pity, such as
have been mentioned, or ‘rosaries’ containing religious emblems, with
the initials I. H. S. A curious cut in the Bodleian represents the
Judgment, and below this a body in a shroud. Above the cut is printed,
‘Surgite mortui Venite ad Judicium,’ and below on either side of a
shield the words, ‘Arma Beate Birgitte De Syon.’
A curious devotional cut is inserted in the _Faques Psalter_ of 1504 in
the British Museum, containing the emblems of the Passion and a large
I. H. S. At the base of the cut are the initials d. h. b., perhaps
referring to the place where the cut was issued. Most of these cuts
were doubtless produced in monasteries or religious houses to give or
sell to visitors, who very often inserted them in their own private
books of devotion, and in this manner many have been preserved. The
Lambeth copy of the Wynkyn de Worde _Sarum Horæ_ of 1494 shows signs of
having contained eighteen of such pictures, though only three are now
left.
After the single leaf prints we come to the block-books, which we may
look upon in some ways as the precursors of printed books.
‘A block-book is a book printed wholly from carved blocks of wood.
Such volumes usually consist of pictorial matter only; if any text
is added in illustration, it likewise is carved upon the wood-block,
and not put together with movable types. The whole of any one page,
sometimes the whole of two pages, is printed from a single block of
wood. The manner in which the printing was done is peculiar. The block
was first thoroughly wetted with a thin watery ink, then a sheet of
damp paper was laid upon it, and the back of the paper was carefully
rubbed with some kind of dabber or burnisher, till an impression from
the ridges of the carved block had been transferred to the paper. Of
course in this fashion a sheet could only be printed on one side; the
only block-book which does not possess this characteristic is the
_Legend of St. Servatius_ in the Royal Library of Brussels, and that is
an exceptional volume in many respects besides.’[2] These block-books
must be considered as forming a distinct group of themselves, radically
different from other books, though undoubtedly they gave the idea to
the inventor of movable type. They continued to be made during the
whole of the fifteenth century, almost always on the same plan, and
each one as archaic looking as another. The invention of movable type
did not do away with the demand, and the supply was kept up.
[2] Conway’s _Woodcutters of the Netherlands_. Cambridge, 1884. 8vo.
Unfortunately we have no data for determining the exact period at which
these books were made; and it is curious to note that all the editions
which are dated have a late date, the majority being between 1470 and
1480, and none being earlier than the first date, with the exception of
the Brussels block-book, which is dated 1440.
The number of different block-books in existence is hard to estimate,
but it must approach somewhere near one hundred. Many of these are
of little importance, many others of too late a date to be of much
interest.
The best known of the earlier block-books are the _Ars Moriendi_, the
_Biblia Pauperum_, the _Apocalypse_, and the _Canticum Canticorum_.
Of these, the first and third are probably German, the second and
fourth Dutch. Of all these books there are a number of editions, not
easily distinguishable apart, and which it is difficult to place in
chronological order. These editions are hardly editions in the modern
sense of the term. They were not produced by a printer who used one set
of blocks till they were worn out, and then cut another. The woodcutter
was the only tradesman, and he sold, not the books, but the blocks.
He cut set after set of blocks to print the few books then in demand,
and these were sold to private purchasers. We find wealthy people or
heads of religious establishments in possession of such sets. In the
inventory of Jean de Hinsberg, Bishop of Liège, 1419-1455, are noticed—
‘Unum instrumentum ad imprimendas scripturas et ymagines
‘Novem printe lignee ad imprimendas ymagines cum quatuordecim aliis
lapideis printis.’
Thus, these editions do not necessarily follow one another; some may
have been produced side by side by different cutters, others within the
interval of a few months, but by the same man. Their date is another
difficult point. The copies of the _Biblia Pauperum_, _Apocalypse_,
and _Ars Moriendi_, which belonged to Mr. Horn, were in their original
binding, and it was stamped with a date. The books were separated and
the binding destroyed. Mr. Horn asserted from memory that the first
three figures of the date were certainly 142, and the last probably an
8. Mr. Conway very justly points out that the resemblance of a 5 of
that date to our 2 was very strong, and that Mr. Horn’s memory may
have deceived him.
It will be noticed in examining block-books generally, that the
letterpress in the majority of the later examples is cut in imitation
of handwriting, and not of the square church hand from which printing
types and the letterpress of the earlier block-books were copied. The
reason of this probably is, that it was found useless to try to compete
with the books printed from movable type in regularity and neatness.
To do so would have involved a much greater expenditure of trouble by
the woodcutter and designer. The illustrations were the important part
of the book, and the letterpress was put in with as little trouble as
possible.
The sheets on which the early block-books were printed were not quired,
_i.e._ placed one inside the other to form a quire or gathering, as was
done in ordinary printed books, but followed each other singly. In many
of the books we find signatures, each sheet being signed with a letter
of the alphabet as a guide to the binder in arranging them.
Among the dated block-books may be mentioned an edition of the
_Endkrist_, dated 1472, produced at Nuremberg; an edition of the _Ars
Moriendi_ cut by Hans Sporer in 1473; and another of about the same
period cut by Ludwig zu Ulm. Of the _Biblia Pauperum_ there are three
dated editions known, one of 1470 and two of 1471. A copy of the _De
generatione Christi_ has the following full colophon:—
‘Johannes Eysenhut impressor, anno ab incarnationis dominice Mº
quadringentesimo septuagesimo Iº.’ Hans Sporer of Nuremberg produced an
edition of the _Biblia Pauperum_ in 1475, and Chatto speaks of another
of the same year without a name, but containing as a mark a shield with
a spur upon it, which he supposes to stand for the name Sporer. Many
of these later books were not printed in distemper on one side of the
paper only, but on both sides and in printer’s ink, showing that the
use of the printing press was known to those who produced them.
[Illustration: PAGE 3 OF THE ‘MIRABILIA ROMÆ’]
Among the late block-books should be noticed the _Mirabilia Romæ_
[Hain 11,208]; for why it should have been printed as a block-book
is a mystery. It consists of 184 pages of text, with only two
illustrations, printed on both sides of the page, and evidently of late
date. The letterpress is not cut in imitation of type, but of ordinary
handwriting, and the book may have been made to sell to those who were
not accustomed to the type of printed books. The arms of the Pope which
occur in the book are those of Sixtus IV., who occupied the papal
chair from 1471 to 1484, so that the book may be considered to have
been produced within those two dates, probably nearer the latter. The
accompanying facsimile is taken from the first page of text.
The best known of the block-books, and the one which has the most
important place in the history of printing, is the _Speculum Humanæ
Salvationis_. While it is called a block-book, it has many differences
from those we have previously spoken of, and occupies a position midway
between them and the ordinary printed book.
The earliest block-books were printed page by page, and the sheets
were bound up one after the other; but the _Speculum_ is arranged in
quires, though still only printed on one side of the page. In it, too,
the text is, as a rule, printed from movable type, except in the case
of one edition, where some pages are entirely xylographic. There are
four editions known, printed, according to the best authorities, in the
following order:—
1. Latin, printed with one fount. [Hessels, 2.]
2. Dutch, printed with two founts. [Hessels, 3.]
3. Latin, with twenty leaves printed xylographically. [Hessels, 1.]
4. Dutch, with one fount. [Hessels, 4.]
In all these four books the same cuts are used, and the type with which
they were printed was used in other books.
Edition 1 contains sixty-four leaves, made up by one gathering of
six leaves, three of fourteen, and one of sixteen; the text is
throughout printed from movable type. In two copies, those in the
Meerman-Westreenen Museum at the Hague, and the Pitti Palace at
Florence, are to be found cancels of portions of some leaves. Either
the text or the illustration has been defectively printed; in each case
the defective part has been supplied by another copy pasted on.
Edition 2 contains sixty-two leaves, made up in the same way as the
first edition, but having only four leaves in the first gathering. Two
leaves in this edition are printed in a different type from the rest of
the book.
Edition 3 contains the same number of leaves, and is made up in the
same way as edition 1. It is remarkable for having twenty leaves
printed entirely from blocks, text as well as illustrations.
Edition 4 is made up in the same way as edition 2. The copy in the
library at Lille contains some leaves with text printed upon both
sides, seemingly by an error of the printer. The very fact of their
existence shows that it was possible to print the text on both sides
of the leaf. There must therefore have been some reason other than the
ignorance or incapacity of the printer for printing these books on one
side only, or, as it is called, anopisthographically.
There can be very little doubt that Mr. Sotheby is correct in
his conjecture, that ‘the then usual process of taking off the
wood engravings by friction, rendered it impossible to effect two
impressions back to back, as the friction for the second would
materially injure the first. On this account, and on no other, we
presume, was the text printed only on one side.’ In the Lille copy
above mentioned, two leaves, 25 and 26 (the centre sheet of the
third quire), contain printed on their other side the text, not the
illustrations, of leaves 47 and 62 (the first sheet of the fifth quire.)
From this we learn three things of great importance--1. That the text
and the cut were not printed at the same time, and that the text was
printed first. 2. That the printer could print the text, for which he
used movable type, on both sides of the paper. 3. That the book was
printed, not page by page, but two pages at a time.
Mr. Ottley was strongly of opinion, after careful examination, that the
book was certainly printed two pages at a time. He says, ‘The proofs
of this are, I think, conclusive. The upper lines of the text in those
two pages always range exactly with each other.... Here and there, in
turning over the book, we observe a page printed awry or diagonally
on the paper; in such case, if the other page of the same sheet be
examined, the same defect will be noticed. Upon opening the two Dutch
copies of the edition, which I shall hereafter show to be the fourth
at Harlem, in the middle sheet of the same gathering we find, upon
comparing them, the exact same breadth and regularity of the inner
margin in both, and the lines of the two pages range with each other
exactly the same in both copies, which could not be the case had each
page been printed separately.’
Where and when was this book printed? Conjectural dates have been
given to it ranging from 1410 to 1470. The earliest date that can be
absolutely connected with it is 1471-73. Certainly there is nothing in
its printing which would point to its having been executed earlier than
1470. Its being printed only on the one side of the leaf was a matter
of necessity on account of the cuts, and is not a sign of remote
age, while the printing of two pages at a time argues an advance of
knowledge in the printer, and consequently a later date. About 1480-81
the blocks which had been used for the four editions of the _Speculum_
passed into the hands of John Veldener. This Veldener printed in
Louvain between 1475 and 1477, and he was not then in possession of
the blocks. ‘At the end of 1478 he began work at Utrecht, still,
however, without this set of blocks. For his second edition of the
_Fasciculus temporum_, published 14th February 1480, he had a few new
blocks made, some of which were copied from _Speculum_ cuts. At last,
on the 19th April 1481, he published an _Epistles and Gospels_ in
Dutch, and into that he introduced two cut-up portions of the real old
_Speculum_ blocks. This was the last book Veldener is known to have
printed at Utrecht. For two years we hear nothing more of him, and then
he reappears at Kuilenburg, whither he removed his presses. There, on
the 27th September 1483, he printed a quarto edition of the _Speculum_
in Dutch. For it he cut up all the original blocks into their separate
compartments, and thus suited them to fit into the upper portion of a
quarto page. He had, moreover, twelve new cuts made in imitation of
these severed portions of the old set, and he printed them along with
the rest. Once more, in 1484 he employed a couple of the old set in the
Dutch _Herbarius_, which was the last book known to have been issued by
him at Kuilenburg. Thenceforward the _Speculum_ cuts appear no more.’[3]
[3] Conway’s _Woodcutters_, p. 13.
The only place, then, with which the _Speculum_ blocks are definitely
connected is Utrecht, and there they must be left until some further
evidence is forthcoming respecting their origin; nor have we any
substantial reason for believing that when they passed into the
possession of Veldener they had been in existence for more than ten or
twelve years.
Some among the late block-books are of interest as having been produced
by men who were at the same time printers in the ordinary sense of the
word. There is part of a _Donatus_ in the Bodleian, with a colophon
stating it to be the work of Conrad Dinckmut, a printer at Ulm from
1482 to 1496. In the British Museum is a German almanac of about 1490
produced by Conrad Kacheloffen, who printed a number of books, many
with illustrations, at Leipzig. For a book so small as the _Donatus_,
a book which was always in demand, it would be almost as economical to
cut blocks as to keep type standing, and we consequently find a number
of such xylographic editions produced at the very end of the fifteenth
century. In the Bibliothèque Nationale are two original blocks, bought
by Foucault, the minister of Louis XIV., in Germany, and probably cut
about 1500 or shortly before. The letters are cut in exact imitation of
type, and with such regularity that a print from the block might almost
pass for a print from ordinary type, did not the bases and tops of a
few letters overlap.
The latest block-book of any size was printed at Venice. It is the
_Figure del Testamento Vecchio_, printed about 1510 by Giovanni Andrea
Vavassore.
In the library at Lambeth Palace are two curious block-printed leaves
of early English work. Each leaf contains an indulgence printed four
times, consisting of a figure of Saint Cornelius and five lines of
text. ‘The hole indulgence of pardon granted to blessed S. Cornelis is
vi score years, vi score lentes, ii M ix C and xx dais of pardon for
evermore to endure.’
It shows us very clearly the cheapness with which such work could be
produced; for, in order to save the time which would be occupied in
taking impressions singly from one block, two blocks have been used
almost exactly the same, so that two impressions could be taken off at
once. This was usually done in printing indulgences from movable type,
for there the trouble of setting up twice was very small compared to
the gain in the time and labour which resulted from it.
There still remains to be noticed the one specimen of xylography
produced in France. This is known as _Les Neuf Preux_. It consists
of three sheets of paper, each of which contains an impression from
a block containing three figures. They are printed by means of the
frotton in light-coloured ink, and have been coloured by hand. The
first sheet contains pictures of the three champions of classical
times, Hector, Alexander, and Julius Cæsar; the second, the three
champions of the Old Testament, Joshua, David, and Judas Maccabæus; the
third, the three champions of mediæval history, Arthur, Charlemagne,
and Godfrey of Boulogne. Under each picture is a stanza of six lines,
all rhyming, cut in a bold type.
These leaves form part of the _Armorial_ of Gilles le Bouvier, who
was King-at-Arms to Charles VII. of France; and as the manuscript was
finished between 9th November 1454 and 22nd September 1457, it is
reasonable to suppose that the prints were executed in France, probably
at Paris, before the latter date. The verses are, at any rate, the
oldest printed specimen of the French language.
When we consider that printing of a rudimentary kind had existed
for so many centuries, and that during the whole of the early part
of the fifteenth century examples with words or even whole lines of
inscription were being produced, we can only wonder that the discovery
of printing from movable types should have been made so late. It has
been said inventions will always be made when the need for them has
arisen, and this is the real reason, perhaps, why the discovery of
printing was delayed. The intellectual requirements of the mediæval
world were not greater than could be satisfactorily supplied by the
scribe and illuminator, but with the revival of letters came an
absolute need for the more rapid multiplication of the instruments
of learning. We may even say that the intellectual activity of
the fifteenth century not only called printing into existence, but
furnished it with its noblest models. The scholarly scribes of Italy at
that epoch had revived the Caroline minuscules as used in the eleventh
and twelfth centuries, and it was this beautiful hand which the early
Italian printers imitated, thereby giving us the ‘Roman’ type in which
our books are still printed.
I cannot more fitly close this preliminary chapter than by quoting
from the MS. note-books of Henry Bradshaw the opening sentences of his
article ‘Typography’ for the _Encyclopædia Britannica_, an article
which unfortunately was never completed.
‘Typography was, in the eyes of those who first used it, the art of
multiplying books, of writing by means of single types capable of being
used again and again, instead of with a pen, which, of course, could
only produce one book at a time.[4]
[4] This is clearly brought before us by the words of the first
printers at Avignon, ‘ars artificialiter scribendi,’ a phrase used
several times over in speaking of their new invention.
‘The art of multiplying single sheets, for which woodcut blocks
could be used to serve a temporary purpose, may be looked upon as an
intermediate stage, which may have given the idea of typography. When
the reproduction of books had long passed out of the exclusive hands
of the monasteries into the hands of students or hangers-on of the
universities, any invention of this kind would be readily and rapidly
taken up. When there was no Greek press in Paris, we find Georgius
Hermonymus making a living by constant copying of Greek books for
the scholars who were so eager for them. So Reuchlin in the same way
supported himself by copying.
‘In fact, the two departments of compositor and corrector in the
printing office were the direct representatives and successors of the
scribe and corrector of manuscripts from the early times. The kind of
men whom we find mentioned in the early printing offices as correctors,
are just such men as would be sought for in earlier times in an
important scriptorium. In our modern world, printed and written books
have come to be looked upon as totally distinct things, whereas it is
impossible to bring before our minds the state of things when books
were first printed, until we look upon them as precisely the same. They
were brought to fairs, or such general centres of circulation as Paris,
Leipzig, or Frankfort, before the days of printing, just as afterwards,
only that printing enabled the stationer to supply his buyers with
much greater rapidity than before, and at much cheaper rates; so that
the laws of supply and demand work together in such a manner that
it is difficult to say which had more influence in accelerating the
movement.’
CHAPTER II.
THE INVENTION OF PRINTING.
The earliest specimen of printing from movable type known to exist was
printed at Mainz in 1454. In making this statement, I do not wish to
pass over the claims of France and the Low Countries to the invention
of printing, but only to point out that, in considering the question,
we must put the evidence of the printed books themselves first, and
then work from these to such documentary evidence as we possess. France
has the documents but no books; the Low Countries neither the one nor
the other; and therefore, if we are to set about our inquiries on any
rational plan, we must date the invention of printing from the date of
its first product. This is the famous _Indulgence_ of Nicholas V. to
such as should contribute money to aid the King of Cyprus against the
Turks.
In the copy of the _Indulgence_ now preserved in the Meerman-Westreenen
Museum at the Hague (discovered by Albert Frick at Ulm in 1762, and
afterwards in the collections of Schelhorn and Meerman), the place
of issue, Erfurth, and the date, November 15, have been filled in;
thus giving us as the earliest authentic date on a printed document,
November 15, 1454.
In the years 1454 and 1455 there was a large demand for these
_Indulgences_, and seven editions were issued. These may be divided
into two sets, the one containing thirty-one lines, the other thirty
lines; the first dated example belonging to the former.
These two sets are unmistakably the work of two different printers,
one of whom may well have been Peter Schœffer, since we find the
initial letters which are used in the thirty-line editions used again
in an _Indulgence_ of 1489 certainly printed by him. Who, then, was
the printer of the other set? He is generally stated to have been
John Gutenberg; and though we have no proof of this, or indeed of
Gutenberg’s having printed any book at all, there is a strong weight of
circumstantial evidence in his favour.
What do we know about John Gutenberg, the presumed printer of the first
dated specimen of printing? The earliest information comes from the
record of a lawsuit brought against him at Strasburg in 1439 by George
Dritzehn, for money advanced.
There is hardly room for doubt that the business on which Gutenberg
was engaged, and for which money was advanced him, was printing. There
is a certain ambiguity about some of the expressions, but the greater
part of the account is too clear and straightforward to allow of any
doubt.[5] It may safely be said that before 1439 Gutenberg was at work
at Strasburg, experimenting on and perfecting the art of printing.
[5] A very careful literal and unabridged translation will be found
in Hessels’ _Gutenberg_, pp. 34-57. The text used is Laborde’s with
some corrections, and Schœpflin’s readings when they vary are given in
notes. It should be noted that Mr. Hessels implies that the account of
this trial is a forgery, or at any rate unreliable; but his negative
and partial reasoning cannot stand against the evidence brought forward
by many trustworthy authorities.
The next document which relates to him as a printer is the lawsuit of
1455, the original transcript of which was recently found at Göttingen.
This was brought against him by Fust to recover a loan of 800 guilders.
In this lawsuit mention is made of two of Gutenberg’s servants,
Heinrich Keffer, afterwards a printer at Nuremberg, and Bertolf von
Hanau, supposed to be the same as Bertold Ruppel, the first printer at
Basle. Peter Schœffer also appears as a witness. We learn from this
suit that somewhere about August 1450, Fust advanced the amount of
800 guilders, and about December 1452 a like amount; but these loans
were advanced in the first instance by Fust towards assisting a work
of which the method was understood, and we are therefore justified in
considering that by that time Gutenberg had mastered the principles of
the art of printing.
The first two books printed at Mainz were the editions of the
_Vulgate_, known from the number of lines which go to the page as the
forty-two line and thirty-six line Bibles. The forty-two line edition
is generally called the Mazarine Bible, because the copy which first
attracted notice was found in Cardinal Mazarin’s library; and the
thirty-six line edition, Pfister’s or the Bamberg Bible, because the
type used in it was at one time in the possession of Albrecht Pfister
of Bamberg. On the question as to which of the two editions is the
earlier, there has been endless controversy; and before going farther,
it will be as well to state shortly the actual data which we possess
from which conclusions can be drawn.
The Paris copy of the forty-two line Bible has the rubricator’s
inscription, which shows that the book was finished before the 15th
August 1456.
The only exact date we know of, connected with the other Bible,
is 1461, this date being written on a copy of the last leaf, also
preserved in the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris.
The types of both Bibles were in existence in 1454, for they were used
in the thirty and thirty-one line letters of _Indulgence_ printed in
that year.
The type of the forty-two line Bible is clearly a product of the
Gutenberg-Fust-Schœffer partnership, for it is used afterwards by
Schœffer as Fust’s partner, and must therefore have been the property
of Fust. Mr. Hessels, who has worked out the history of the types with
extreme care and accuracy, says: ‘I have shown above that one of the
initials of the thirty line _Indulgence_ is found in 1489 in Schœffer’s
office. The church type of the same _Indulgence_ links on (in spite of
the different capital P) to the anonymous forty-two line Bible of 1456.
This Bible links on to the thirty-five line Donatus, which is in the
same type, and has Schœffer’s name and his coloured capitals.[6] This
again brings us to the _Psalter_, which Joh. Fust and Peter Schœffer
published together on the 14th August 1457, at Mentz, their first
(dated) book with their name and the capitals of the _Donatus_.’
[6] The colophon of this book says: ... ‘per Petrum de Gernssheym
in urbe Moguntina cum suis capitalibus absque calami exaratione
effigiatus;’ and Mr. Hessels translates ‘cum suis capitalibus,’
‘with his capital letters,’ a rendering which is surely impossible.
We may safely say of the forty-two line Bible, that it could not have
been begun before about August 1450 (when Gutenberg entered into
partnership with Fust), and that it could not have been finished later
than August 1456 (the rubricated date of the Paris copy).
As regards the thirty-six line Bible, M. Dziatzko has brought forward,
after much patient study, some remarkable evidence. He proves, from an
examination of the text, that the thirty-six line Bible was set up,
at any rate in part, from the forty-two line Bible. One copy survives
which betrays this; for the compositor has passed from the last word
of leaf 7 to the first word of leaf 9. In another place he has misread
the beginning of a chapter, and included the last two words of the
one before, which is explained by the arrangement of the text in the
forty-two line edition.
Dziatzko concludes that this latter edition was the product of the
Gutenberg-Fust confederation, and that Gutenberg may have produced the
thirty-six line Bible more or less _pari passu_, either alone or in
partnership with (perhaps) Pfister. An examination of the paper used
in printing the two books points to the conclusion that there were
substantial means available for the production of the forty-two line
Bible, while the thirty-six line seems to show many separate purchases
of small amounts of different papers.
It is impossible to assign any date for the commencement of the
thirty-six line Bible. Fust had clearly nothing to do with it, and the
type may have been made and some sheets printed before the partnership
for printing the forty-two line Bible was entered into in 1450. The
largeness of the type and consequent lesser number of lines to the page
points to an early date, for the tendency was always to increase the
number of lines to the page and economise paper. Thus we find that when
the first gathering of the forty-two line Bible had been printed, which
has only forty lines to the page, the type was recast, so as to have
the same face of letter on a smaller body; and with this type the page
was made to contain forty-two lines to the page.
The workmanship and the appearance of the type would also lead us to
suppose that the thirty-six line Bible was printed earlier than the
_Manung widder die Durcke_, which, being an ephemeral publication
applicable only to the year 1455, must presumably have been printed in
1454.
We can therefore probably put both Bibles earlier than 1454.
The first book with a printed date is the well-known _Psalmorum
Codex_ of 1457, printed by Schœffer. Of this book nine copies are
known, and all vary slightly from each other.[7] Only two types are
used throughout the _Psalter_, but both are very large. Mr. Weale, on
account of the variations observable in the letters, insists that the
book was printed from cut and not cast type; but he gives no reason for
this opinion; and when we consider that books had already been produced
from cast type, it is impossible to understand why Schœffer should have
resorted to so laborious a method. The dissimilarity of some letters
is not so strong a proof of their having been cut, as the similarity
of the greater number is of their having been cast. Bradshaw, who was
of this opinion, had also noted some curious shrinkages in the type,
resulting from the way the matrices for the type were formed.
[7] For a very full account of this book see the Catalogue of MSS. and
Printed Books exhibited at the Historical Music Loan Exhibition, by W.
H. James Weale, London, 1886, 8vo, pp. 27-45.
The most striking thing about the _Psalter_ are the wonderful capital
letters; and how these were printed has always been a vexed question.
In the editions of 1457 and 1459 they are in two colours, the letter
in one colour and the surrounding ornamentation in another. Though
it is impossible to determine exactly how they were produced, there
is at any rate something to be settled on the question. In one case,
in the edition of 1515, in which these initials were still used, the
exterior ornament has been printed, but the letter itself and the
interior ornament have not. This shows at any rate that the letter
and the ornament were not on one block, and that the exterior and
interior ornaments were on different blocks; and is also in favour
of the suggestion put forward by Fischer, that the ornament and the
letter, though on different blocks, were not printed at the same time.
In support of his theory, Fischer mentioned a case of the letter
overlapping the ornament in a copy of the edition of 1459, and such a
slip could not have occurred had the letter and ornament been printed
from inset blocks in the method new known as the Congreve process.
It has also been argued by some writers, among whom is William Blades,
that the letter was not printed in colour, but that the design was
merely impressed in blank upon the paper or vellum, and afterwards
filled in with colour by the illuminator. This is shown, it is said, by
some portions of lines here and there in the ornamentation remaining
uncoloured, a result surely due to imperfect inking rather than to a
careless illuminator. It is hardly probable that the rubricator would
begin a line and leave the end uncoloured while it was plainly traced
for him; but, on the other hand, it is just such a fault as would, and
often did, occur in printing an elaborate and involved ornament. No
doubt in some cases the capitals, like the letters of the text, were
touched up by the rubricator; and this is, as a rule, most noticeable
when the ornament or letter is in blue. The blue ink used had a green
tinge, and in some cases looked almost grey, and was therefore very
often touched up with a brighter colour. Mr. Weale is of opinion that
these letters were not set up and printed with the rest of the book,
but were ‘printed, subsequently to the typography, not by a pull of the
press, but by the blow of a mallet on the superimposed block.’
It was probably about 1458, between the times of printing the two
editions of the _Psalter_, that Schœffer printed the book called in his
catalogue of 1469-70, _Canon misse cum prefacionibus et imparatoriis
suis_. This was the Canon of the Mass, printed by itself for inserting
in copies of the Missal. This particular part, being the most used,
was often worn out before the rest of the book; and we know from early
catalogues[8] that it was the custom of printers to print this special
part on vellum. While the printing of a complete Missal would have been
a doubtful speculation, the printing of this one part, unvarying in the
different uses, required no great outlay, and was almost certain to
be profitable. Two copies only are known, and these are of different
editions. One is in the Bodleian, and was bound up with an imperfect
copy of the _Mainz Missal_ of 1493. The other is in the Imperial
Library at St. Petersburg, in a copy of the _Breslau Missal_ of 1483.
[8] In a catalogue issued by Ratdolt about 1491 we read: ... ‘videlicet
unum missarum (?) in papiro bene corporatum et illigatum cum canone
pergameneo non ultra tres florenos minus quarta: sed cum canone papireo
duos florenos cum dimidio fore comparandum.’
The Bodleian copy consists of twelve leaves, printed on vellum in the
large type of the _Psalter_, and ornamented with the same beautiful
initials. The capital T of the _Te igitur_, commencing the Canon, is
as large as the well-known B of the _Psalter_, and even more beautiful
in execution. Besides the ordinary coloured capitals which occur also
in the _Psalter_, there is a monogram composed of the letters V.D.,
standing for _Vere dignum_.
In 1459 a second edition of the _Psalter_ was issued, and also the
_Rationale Durandi_, both containing coloured capitals, though some
copies of the latter book are without the printed initials. A _Donatus_
without date, printed in the type of the forty-two line Bible, has also
the coloured capitals, and may be dated before 1460. After that time we
only find these letters in use for the editions of the _Psalter_ which
appeared in 1490, 1502, 1515, 1516; and for a _Donatus_ in the 1462
Bible type. Their size and the trouble of printing them account, no
doubt, for their disuse.
In June 1460, Schœffer issued the _Constitutions_ of Clement V., a
large folio remarkable for the care with which it was printed, and
for the clever way in which the commentary was worked round the
text. In 1462 appeared the first dated _Bible_, which is at the same
time the first book clearly divided into two volumes.[9] In the next
few years we have a number of Bulls and other such ephemeral
publications, relating mostly to the quarrels which were going on in
Mainz; but in 1465, Schœffer starts again to produce larger books, and
in this year we have the _Decretals_ of Boniface VIII. and the _De
Officiis_ of Cicero. This latter book is important as being the first
containing Greek type, that is, if it is allowed to be earlier than
the _Lactantius_ of the same year printed at Subiaco. In 1466 it was
reprinted.
[9] It has never, I think, been noticed in print that some of the
capital letters in certain sheets of this Bible are not the work of
the rubricator, but are printed. Attempts were made to print both
the blue and the red on the same page, but it apparently was found
too laborious, and was given up. The red letters were printed in
colour; the letters which were to be blue were impressed in blank, and
afterwards filled up in colour by the illuminator. He did not always
follow the impressed letter, so that its outline can be clearly seen.
Some copies of this Bible have Schœffer’s mark, and a date at the end
of the first volume; others are without them. The colophons also vary.
[Illustration: SCHOEFFER’S CATALOGUE.]
In or about 1469, Schœffer printed a most interesting document, a
catalogue of books for sale by himself or his agent. It is printed on
one side of a sheet, and was meant to be fixed up as an advertisement
in the different towns visited, the name of the place where the books
could be obtained being written at the bottom. There are altogether
twenty-one books advertised, three of which were not printed by
Schœffer, but probably by Gutenberg; and there are also in the list
three unknown books. Nearly all the important works from the press
are in it, the 1462 Bible on vellum, the _Psalter_ of 1459, the
_Decretals_, the _Cicero_, and others. At the foot of the list is
printed in the large _Psalter_ type, ‘Hec est littera psalterii,’ so
that the sheet is the earliest known type-specimen as well as catalogue.
The three books which are unknown, at any rate as having been printed
by Schœffer, are the _Consolatorium timorate conscientie_ and the _De
contractibus mercatorum_, both by Johann Nider, a famous Dominican, and
the _Historia Griseldis_ of Petrarch.
In 1470, Schœffer put out another advertisement relating to his edition
of the _Letters of St. Jerome_, printed in that year. Of this broadside
two copies are known, one in the Munich Library, the other, formerly
belonging to M. Weigel, in the British Museum. From 1470 to 1479,
Schœffer printed a large number of books. Hain mentions twenty-seven,
almost all of which he himself had collated. This was the busiest time
in Schœffer’s career, and he carried on business in several towns. His
agent in Paris, Hermann de Stalhœn, died about 1474, and the books in
his possession were dispersed. On the complaint of Schœffer, Louis XI.
allowed him 2425 crowns as compensation,—a sum which shows that the
stock of books must have been very large. In 1479 he was received as a
citizen of Frankfort-on-the-Maine on payment of a certain sum, no doubt
in order that he might there sell his books. At Mainz he became an
important citizen, and was made a judge.
From 1457 to 1468, Schœffer had used only four types, the two church
types which appear in the _Psalter_, and the two book types which
appear in the _Durandus_. In this year he obtained a fifth type,
like the smaller one of the _Durandus_, and about the same in body,
but with a larger face. In 1484 and 1485 two new types appear, one
a church type very much resembling that used in the forty-two line
Bible, but with a larger face; the other, a vernacular type, which
occurs first in the _Hortus Sanitatis_ of 1485, a book containing
Schœffer’s mark though not his name, and appears the year following
in the _Breydenbach_, printed at Mainz by Erhard Reüwick. Reüwick
was an engraver, and the frontispiece to the _Hortus Sanitatis_ is
perhaps from his hand, showing, if it be so, a connection between him
and Schœffer, which his use of the latter’s type tends to confirm.
In fact, it seems most probable that the text of the two editions of
the _Breydenbach_, the Latin one of 1486 and the German one of 1488,
was really printed by Schœffer, while Reüwick engraved the wonderful
illustrations. The title-page of this book is an exquisite piece
of work, and by far the finest example of wood engraving which had
appeared. It is further noticeable as containing cross-hatching, which
is usually said to have first been used in the poor cuts of that very
much overpraised book, the _Nuremberg Chronicle_ of 1493. It contains
also a number of views of remarkable places, printed as folded plates.
Some of these views are as much as five feet long, and were printed
from several blocks on separate pieces of paper, which were afterwards
pasted together.
Schœffer continued to print during the whole of the fifteenth century,
though towards the end he issued few books, Another printer, Petrus
de Friedberg, started to print at Mainz in 1493, and between that
time and 1498 issued a fair number of books. About 1480 a group of six
or seven books, all undated, were printed at Mainz, which were long
supposed to be very early, and not impossibly printed by Gutenberg.
One of these was a _Prognostication_, said to be for the year 1460,
and therefore presumably printed in 1459. A copy is preserved in the
library of Darmstadt; and some years ago this was examined by Mr.
Hessels, who found that the date had been tampered with, and that it
should really read 1482.
From 1455 onwards, while the press of Schœffer was busily at work,
we lose sight of Gutenberg. Three books, however, all printed about
1460 at Mainz, are ascribed to him. These are the _Catholicon_ (a kind
of dictionary) of 1460, the _Tractatus racionis et conscientiæ_ of
Matthæus de Cracovia, and the _Summa de articulis fidei_ of Aquinas,
both without date. To these may be added a broadside indulgence
printed in 1461. Bernard attributes these books to the press of Henry
Bechtermuntze, who afterwards printed with the same type at Eltvil.
One fact appears to tell strongly against this conclusion. In 1469-70,
when Schœffer issued his catalogue, we find these three books in it,
the remainder being all of Schœffer’s own production. How did they get
into Schœffer’s hands? Had they been printed by Bechtermuntze we should
surely find the _Vocabularius ex quo_ also in the catalogue, for he
had issued editions in 1467 and 1469. It is more probable that they
had formed the stock of a printer who had given up business, and had
therefore got rid of all the books remaining on his hands.[10]
[10] In 1468 all the materials connected with Gutenberg’s press were
handed over to Conrad Homery, their owner, who binds himself to use the
type only in Mainz; and also binds himself, if he sells it, to sell
it to a citizen of Mainz, _provided that citizen offers as much as a
stranger_. The stock of printed books would also belong to Homery in
his capacity of creditor, and would be sold in Mainz, where, so far as
we know, there was no one except Schœffer to buy them.
In the copy of the _Tractatus racionis_ belonging to the Bibliothèque
Nationale the following manuscript note occurs: ‘Hos duos sexternos
accomidauit mihi henrycus Keppfer de moguncia nunquam reuenit ut
reacciperetur,’ etc. This Keppfer was one of Gutenberg’s workmen;
and his name occurs in the notarial instrument of 1455, so that this
inscription forms a link between the book and Gutenberg.
We have, unfortunately, no direct evidence as to the printer. We know
that the books were printed at Mainz, for it is directly so stated in
the Schœffer catalogue and in the colophon of the _Catholicon_. Now we
know of no printers at Mainz in 1460 except Schœffer and Gutenberg,
and Schœffer was certainly not the printer of these books. On the
other hand, there are no books except these three that could have been
printed by Gutenberg; and if these three are to be ascribed to any one
else, Gutenberg is left in the position of a known printer who printed
nothing. It has been shown above that it is very improbable that the
books were printed by Bechtermuntze; and the fact that in 1470 the
remaining copies were in the hands of a man who did not print them,
points to their real printer having died or given up business. Though
from these various facts we can prove nothing as regards the identity
of the printer, we have some show of probability for imagining that he
must have been Gutenberg.
There is no doubt whatever that the _Catholicon_ type appears at
Eltvil in the hands of the two brothers Bechtermuntze in 1467, for in
the _Vocabularius ex quo_ there is a clear colophon stating that the
book was commenced by Henry Bechtermuntze and finished by Nicholas
Bechtermuntze and Wygand Spyess of Orthenberg on the 4th of November
1467.
There has been a great deal of argument on the question how these types
came into the hands of the Eltvil printers while Gutenberg was alive.
We know that Gutenberg became a pensioner of Adolph II. in 1465, and
would therefore presumably give up printing in that year. The types and
printing materials which he had been using belonged to a certain Dr.
Homery, and were reclaimed by him in 1468. The distance from Eltvil to
Mainz is only some five or six miles, and the Rhine afforded easy means
of communication between the two places, so that the difficulty of the
transference of type backwards and forwards seems, as a rule, very much
overstated. Although we have no evidence of printing at Eltvil before
1467, still it will be best to give an account of the press in this
chapter, since it was so intimately connected with the early press at
Mainz.
In 1467, on the 4th November, an edition of the _Vocabularius ex quo_
was published. The colophon tells us that the book was begun by Henry
Bechtermuntze, and finished by his brother Nicholas in partnership with
a certain Wygand Speyss of Orthenberg. A second edition was published
in June 1469 by Nicholas Bechtermuntze alone. Both these editions are
printed in the type used for the _Catholicon_ of 1460, but with a few
additional abbreviations. In 1472 a third edition of the _Vocabularius
ex quo_ was issued, in a type very similar to the type of the
thirty-one line _Letters of Indulgence_, but slightly smaller; and an
edition of the _Summa de articulis fidei_ of Aquinas [Hain, *1426] was
issued in the same type. In 1477 a fourth edition of the _Vocabularius
ex quo_ was printed by Nicholas Bechtermuntze; the type is different
from that used in the other books, and is identical, as Mr. Hessels
tells us, with that used about the same time by Peter Drach at Spire.
Before leaving Mainz, it will be as well to notice the books printed
by the Brothers of the Common Life at Marienthal. This monastery was
close to Mainz on the opposite side of the river, and not far from
Eltvil. The earliest book is a _Copia indulgentiarum per Adolphum
archiepiscopum Moguntinum concessarum_, dated from Mainz in August
1468, and presumably printed in the same year. In 1474 they issued the
_Mainz Breviary_, a book of great rarity, and of which the copies vary;
in fact, of certain portions there seem to have been several editions.
Their latest piece of printing with a date is a broadside indulgence
of 1484, of which there is a copy at Darmstadt. Dr. F. Falk, in his
article ‘_Die Presse zu Marienthal im Rheingau_,’ mentions fourteen
books as printed at this press; but he includes some printed in a type
which cannot with certainty be ascribed to Marienthal. The Brothers
seem to have used only two types, both of which are found in the
_Breviary_. Both are very distinctive, especially the larger, which is
a very heavy solid Gothic letter, easily distinguishable by the curious
lower case _d_.
CHAPTER III.
SPREAD OF PRINTING IN GERMANY.
Before 1462, when the sacking of Mainz by Adolf von Nassau is popularly
supposed to have disseminated the art of printing, presses were at work
in at least two other German towns, Strasburg and Bamberg.
The first of these places is mentioned by Trithemius, who records
that after the secret of printing was discovered, it spread first to
Strasburg. Judging merely from authentic dates, this is evidently
correct, for we have the date 1460 for Strasburg, and 1461-62 for
Bamberg. There are, however, strong reasons for supposing that this
order is hardly the correct one, and that Bamberg should come first.
Since, however, the statement and the dates exist, it will be safer for
us provisionally to consider Strasburg as the first, and state later on
the arguments in favour of Bamberg.
Though no dated book is known printed at Strasburg before 1471, in
which year Eggestein printed the _Decretum Gratiani_, and though
Mentelin’s first dated book is of the year 1473, yet we know from the
rubrications of a copy of the _Latin Bible_ in the library at Freiburg,
that that book was finished, the first volume before 1460, and the
second before 1461. Concerning the printer, John Mentelin, a good deal
is known. Born at Schelestadt, he became a scribe and illuminator;
but, like many others, abandoned the original business to become a
printer. P. de Lignamine in his Chronicle says that by 1458, Mentelin
had a press at Strasburg, and was printing, like Gutenberg, three
hundred sheets a day. By 1461 he had finished printing the forty-nine
line edition of the _Latin Bible_. He died on the 12th December 1478,
leaving two daughters, one married to Adolf Rusch d’Ingwiller, his
successor; the other, to Martin Schott, another Strasburg printer.
Very few of his books are dated; and as his types have not yet been
systematically studied, the books cannot be ranged in any accurate
order.
Taking the information in Lignamine’s Chronicle as exact, and we have
no reason to doubt its accuracy, we may take certain books in the type
of the Bible as the earliest of Mentelin’s books.[11] Round 1466 we can
group some other books, the _Augustinus de arte predicandi_ and the
_Homily on St. Matthew_ by St. Chrysostom. A copy of the former book
in the British Museum is rubricated 1466; and of the latter a copy in
the Spencer Collection has the same year added in manuscript. In Sir
M. M. Sykes’ sale was a volume containing copies of these two books
bound together in contemporary binding. About 1470, Mentelin issued a
catalogue containing the titles of nine books, including a _Virgil_, a
_Terence_, and a _Valerius Maximus_. Mentelin also printed the first
edition of the Bible in German, a folio of 406 leaves. Several copies
are known with the rubricated date of 1466; and the same date is also
found in a copy of the _Secunda secundæ_ of Aquinas. Many other of his
books contain manuscript dates, and show that they are considerably
earlier than is usually supposed.
[11] In the University Library, Cambridge, is a very interesting copy
of the first volume of this Bible, bought at the Culemann sale. It
consists for the most part of proof-sheets, and variations from the
ordinary copies occur on almost every page. It is printed on small
sheets of paper in the manner of a broadside, the sheets being pasted
together at the inner margin.
Henry Eggestein, whose first dated book was issued in 1471, was living
in Strasburg as early as 1442, and probably began to print almost as
soon as Mentelin. The earliest date attributable to any of his books
is 1466, the date written by Bamler, at that time an illuminator, in
the copy of one of his forty-five line editions of the Bible now in the
library at Wolfenbüttel. In 1471, Eggestein himself tells us that he
had printed a large number of books. A little time before this he had
issued a most glowing advertisement of his Bible. He appeals to the
good man to come and see his wonderful edition, produced, as the early
printers were so fond of saying, not by the pen, but by the wonderful
art of printing. The proofs had been read by the best scholars, and the
book printed in the best style. This Bible, which has forty-five lines
to the column, was finished by 1466, for the copy now in the library at
Munich was rubricated in that year. The only printed dates that occur
in Eggestein’s books are 1471 and 1472. Hain gives three books of the
years 1474, 1475, and 1478 as printed in his type, but these contain no
printer’s name.
The most mysterious printer connected with the history of the Strasburg
press, is the printer who used a peculiarly shaped capital R, and is
therefore known as the R printer. He seems to have been very generally
confounded with Mentelin till 1825, when the sale catalogue of Dr.
Kloss’ books appeared. In this sale there happened to be two copies
of the _Speculum_ of Vincent de Beauvais, one the undoubted Mentelin
edition, the other by the R printer. The writer of the note in the
catalogue stated that, on comparison, the types of the two editions,
though very like each other, were not the same. Since the type is
different, and the peculiar R has never yet been found in any authentic
book printed by Mentelin, we may safely say that Mentelin was not the
printer. To whom, then, are the books to be ascribed? Many consider
them the work of Adolf Rusch d’Ingwiller. M. Madden attributes them
all to the Monastery of Weidenbach at Cologne, in common with most
of the other books by unknown printers, and dates them about 1470.
Bradshaw, writing to Mr. Winter Jones in 1870, says: ‘In turning over
a volume of fragments yesterday, I found a Bull of Sixtus IV., dated
1478, in the type of the famous “R” printer so often confounded with
Mentelin. His books are commonly put down to 1470 or earlier, and I
believe no one ever thought of putting his books so late as 1478.[12]
Yet this little piece is almost the only certain date which is known
in connection with this whole series of books.’ Complete sets of the
_Speculum_ of Vincent de Beauvais are very often made up, partly from
Mentelin’s and partly from the R printer’s editions, which points to
their having been probably printed at the same place and about the same
time. The earliest MS. date found in any of the books by the R printer
is 1464; for a note in the copy of the _Duranti Rationale divinorum
Officiorum_ in the library at Basle, states that the book was bought
in that year for the University. If this date is authentic, it follows
that Strasburg was the first place where Roman type was used.
[12] This indulgence had been noticed by Bernard, _De l’Origine de
l’Imprimerie_, vol. ii. pp. 108, 109.
The next important printer at Strasburg is George Husner, who began
in 1476 and printed up till 1498. His types may be recognised by the
capital H, which is Roman, and has a boss on the lower side of the
cross-bar. John Gruninger, who began in 1483, issued some beautifully
illustrated books, the most celebrated being the _Horace_, _Terence_,
and _Boethius_, and Brandt’s _Ship of Fools_. He and another later
Strasburg printer, Knoblochzer, share with Conrad Zeninger of Nuremberg
the doubtful honour of being the most careless printers in the
fifteenth century.
Albrecht Pfister was printing at Bamberg as early as 1461, and his
first dated book, Boner’s _Edelstein_, was issued on 4th February of
that year. He used but one type, a discarded fount from Mainz which
had been used in printing the thirty-six line Bible and the other
books of that group. By many he is credited with being the printer of
the thirty-six line Bible,—a theory which a short examination of the
workmanship of his signed books would go far to upset. Pfister seems
to have been more of a wood engraver than a printer, relying rather
on the attractive nature of his illustrations than on the elegance
of his printing. We can attribute to him with certainty nine books,
with one exception all written in German, and with two exceptions all
illustrated with woodcuts. Mr. Hessels is of opinion that certain
of these books ought to be placed, on account of their workmanship,
before the _Boner_ of 1461; as, for instance, the _Quarrel of a Widower
with Death_, in which the lines are very uneven. There are certain
peculiarities noticeable in Pfister’s method of work which occur also
in the _Manung widder die Durke_, a prognostication for 1455, preserved
in the Royal Library, Munich, and in the _Cisianus zu dutsche_ at
Cambridge, the most marked being the filling up of blank spaces with
an ornament of stops. The curious rhyming form of these calendars, and
the dialect of German in which they are written, resemble exactly the
rhyming colophon put by Pfister to the Boner’s _Edelstein_. In all
three cases the ends of the lines are not marked, but the works are
printed as prose.
Paulus Paulirinus of Prague, in his description of a ‘ciripagus’
wrote: ‘Et tempore mei Pambergæ quidam sculpsit integram Bibliam super
lamellas, et in quatuor septimanis totam Bibliam super pargameno
subtili presignavit scriptura.’ Some writers have suggested that
these words refer to the thirty-six line Bible; but a ‘Bible cut on
thin plates’ can only be a block-book, and probably an edition of the
_Biblia Pauperum_. Paul of Prague composed a large part of his book
before 1463, when no other printer besides Pfister was at work at
Bamberg, and these words probably apply to either the Latin or German
edition of the _Biblia Pauperum_ which Pfister issued.
We have no information as to when or where Pfister began to print, and
the extraordinary rarity of his books prevents much connected work
upon them. There is no doubt that he came into possession of the type
of the thirty-six line Bible, and in this type a number of books were
printed. The earliest of these books is probably the _Manung Widder die
Durke_, which, since it was a prognostication for 1455, was presumably
printed in 1454. This book, as far as it is possible to judge, was
manifestly printed after the thirty-six line Bible, and by a different
printer. In it we first find the peculiar lozenge-shaped ornament of
stops which continues through the series of books in this type. The
calendar of 1457 in the Bibliothèque Nationale, probably printed in
1456, is the next piece in the series to which an approximate date can
be given. Of this calendar, originally printed on a single sheet,
only the upper half remains, found in 1804 at Mainz, where it had been
used as a cover for some ecclesiastical papers. It bears the following
inscription: ‘Prebendarum. Registrum capituli ecclesie Sancti Gengolffi
intra muros Moguntiæ receptorum et distributorum anno LVII., per Johan:
Kess, vicarium ecclesie predicte.’ Thus, at the end of the year 1457
or beginning of 1458, it was treated at Mainz as waste-paper. With
this calendar may be classed the _Cisianus zu dutsche_ at Cambridge, a
rhyming calendar in German.
There are, then, the series of nine or ten books, usually all given to
Pfister, though only two bear his name; and of these some are after
and some can be placed before 1461. The typographical peculiarities of
Pfister’s signed books are the same as those of the early calendars,
and point to his having also produced them. This brings us at once
into the obvious difficulties, for we should have Pfister printing as
early as 1454, while Gutenberg was still in partnership with Fust. The
knowledge about Pfister’s press is too meagre to allow any of these
difficulties to be cleared up, though something may yet result from a
more careful examination of the books themselves. The only examples
in England of books printed by Pfister (with the exception of the
_Cisianus_) are in the Spencer Library. There are there four books and
a fragment of a fifth.
The conjecture put forward by M. Dziatako, that Gutenberg may have
printed the thirty-six line Bible in partnership with some other
printer, as, for example, Pfister, would certainly, if any proof in
its favour could be adduced, simplify matters very much. We should
then have all the books in a natural sequence, from the Bible to the
latest books of Pfister, and we could account for the printing of
the _Manung_ in 1454, while Gutenberg was still in partnership with
Fust and Schœffer for the production of the forty-two line Bible. The
workmanship of the thirty-six line Bible is in some points different
from the later books, all of which were probably the work of Pfister,
who, according to this theory, must have been at work at Mainz as early
as 1454. The contract between Gutenberg and Fust did not necessarily
bind the former to print only with Fust, so that he may also have
worked with Pfister, and taught him the art.
Pfister’s last dated book, _The Histories of Joseph, Daniel, Judith,
and Esther_, was printed in 1462, not long after the day of St.
Walburga (May 1).
After this time we hear of no book printed at Bamberg till 1481, when
John Sensenschmidt printed the _Missale Ordinis S. Benedicti_, commonly
known as the Bamberg Missal.
Cologne, from its situation on the Rhine, was in a favourable position
for receiving information and materials from Mainz, and we find that by
1466, Ulric Zel of Hanau, a clerk of the diocese of Mainz, was settled
there as a printer. His first dated book was the Chrysostom _Super
psalmo quinquagesimo_; but some other books were certainly issued
before it. The Cicero _De Officiis_, a quarto with thirty-four lines to
the page, is earlier, and is perhaps the first book he issued. It has
many signs of being a very early production, and may possibly have been
issued before Schœffer’s edition of 1465.
M. Madden, in his _Lettres d’un Bibliographe_, has argued that a very
early school of typography existed at Cologne, in the Monastery of
Weidenbach. Though his researches have thrown a great deal of light
on various points connected with early printing, and are in some ways
of real value, much that he has theorised about Weidenbach requires
confirmation. We can hardly be expected to believe, as he would try to
persuade us, that Caxton, and Zel, and Jenson, and many other printers
whose types belong to different families, could all learn printing
at this one place. It would be impossible for men who had learnt to
print in the same school to produce such radically different kinds of
type, and work in such different methods. The early tentative essays
of Zel’s press can be clearly identified, and their order more or less
accurately determined, from their typographical characteristics. His
earliest books were quartos; and of these the first few have four point
holes to the page. These point holes are small holes about an inch
from the top and bottom lines, and nearly parallel with the sides of
the type, made by the four pins which went through the paper when one
side of the page was printed, and served as a guide to place the paper
straight when the other side was printed.[13]
[13] The use of four points to obtain a correct register is generally a
sure sign of the infancy of a press. Blades says they are to be found
in all the books printed in Caxton’s Type 1.
Then, before he settled down to printing his quartos with twenty-seven
lines to the page, he experimented with various numbers of lines. We
can safely start with the following books in the following order:—
_A._ Cicero, _De officiis_, 34 lines to the page.
Chrysostom, _Super psalmo quinquagesimo_, 1466, 33 lines to the
page.
Gerson, _Super materia celebrationis missæ_, 31 lines to the page.
Gerson, _Alphabetum divini amoris_, 31 lines to the page.
These form an early group by themselves, and commence on the first
leaf; the second group begins with
_B._ Augustinus, _De vita christiana_ and _De singularitate
clericorum_, 1467, 28 and 27 lines to the page.
Then follows a number of tracts by Gerson and Chrysostom, all having
four point holes, and all probably printed before 1470. Zel continued
to print throughout the whole of the fifteenth century.
At a very early date there were a number of other printers settled at
Cologne, all using types which, though easily distinguishable, are
similar in appearance and of the same family; and their books have
generally been ascribed to Zel. To many of them it is impossible to put
a printer’s name; and certain of them have been divided into groups
known by the title of the commonest book in that group which has no
edition in another group. For instance, we have a certain number of
books printed by the printer of the _Historia Sancti Albani_; another
printer is known as the printer of _Dictys_ (perhaps Arnold ther
Hoernen); another as the printer of _Augustinus de Fide_ (perhaps
Goiswin Gops), and so on. No doubt, in time, when the Cologne press has
been more carefully studied, the identity of some of these printers
will be discovered; but at present there are a great many difficulties
waiting to be cleared away.
Arnold ther Hoernen, who began to print in or before 1470, was the
pioneer of several improvements. The _Sermo ad populum_, printed in
1470, has a title-page, and the leaves numbered in the centre of the
right-hand margin; very soon after he printed a book with headlines. He
printed ‘infra sedecim domos,’ and used a small neat device, of which
there are two varieties, always confused. John Koelhoff, a native of
Lubeck, printed at Cologne from 1472 (?) to 1493, when he died. If the
date of 1472 in his _Expositio Decalogi_ of Nider be correct, he was
the first printer who used ordinary printed signatures; but the date of
the book is questioned. The shapes of the capital letters in Koelhoff’s
types are very distinctive; and it is curious to notice that a fount
unmistakably copied from them was used by a Venetian printer named John
de Colonia. Nicholas Gotz of Sletzstat, who began printing about 1470,
though we find no dated book of his before 1474, and who finished in
1480, used a device engraved upon copper in the ‘manière criblée,’ or
dotted style. It consists of a coat-of-arms surmounted by a helmet and
crest, with his motto, ‘Sola spes mea inte virginis gratia.’ In some
books we find the motto printed in a different form—‘Spes mea sola
in virginis gratia.’ In 1475 was issued the _Sermo de presentacione
beatissime virginis Marie_, the only book known containing the name
of Goiswinus Gops de Euskyrchen. In 1476, Peter Bergman de Olpe and
Conrad Winters de Homborch began to print, and were followed in 1477
by Guldenschaff, and in 1479 by Henry Quentell, the last named being
the most important printer at Cologne during the latter years of the
fifteenth century.
Gunther Zainer was the first printer at Augsburg; and in March 1468
issued his first dated book, the _Meditationes vite domini nostri Jesu
Christi_, by Bonaventure. Some of his undated books show signs from
their workmanship of having been printed at a still earlier date.
At first he used a small Gothic type, but in 1472 he published the
_Etymologiæ S. Isidori_ in a beautiful Roman letter, the first, with a
date, used in Germany. His later books are printed in a large, thick,
black letter, and have in many cases ornamental capitals and borders.
He was connected in some way with the Monastery of the Chartreuse at
Buxheim, and to their library he gave many of his books; and we learn
from their archives that he died on the 13th April 1478. By 1472 we
find two more printers settled in Augsburg, John Baemler and John
Schussler. The first of these, before becoming a printer, had been a
scribe and rubricator, and as such had sometimes signed his name to
books. This has given rise to the idea that he printed them, and he is
often quoted as the printer of a Bible in 1466. He worked from 1472 to
1495, printing a very large number of books. Schussler printed only for
three years, from 1470 to 1473, issuing about eight books, printed in
a curious small type, half-Gothic, half-Roman, and very like that used
at Subiaco. About 1472-73, Melchior de Stanheim, head of the Monastery
of SS. Ulric and Afra, purchased some presses and began to print with
types, which seem to have been borrowed from other Augsburg printers,
such as Zainer, Schussler, and Anthony Sorg. The latter started on his
own account in 1475, and issued a very large number of books between
that year and 1493.
The early Augsburg books are especially noted for their woodcuts,
which, though not perhaps of much artistic merit, are very numerous and
curious. Some very beautifully printed books were also produced about
the end of the century by John Schœnsperger, who is celebrated as the
printer of the _Theurdanck_ of 1517.
In 1470, John Sensenschmidt and Henry Keppfer of Mainz, whom we
have before spoken of as a servant of Gutenberg, began to print
at Nuremberg. Their first book was the _Codex egregius comestorii
viciorum_, and in the colophon the printer says: ‘Nuremburge anno,
etc., LXXº patronarum formarumque concordia et proporcione impressus.’
These words are exactly copied from the colophon of the _Catholicon_,
which is considered to have been printed by Gutenberg.
In 1472, Frederick Creusner and Anthony Koburger, the two most famous
Nuremberg printers, both began to print. They seem to have been
closely connected in business, and we sometimes find Creusner using
Koburger’s type; for instance, the _Poggius_ of 1475 by Creusner, and
the _Boethius_ of 1473 by Koburger, are in the same type. Most of the
early Nuremberg types are readily distinguished by the capital N, in
which the cross stroke slants the wrong way. Koburger was perhaps the
most important printer and publisher of the fifteenth century. He is
said to have employed twenty-four presses at Nuremberg, besides having
books printed for him in other towns. About 1480 he issued a most
interesting catalogue, of which there is a copy in the British Museum,
containing the titles of twenty-two books, not all, however, printed
by himself. In 1495 he printed also an advertisement of the _Nuremberg
Chronicles_.[14]
[14] These early book catalogues supply a very great deal of curious
information, and are very well worth careful study. An extremely good
article by Wilhelm Meyer, containing reprints of twenty-two, was issued
some years ago in the _Centralblatt für Bibliothekswesen_; and since
that time reprints of a few others have appeared in the same magazine.
Though Spire was not an important town in the history of printing, a
book was printed there as early as 1471. This was the _Postilla super
Apocalypsin_ [Hain, 13,310]. It is a quarto, printed in a rude Roman
type, but with a Gothic V. Two other works of Augustine and one of Huss
(_Gesta Christi_) are known, printed in a larger type, but without
date, place, or name of printer. It has usually been assumed, on what
grounds is not stated, that these books were printed by Peter Drach;
but as at present no book is known in this type with his name, it is
perhaps wiser to assign them to an unknown printer. Peter Drach’s first
dated book was issued in 1477, and the history of his press at this
time is particularly interesting. The type in which his _Vocabularius
utriusque Juris_ of May 1477 is printed, is absolutely the same as that
used in December of the same year for printing the _Vocabularius ex
quo_, printed, according to its colophon, by Nicholas Bechtermuntze at
Eltvil. On this subject it is best to quote Mr. Hessels’ own words, for
to him this discovery is due:[15]—
[15] _Gutenberg; Was he the Inventor of Printing?_ By J. H. Hessels.
London, 1882. 8vo. P. 181.
‘I may here observe that Type 3 [that of Bechtermuntze in 1477] is
exactly the same as that used by Peter Drach at Spire. When I received
this _Vocabulary_ [_ex quo_ of 1477] from Munich, the only book I had
seen of Drach was the _Leonardi de Utino Sermones_, published in 1479;
and it occurred to me that Bechtermuncze had probably ceased to print
about this time, and might have transferred his type to Drach. But this
appears not to have been the case, as Drach published already, on the
18th May 1477, the _Vocabularius Juris utriusque_, printed with the
very same type, and must therefore have been in possession of his type
simultaneously with Bechtermuncze. The question therefore arises, Did
Drach perhaps print the 1477 _Vocabulary_ for Nicolaus Bechtermuncze?’
This question must, unfortunately, be left for the present where Mr.
Hessels has left it, but it offers a most interesting point for further
research.
From 1477, Peter Drach continued to print at any rate to the end of
the fifteenth century; but it is perhaps possible that there were a
father and son of the same name, whose various books have not been
separated. The _Omeliarum opus_ of 1482 [Hain, 8789] is spoken of as
‘factore Petro Drach juniore in inclita Spirensium urbe impressum.’ The
only other interesting printers at Spire were the brothers John and
Conrad Hijst, whose names are found in the preface to an edition of the
_Philobiblon_ of Richard de Bury, which they, printed about 1483. They
used an ornamental Gothic type, generally confused with that belonging
to Reyser of Eichstadt, and their unsigned books are almost always
described by Hain and others as printed ‘typis Reyserianis.’
Only one printer is known to have been at Esslingen in the fifteenth
century. This was Conrad Fyner, who began to print in 1472, and
continued in the town till 1480. Though the first dated book is 1472,
it is most probable that several of the undated books should be placed
earlier. Fyner’s first small type is extremely like one used at
Strasburg by Eggestein, if indeed it is not identical, and their books
are constantly confused. In 1473, Fyner printed Gerson’s _Collectorium
super Magnificat_, the first book containing printed musical notes; and
in 1475, _P. Niger contra perfidos Judeos_, which contains the first
specimen of Hebrew type. One book in Fyner’s type [Hain, *9335] is said
to be printed by Johannes Hug de Goppingen. In 1481, Fyner moved to
Urach, where he printed one book, and after that date he disappears.
At Lavingen only one book is known to have been printed in the
fifteenth century. It is the _Augustinus de consensu evangelistarum_
[Hain, *1981], issued on April 12, 1473. Madden conjectures from the
appearance of the type and the capital letters that the book was
printed by John Zainer of Ulm. Both type and capitals, however, are
different, but their resemblance is quite natural considering the short
distance between Ulm and Lavingen.
At an early period Ulm was very important as a centre for wood
engraving, and several block-books are known to have been produced
there. An edition of the _Ars Moriendi_ is signed Ludwig ze Ulm, whom
Dr. Hassler conjectures to have been Ludwig Hohenwang. The earliest
printer that we find mentioned in a dated book is John Zainer of
Reutlingen, no doubt a relation of Gunther Zainer the printer at
Augsburg. He issued in 1473 a work by Boccaccio, _De præclaris
mulieribus_, illustrated with a number of woodcuts, and having also
woodcut initials and borders. He printed from this time to the end of
the century, many of his books being ornamented. Another printer at Ulm
to be noticed is Conrad Dinckmut, who printed from 1482 to 1496. He was
probably a wood engraver, for he illustrated many of his books with
woodcuts, and also produced a xylographic _Donatus_, of which there is
an imperfect copy in the Bodleian.
In 1473, printing was introduced into Merseburg by Luke Brandis, who
moved in 1475 to Lubeck. In 1475, also, Conrad Elyas began to print
at Breslau, and by 1480 no fewer than twenty-three towns had printing
presses. Between 1480 and 1490 the art was introduced into fifteen more
towns, and between 1490 and 1501 into twelve. So that the total number
of plates in Germany where printing was practised in the fifteenth
century is fifty.
Basle was the first city of Switzerland into which printing was
introduced, but it is hard to determine when this took place. The
earliest printer was Berthold Rodt, or Ruppel of Hanau, who is supposed
to be the same man as the Bertholdus of Hanau who figures in the
lawsuit of 1455 as a servant of Gutenberg. It is not till 1473, in the
colophon of the _Repertorium Vocabulorum_ of Conrad de Mure, that we
find either his name or a date; but many books are known printed in
the same type. One of these, the _Moralia in Job_ of St. Gregory, was
printed in or before 1468, for one copy contains a manuscript note
showing that it was bought in that year by Joseph de Vergers, an
ecclesiastic of Mainz. About 1474, Berthold began to print a Bible,
but finished only the first volume, dying, it is supposed, about that
time. The second volume was printed by Bernard Richel, and is dated
1475. The most important printers of Basle were Wenssler, Amorbach,
and Froben. About 1469, Helyas de Louffen, a canon of the Abbey of
Beromunster, began to print, and in 1470 issued the _Mammotrectus_ of
Marchesinus, finished on the Vigil of St. Martin, the exact day and
year in which Schœffer finished his edition of the same book. Bernard
says that the two editions are certainly different, and could not have
been copied one from the other, so that the similarity of date must be
looked upon as a curious coincidence. This _Mammotrectus_ is the first
dated book issued in Switzerland, and is printed in the most remarkable
Gothic type used anywhere in the fifteenth century. Many of the capital
letters if found by themselves could not be read, and it is a type
which once seen can never be forgotten. At the foot of each column in
the book is a letter which looks like a signature, but which is put
there for the purpose of a number to the column. Helyas de Louffen died
in 1475, having printed about eight books, some in Gothic and some in
Roman type.
Before the end of the fifteenth century printing presses were at work
in five other towns of Switzerland: Geneva (1478), Promentour (1482),
Lausanne (1493), Trogen (1497), and Sursee (1500).
CHAPTER IV.
ITALY.
Italian historians have several times attempted to bring forward
Pamphilo Castaldi as the inventor of printing. It is little use to
recapitulate here the various unsupported assertions on which this
claim is based,—a claim which, if it ever had, has now ceased to have
any sensible supporters.
We may safely assume, with our present knowledge, that the art of
printing was introduced into Italy in 1465 by two Germans, Conrad
Sweynheym and Arnold Pannartz. On their arrival in Italy they
settled first in the Monastery of Saint Scholastica at Subiaco, an
establishment of Benedictines, of which Cardinal Turrecremata was
Abbot, where they would be in congenial society, since, as Cardinal
Quirini says, many of the inmates were Germans.
The first book which they printed was a _Donatus pro puerulis_, of
which they said in their list, printed in 1472, ‘unde imprimendi
initium sumpsimus.’ Unfortunately, of this _Donatus_ no copy is known,
though rumours of a copy in a private collection in Italy have from
time to time been circulated. The earliest book from their press of
which copies are in existence, is the Cicero _De Oratore_, printed
before 30th September 1465.[16] It has been always a moot point whether
this Cicero _De Oratore_ or the Mainz _Ciceronis Officia et Paradoxa_,
printed in the same year, can justly claim to be the first printed
Latin classic, while the claims of the _De Officiis_ of Zel, which,
though, undated, is very probably as early, have been entirely ignored.
[16] This book has usually been dated later than the _Lactantius_, that
is, after 29th October 1465; but M. Fumagalli, in his _Dei primi libri
a stampa in Italia_, Lugano, 1875, 8vo, describes a copy containing a
manuscript note dated ‘Pridie Kal. Octobres, M.cccc.lxv.,’ so that the
_Cicero_ must be considered the first known book printed in Italy. On
the other hand, it should be noticed that some authorities consider the
inscription to be a forgery.
The Subiaco _De Oratore_ is a large quarto of 109 leaves, with thirty
lines to the page. Like the first German books, it is beautifully
printed, and shows few signs of being an early production. Sweynheym
and Pannartz must have learnt their business carefully, for this their
first book is printed by half sheets, _i.e._ two pages at a time,
though other printers were still printing their quartos page by page.
On the 29th October 1465 these printers issued their first dated book,
the first edition of Lactantius _De divinis institutionibus_. Of this
book 275 copies were printed. It is a small folio of 188 leaves, and
thirty-six lines to the page, printed in a type which, though Roman,
is very Gothic in appearance, and is sometimes called semi-Gothic. The
smaller letters have a curious resemblance to those used by Zainer at
Ulm and by Schussler at Augsburg in their earliest books, though the
capital letters are quite different.
The fourth and last book printed by Sweynheym and Pannartz at Subiaco
was an edition of the _De civitate dei_ of Saint Augustine. This is a
large folio, of 270 leaves, with two columns, and forty-four lines to
the page. It was issued on the 12th June 1467; and though it contains
no name of either printer or place, can be easily identified by the
type. A copy in the Bibliothèque Nationale has an extremely interesting
manuscript note, which tells us that Leonardus Dathus, ‘Episcopus
Massanus,’ bought the book from the Germans themselves, living at Rome,
who were producing innumerable books of that sort by means of printing,
not writing, in November 1467, This note is valuable in two ways; it
puts it beyond doubt who the printers of the book were, and it also
enables us to determine more precisely the date when they left Subiaco.
The _Augustine_ was finished in June, and by November the printers were
at Rome. As they issued a book in Rome in 1467, and would take some
time to settle in their new establishment and prepare their new types,
we may take it as probable that they left the Monastery of Subiaco as
soon as possible after the printing of the _Augustine_.
About June, then, Sweynheym and Pannartz left the Monastery of Subiaco
and transferred their printing materials to Rome, finding a home in
a house belonging to the brothers Peter and Francis de Maximis. The
semi-Gothic fount of type which had been used at Subiaco was discarded
in favour of one more Roman in character, though heavily cut and not so
graceful as the Venetian of the same period. A curious appearance is
given to it by the invariable use of the long s. Their first venture
was again a work of Cicero, the _Epistolæ ad familiares_, a large
quarto of thirty-one lines to the page. It has the following colophon:—
‘Hoc Conradus opus Suueynheym ordine miro
Arnoldusque simul pannarts una aede colendi
Gente theotonica: romæ expediere sodales.
In domo Petri de Maximo. M.CCCC.LXVII.’
From this time forward, under the able supervision of the Bishop of
Aleria, Sweynheym and Pannartz continued to print with the greatest
industry, but they did not meet with the support which they merited.
In 1472 they had become so badly off that a letter was written to Pope
Sixtus IV. pointing out their distress, and asking for assistance. This
letter, printed on one sheet, is usually found in the fifth volume of
Nicholas de Lyra’s _Commentary on the Bible_, printed in 1472. Its
great bibliographical interest lies in the fact that the printers gave
a list of what they had printed and the number of copies they issued.
In the list twenty-eight works are mentioned, and the number of volumes
amounted altogether to 11,475. They usually issued 275 copies of each
work which they printed.
This list also clearly shows the extraordinary influence of the new
learning so actively promoted by Cosmo de Medici and encouraged by his
grandson Lorenzo. The majority of the books in this list are classics,
either in their original Latin or in Latin translations from the Greek;
and that the printers were anxious to benefit scholars, is shown by
the assertion of the Bishop of Aleria in the prefatory letter to the
_Ciceronis Epistolæ ad Atticum_ of 1470, where it is said that they had
produced their editions of Cicero at the lowest possible price, “ad
pauperum commoditatem.”
To judge from the results, the appeal to the Pope was of little
effect, for in 1473 Conrad Sweynheym gave up the business of printing,
and confined his attention to engraving on metal; while Pannartz
continued to print by himself up till the end of 1476, issuing in
those three years about twelve books. The last book on which Pannartz
was engaged was a new edition of the _Letters of St. Jerome_, but he
only finished one volume. Three years later, George Laver, who seems
to have acquired the type, issued the second volume. It is therefore
quite probable, as is generally asserted, that Pannartz died in 1476
or early in 1477. Sweynheym, ever since he had given up printing, had
been engaged in engraving a series of maps to illustrate Ptolemy’s
_Geography_; but, after working three years upon them, died before they
were finished. The edition of Ptolemy was finally issued in 1478 by
Arnold Buckinck, a German, who in his preface said that he was anxious
‘that the emendations of Calderinus--who also died before the book
was printed--and the results of Sweynheym’s most ingenious mechanical
contrivances might not be lost to the learned world.’
‘Magister vero Conradus Sweynheym, Germanus, a quo formandorum Romæ
librorum ars primum profecta est, occasione hinc sumpta posteritati
consulens animum primum ad hanc doctrinam capescendam applicuit.
Subinde mathematicis adhibitis viris quemadmodum tabulis eneis
imprimerentur edocuit, triennioque in hac cura consumpto diem obiit.
In cujus vigilarum laborumque partem non inferiori ingenio ac studio
Arnoldus Buckinck e Germania vir apprime eruditus ad imperfectum opus
succedens, ne Domitii Conradique obitu eorum vigilæ emendationesque
sine testimonio perirent neve virorum eruditorum censuram fugerent
immensæ subtilitatis machinimenta, examussim ad unum perfecit.’
The book contains twenty-seven maps, each map being printed on two
separate leaves facing each other, and printed only on one side. The
letters which occur on the maps in the names of places are evidently
punched from single dies, and not cut on the plate, as would have been
expected. The letterpress of the book is not printed in any type used
by Sweynheym or Pannartz, which shows that Buckinck was the absolute
printer of the book.
Ulric Hahn, who contests with Sweynheym and Pannartz for the honour of
having introduced printing into Rome, issued as his first book, in
1467, the _Meditations_ of Cardinal Torquemada, better known perhaps as
Turrecremata. It is illustrated with thirty-three woodcuts of inferior
execution, and is printed in a large Gothic type. This type the printer
discarded the following year for one of Roman letter; but odd types
from the Gothic fount frequently make their appearance among the
Roman, and serve as a means of distinguishing Hahn’s books from others
in similar Roman type. As a case in point, we may mention the early
and probably first edition of _Catullus_, wrongly ascribed to Andrea
Belfortis of Ferrara and other printers. This book is in Hahn’s Roman
type, and contains three capital letters from his Gothic fount;—a more
sure means of identification than a fancied allusion to a printer’s
name.[17] For a short time, from 1470 to 1472, Hahn’s books were edited
by Campanus, a scholar of such fame and erudition, that the printer was
able to rival Sweynheym and Pannartz, with their editor the Bishop of
Aleria; but on Campanus taking his departure for Ratisbon, the prestige
of Hahn’s press declined. From the pen of Campanus came perhaps the
punning colophons which play upon the name of Hahn, in Latin, Gallus,
meaning in English a cock. Upon the departure of Campanus, Hahn, took
in partnership one Simon Nicolai Chardella of Lucca, who seems to have
supplied the money as well as superintended the publishing, and they
continued to work together till 1474. From this date till 1478, Hahn
continued to work alone, ending in that year as he had begun, with an
edition of the _Meditationes_ of Torquemada. His former partner, Simon
Nicolai, started a press on his own account, having as an associate his
cousin.
[17] The edition of _Catullus_, mentioned above, is ascribed to Andrea
Belfortis, because the words ‘cui Francia nomen’ occur in the prefatory
verses; and the same words occur, referring to Belfortis, in a book
printed by him. But the types of the _Catullus_ and those used by
Andrea Belfortis are certainly different, while both the types of the
_Catullus_ are found in other books printed by Hahn. The _Catullus_
has also a Registrum Chartarum, which was almost invariably put to his
books by Hahn.
The latest writer[18] on the early history of printing in Venice has
again revived the question as to the correctness of the date of the
_Decor Puellarum_. Though he still clings to the possibility of the
date 1461 being trustworthy, the weight of evidence, all of which is
carefully stated, is decisively in favour of its being a misprint for
1471.
[18] _The Venetian Printing Press._ By Horatio F. Brown. London, 1891.
4to.
It would be useless to recapitulate here all the arguments in favour of
Jenson having printed in 1461, when it is now generally admitted that
John of Spire was the first printer at Venice, and that his first book
was the _Epistolæ familiares_ of Cicero, issued in 1469. Of this book
only one hundred copies were printed. On the 18th September 1469, the
Collegio of Venice granted to John of Spire a monopoly of printing in
that district for five years; and this document distinctly indicates
that he was the first printer at Venice. He did not, however, live to
obtain the advantage of this privilege, ‘nullius est vigoris quia obiit
magister et auctor,’ says a contemporary marginal note to the record,
for he died in 1470. Previous to his death he printed a _Pliny_, the
first volume of a _Livy_, two editions of the _Epistolæ ad familiares_,
and part of the Augustine _De civitate dei_, which was finished by his
brother Windelin.
‘Subita sed morte peremptus
Non potuit cœptum Venetis finire volumen.’
Windelin of Spire was a very prolific printer, and continued to issue
books without intermission from the time of his brother’s death, in
1470, to his own in 1478. But among the early Venetian printers the
most important was certainly Nicholas Jenson. A Frenchman by birth,
he passed his apprenticeship in the Paris Mint, and became afterwards
the head of the Mint at Tours. In 1458, in consequence of the stories
of the invention of printing, he was sent by Charles VII. to Mainz
to learn the art, and introduce it into France. Jenson returned in
1461, when Louis XI. had just been crowned; but he does not seem to
have settled in France, and we first hear of him again in 1470 as a
printer at Venice. From 1470 to 1480 he printed continuously, issuing,
according to Sardini, at least one hundred and fifty-five editions,
though this number must be considerably under the mark. His will was
drawn up on the 7th September 1480, and he died in the same month. The
fame of Jenson rests on the extraordinary beauty of his Roman type,
of which he had but one fount, and which, though frequently copied,
was never equalled. In 1474 he began to use Gothic type, owing to its
great saving of space; and in 1471, in the _Epistolæ familiares_, he
used Greek type in the quotations, the first instance of its employment
in Venice. It is curious that, with its devotion to the new learning,
Venice should not have been the first to issue a Greek book. Jenson
had frequently to use Greek type in his books, but he never printed a
complete work in that language. Milan led the way, printing the _Greek
Grammar_ of Lascaris in 1476; and it was not till 1485 that Venice
issued its first Greek book, the _Erotemata_ of Chrysoloras.
In 1470, another German, Christopher Valdarfer of Ratisbon, began to
print. He left Venice in 1473, and settled at Milan, and the books
which he printed at the former-place are very rare and few in number.
The best known is the _Decameron_ of 1471, the first edition of the
book, familiar to all readers of Dibdin.
In 1471 was issued the _De medicinis universalibus_, printed by Clemens
Sacerdos (Clement of Padua), the first Italian printer in Venice; and
in the year following, Philippus Petri,[19] the first native Venetian
printer, began to print.
[19] This printer’s name seems to have led to a certain amount of
confusion. He was Filippo the son of Piero, in Latin, Philippus Petri;
but after his father’s death, about the end of 1477, he calls himself
Philippus quondam Petri, Filippo son of the late Piero.
Between 1470 and 1480 at least fifty printers were at work in Venice,
and among the most important were John de Colonia, John Manthen de
Gerretzem, Erhard Ratdolt, Octavianus Scotus. Erhard Ratdolt is
especially of importance, for he was practically the first to introduce
wood engravings in his books. In 1476, Ratdolt and his partners, Peter
Loeslein and Bernard Pictor, began their work together by issuing
a _Calendar_ of Regiomontanus, with a very beautiful title-page
surrounded by a woodcut border. From that time onwards, woodcuts were
used in many Venetian books; and at last, in 1499, there appeared there
that unsurpassed illustrated book the _Hypnerotomachia_ of Franciscus
Columna.
The history of the later Venetian press during the last ten years of
the fifteenth century would require at least a volume. So far as the
history of typography itself is concerned, there is nothing of interest
to be noticed; but in the general history of printing Venice holds the
highest place; for more printers printed there than in any other city
of Europe. Of course, amongst this endless outpour of the press many
important books were issued, but there are few which have any interest
for the historian of printing.
There is, however, one printer who must always make this period
celebrated. Aldus Manutius was born at Bassiano in 1450, and began to
print at Venice in 1494. His main idea when he commenced to work was to
print Greek books; and it was perhaps for that reason that he settled
in Venice, where so many manuscripts were preserved, and where so many
Greeks resided. His first two books, both issued in 1494, are the
_Galeomyomachia_ and the _De Herone et Leandro_ of Musæus. In 1496 he
obtained a copyright for twenty years in such Greek books as he might
print, and from this time forward a large number were issued as fast as
possible. So great was the hurry, that the editors in some cases did
not scruple to hand over to the compositors the original manuscripts
themselves from which the edition was taken, with their own emendations
and corrections scribbled upon them. But this custom was not confined
to the Aldine press, for Martin[20] tells us that the Codex Ravennas of
Aristophanes was actually used by the compositors as the working copy
from which part of the Giunta edition of 1515 was set up.
[20] Martin, _Les scholies du Manuscrit d’Aristophane à Ravenna_.
In 1499, Aldus married the daughter of Andrea de Torresani, himself
a great printer, and in 1500 founded the Aldine Academy, the home of
so many editors, and the source of so many scholarly editions of the
sixteenth century. The end of the fifteenth century saw, at any rate,
two rivals in Greek printing to Aldus: Gabriel da Brasichella, who with
his associates published in 1498 the _Epistles of Phalaris_ and _Æsop’s
Fables_; and, in 1499, Zaccharia Caliergi of Crete, who printed with
others or alone up till 1509. Caliergi, it would appear, was hardly a
rival of Aldus; they were, at any rate, so far friendly that Aldus sold
Caliergi’s editions along with his own.
In 1476 a press was set up at Foligno, in the house of Emilianus de
Orsinis, by John Numeister, a native of Mainz, who is generally said
to have been an associate and pupil of Gutenberg. This story seems to
be founded upon an assertion put forward by Fischer, that a copy of
the _Tractatus de celebratione missarum_, in the University Library at
Mainz, contains a rubric stating that the book was printed by Gutenberg
and Numeister in 1463. If this note ever existed, which is very
doubtful, it is clearly a forgery, for the book in which it is said to
occur was not printed till about 1480.
The first book in which we find Numeister’s name is the _De bello
Italico contra Gothos_, by Aretinus, printed in 1470; and about the
same date he printed an edition of the _Epistolæ familiares_ of
Cicero. In 1472 appeared the first edition of _Dante_; between that
year and 1479 we hear nothing of Numeister. In 1479 an edition of the
_Meditationes_ of Turrecremata appeared with his name, printed in a
large church type, not unlike, though not, as is often said, the same
as, the type of the forty-two line Bible, and containing very fine
engraved cuts. This book is generally stated, for some unknown reason,
to have been printed at Mainz. After this date we find no further
mention of Numeister; but M. Claudin[21] has written a monograph to
show that he was the printer of the edition of the _Meditationes_
of Turrecremata issued at Albi in 1481, a book remarkable for its
wonderful engravings on metal, and of the _Missale Lugdunense_,
printed at Lyons in 1487, which is stated in the colophon to have been
printed by ‘Magistrum Jo. alemanum de magontia impressorem.’
[21] _Origine de l’Imprimerie à Albi et en Languedoc._
After 1470 the spread of printing in Italy was very rapid. In 1471 we
find it beginning at Bologna, Ferrara, Florence, Milan, Naples, Pavia,
and Treviso.
The first complete edition of _Ovid_ was produced in 1471, and is the
first book printed at Bologna, the printer being Balthasar Azzoguidi,
‘primus in sua civitate artis impressoriæ inventor,’ as he calls
himself in the preface to the book. Andrea Portilia must also have been
amongst the earliest printers at Bologna, though his only dated book is
1473, for in that year he returned to Parma. Among the many printers
who worked in the town, none are better known, from the frequency with
which their names occur in colophons, than the various members of the
family ‘de Benedictis,’ who worked from 1488 onwards.
Andreas Belfortis, a Frenchman, was the first to print at Ferrara,
issuing in 1471 at least three books, of which the earliest, published
in July, is an edition of _Martial_ (which has catchwords to the quires
in the latter portion). This was followed by editions of _Poggio_ and
_Augustinus Dathus_. Belfortis continued to print till 1493. A certain
Augustinus Carner, who printed a few books between 1474 and 1476,
printed in 1475 the rare _Teseide_ of Boccaccio, the first printed
poem in the Italian language. De Rossi, in his tract, _De typographia
Ebræo-Ferrariensi_, gives a long description of some Hebrew books
printed at Ferrara in 1477, which must be the first printed in that
language, though some words are found in a book printed at Esslingen in
1475.
The first printer at Milan was Anthony Zarotus, and his earliest book,
with both name and date, is the _Virgil_ of 1472. In the previous
year, four books had been issued without any printer’s name, but the
identity of the type with that of the _Virgil_ shows Zarotus to have
printed these also. Mention has often been made of a certain _Terence_,
printed in 1470, March 13. It is quoted by Hain (15,371), who had not
seen it, and by Panzer (ii. 11. 2), and a copy was said to be in the
library of the Earl of Pembroke, the home of many mysterious books. It
is often quoted as the first book with signatures. It was doubtless a
copy of the edition of March 13, 1481, in which some ingenious person
had erased the last two figures, xi, of the date. It is very probable
that there was at first some connection between Zarotus and Philip de
Lavagna; and it was perhaps at the latter’s expense, and through his
means, that Zarotus first printed. Certainly, in the colophon of a book
printed in 1473, probably by Christopher Valdarfer, are the words ‘per
Philippum de Lavagnia, hujus artis stampandi in hac urbe primum latorem
atque inventorem;’ but it is quite possible that the words should not
be taken in too narrow a sense, and that Philip de Lavagna simply means
to speak of himself as the first person to introduce printing into
Milan, not as printer, but as patron.
The history of the first printers in this town is very interesting,
for they entered into various partnerships, and the documents relating
to these have been preserved and published,[22] throwing a good deal of
light on some of the customs and methods of the early printers. In 1476
was printed at Milan the _Grammar_ of Constantine Lascaris, the first
book printed in Greek; and in 1481, a Greek version of the _Psalms_,
the first portion of the Bible printed in this language.
[22] Saxius, _Bibliothecá scriptorum Mediolanensium_. Milan, 1745. Fol.
At Florence, Bernard Cennini, the celebrated goldsmith and assistant of
Ghiberti, printed, with the assistance of two of his sons, an edition
of the Commentary of Servius on Virgil. It was begun towards the end
of 1471, and not finished till October 1472, but is the first book
printed at Florence. This is the only book known to have been printed
by Cennini; but it is not unlikely that in his capacity of goldsmith
he did work for other printers in cutting type. The most interesting
press at Florence in the fifteenth century, was that founded in the
Monastery of St. James of Ripoli by Dominic de Pistoia, the head of
the establishment. Beginning with a _Donatus_, of which every copy has
disappeared, it was carried on briskly up till the time of his death
in 1484, issuing, according to Hain, just over fifty works; according
to De Rossi, nearly one hundred. The account books connected with
this press have been preserved, and from them we can learn the price
of the various articles used by the printers, such as paper, ink,
type-metal. Several kinds of paper are mentioned, and identified, as a
rule, by their watermarks. We have paper from Fabriano with the mark of
a crossbow, a different paper from the same place marked with a cross,
and two sorts of paper from Pescia marked with spectacles and a glove.
There are several celebrated books printed at Florence before 1500
which cannot be passed over. In 1477 was issued the _Monte Santo di
Dio_, said to contain the first copperplate engraving; and in 1481, the
celebrated _Dante_, with engravings by Baccio Baldini after the designs
of Botticelli. Most copies of this book contain only a few of the
plates, while about eight copies are known with the full number. Some
celebrated Greek books also were issued at Florence, notably in 1488
the first edition of _Homer_ printed by Demetrius Chalcondylas at the
expense of two brothers, Bernardus and Nerius Nerlii. There is a copy
of this book in the British Museum, which was bought by Mr. Barnard,
librarian to George III., for seven shillings. One complete copy on
vellum is known, in the library of St. Mark’s at Venice.
Towards the end of the fifteenth century, Francis de Alopa printed five
Greek books entirely in capital letters, the _Anthologia_ of 1494,
_Callimachus_, _Euripides_ (four plays only), _Apollonius Rhodius_,
1496, _Poetae Gnomici_, and _Musæus_. It is very probable that the
‘editio princeps’ of _Lucian_, which was printed at Florence, but is
ascribed by Ebert to Caliergi at Venice, was also printed at this press.
Under the patronage of Ferdinand I., King of Naples, Sixtus Riessinger
of Strasburg began to print there in 1471, and continued till 1479.
He seems to have been in high favour with the king, who offered
him a bishopric, which was, however, refused. In 1472, Arnaldus de
Bruxella set up his press, using (unlike most other printers) Roman
type only. The large M and small _y_ are of a curious form and easily
recognisable, while the final _us_ in words is always represented by
an abbreviation. Most of the books printed by him are rare; of the
_Horace_ and _Petrarch_, only single copies are known; and it was
for the sake of acquiring these two books, so Dibdin tells us, that
Lord Spencer bought the Cassano Library. Hain mentions seventeen
books printed by this Arnaldus de Bruxella, and out of that number he
had seen only one. Van der Meersch gives twenty-three; but some are
doubtful.
Pavia is more celebrated for the number of books it produced than for
their interest, and it is only mentioned here as one of the towns to
which printing is said to have been introduced in 1471.
The last town to be mentioned in this group is Treviso, where, in 1471,
that wandering printer Gerardus de Lisa began to print. In his first
year he printed several books, but his industry gradually got less.
In 1477 we find him at Venice, in 1480 at Cividad di Friuli (Civitas
Austriæ), and in 1484 at Udina.
1472 saw printing established in Cremona, Mantua, Monreale, Padua,
Parma, and Verona, and from this time onwards it spread rapidly over
the whole of Italy, being introduced into seventy-one towns before
the end of the fifteenth century. For the study of typography the
Italian presses are not nearly so interesting as those of other
countries, but from a literary point of view they are immeasurably
superior. The Renaissance movement had been at work in Italy during
the whole of the fifteenth century, and the great impetus given by the
fall of Constantinople was acting most powerfully when the printing
press was introduced. Italy was then the sole guardian of the ancient
civilisation, and was prepared for a more rapid method of reproducing
its early treasures and spreading the learning of its newer scholars.
CHAPTER V.
FRANCE.
A curious prelude has been discovered within the last few years to the
history of the introduction of printing into France. L’Abbé Requin,
searching through the archives of Avignon, brought to light a series of
entries relating to printing, ‘ars scribendi artificialiter,’ as it is
there called, dated as far back as the year 1444.[23]
[23] _L’Imprimerie à Avignon en 1444._ By L’Abbé Requin. Paris, 1890.
_Origines de Imprimerie en France_ (Avignon, 1444). By L’Abbé Requin.
Paris, 1891. _Les Origines de l’Imprimerie à Avignon._ Par M. Duhamel.
1890.
The information obtained from the notarial books, fairly complete
in its way, is as follows:—A certain silversmith, named Procopius
Waldfoghel of Prague, was settled at Avignon by the beginning of
1444, and was working at printing, in conjunction with a student of
the university, Manaudus Vitalis, whom he had supplied with printing
materials.
In a notarial act of the 4th July of that year, the following materials
are mentioned:—‘Duo abecedaria calibis et duas formas ferreas,
unum instrumentum calibis vocatum vitis, quadraginta octo formas
stangni necnon diversas alias formas ad artem scribendi pertinentes.’
Waldfoghel was evidently the maker of the materials and the teacher of
the art, and he seems to have supplied his apprentices with such tools
as would enable them to print for themselves.
In 1444, besides Manaudus Vitalis, Waldfoghel had as apprentices,
Girardus Ferrose of Treves, Georgius de la Jardina, Arnaldus de
Cosselhac, and a Jew named Davinus de Cadarossia.
From a document dated 10th March 1446, we learn that Waldfoghel,
having two years previously taught the art of printing to the Jew, had
promised to cut for him a set of twenty-seven Hebrew letters and to
give him certain other materials. In return for this, the Jew was to
teach him to dye in a particular way all kinds of textile material, and
to keep secret all he learnt on the art of printing.
In another document, of 5th April 1446, relating to the partnership of
Waldfoghel, Manaudus Vitalis, and Amaldus de Cosselhac, and the selling
of his share to the remaining two by Vitalis, we have mention made of
‘nonnulla instrumenta sive artificia causa artificialiter scribendi,
tam de ferro, de callibe, de cupro, de lethono, de plumbo, de stagna et
de fuste.’
There seems to be no doubt that these various entries refer to printing
with movable types; they cannot refer to xylographic printing, nor to
stencilling. At the same time, there is no evidence to point to any
particular kind of printing; and the various materials mentioned would
rather make it appear that the Avignon invention was some method of
stamping letters or words from cut type, than printing from cast type
in a press. Until some specimen is found of this Avignon work, from
which some definite knowledge can be obtained, the question must be
left undecided, for it is useless to try to extract from words capable
of various renderings any exact meaning. Our information at present
is only sufficient to enable us to say that some kind of printing was
being practised at Avignon as early as 1444. It seems, too, impossible
that, had this invention been printing of the ordinary kind; nothing
more should have come of the experiment; and we know of no printing in
France before 1470.
_Les neuf Preux_, the only block-book executed in France, has been
already noticed. It is considered to have been printed at Paris about
1455.
The first printing press was naturally started at Paris, the great
centre of learning and culture, and it seems strange that so important
an invention should not have been introduced earlier than 1470. Many
specimens of the art had been seen, for Fust in 1466 and Schœffer in
1468 had visited the capital to sell their books. If we may believe
the manuscript preserved in the library of the Arsenal, the French
King, in October 1458, sent out Nicholas Jenson to learn the art; but
he, ‘on his return to France, finding Charles VII. dead, set up his
establishment elsewhere.’ Probably a strong antagonism to the new art
would be shown by the immense number of professional copyists and
scribes who gained their livelihood in connection with the university,
though the demand for manuscripts continued in France for some time
after the introduction of printing. Many of the wealthy, moreover,
refused to recognise the innovation, and admitted no printed book
into their libraries, so that the scribes were not at once deprived
of employment. Many of these men who had been employed in producing
manuscripts, soon turned to the new art as a means of employment,
becoming themselves printers, or assisting in the production of books,
as rubricators or illuminators.
In 1470, thanks to the exertions of Jean Heynlyn and Guillaume Fichet,
both men of high position in the University of Paris, a printing press
was set up in the precincts of the Sorbonne by three Germans, Martin
Crantz, Ulrich Gering of Constance, and Michael Friburger of Colmar.
The first book they issued was _Gasparini Pergamensis Epistolarum
Opus_, a quarto of 118 leaves, with a prefatory letter to Heynlyn,
which fixes the date of its production in 1470, and an interesting
colophon—
‘Ut sol lumen, sic doctrinam fundis in orbem,
Musarum nutrix, regia Parisius.
Hinc prope divinam, tu, quam Germania novit,
Artem scribendi suscipe promerita.
Primos ecce libros quos hæc industria finxit
Francorum in terris, ædibus atque tuis.
Michael, Udalricus Martinusque magistri
Hos impresserunt ac facient alios.’
The classical taste of the patrons of the first press is strongly
shown by its productions, for within the first three years a most
important series of classical books had been published. _Florus_ and
_Sallust_ (both first editions), _Terence_, Virgil’s _Eclogues_ and
_Georgics_, _Juvenal_ and _Persius_, Cicero’s _Tusculan Disputations_,
and _Valerius Maximus_, are amongst the books they issued.
In 1470-71 these printers finished thirteen books, while in the
following year, before moving from the Sorbonne, they printed no
less than seventeen. Some time towards the end of 1472 they left
the Sorbonne and migrated to the Rue St. Jacques, where two other
printers--Kaiser and Stoll--were already settled in partnership at the
sign of the Green Ball (Intersignium viridis follis).
In 1472 was issued the _Gasparini Orthographia_. The copy of this
book in the library at Basle contains a unique supplementary letter
from Fichet to Robert Gaguin, in which is the following interesting
statement about the invention of printing:—‘Report says that there
(in Germany), not far from the city of Mainz (Ferunt enim illic, haud
procul a civitate Maguncia), there was a certain John, whose surname
was Gutenberg, who first of any thought out the art of printing ... by
which art books are printed from metal letters.’[24]
[24] Mr. Hessels, in his _Haarlem the Birthplace of Printing, not
Mentz_, attempts to weaken the value of this evidence, and translates
‘ferunt enim illic’ as ‘a rumour current in Germany,’—a striking
example of ingenious mistranslation. ‘Illic’ is, of course, to be taken
with what follows, and is further defined by ‘haud procul a civitate
Maguncia.’
Between the two printing offices in the Rue St. Jacques a keen spirit
of rivalry arose; and this was carried to such an extent, that no
sooner was a book printed by one than another edition was issued by the
other--a sign that the demand for such books must have been large. The
earliest type used by these first printers is an exquisite Roman, the
letters being more square than the best Roman type of Venice, and far
surpassing it in beauty. Round brackets are used, and all the generally
used stops are found. The first type of Kaiser and Stoll is also Roman,
with neat and very distinctive capitals, and the small _l_ has a short
stroke coming out on the left side about half-way up, a peculiarity
still retained in all the Roman type belonging to the ‘Imprimerie
Nationale.’ The popular taste seems to have been for Gothic type, and
very few printers made use of Roman before the year 1500.
[Illustration: PAGE OF FIRST PARIS BOOK.]
About 1478, Gering’s two partners, Crantz and Friburger, left him; but
he himself continued to print on for many years. About this date, too,
the character of the books issued from the Paris presses began entirely
to change. In 1477, Pasquier Bonhomme had issued the first French book
printed in that city, the _Grandes Chroniques de France_, and from this
time forward classical books were neglected, and nothing printed but
romances and chronicles, service-books and grammars, and such books
as were in popular demand. During the twelve or fourteen years after
the first French book appeared, not one classical book a year was
issued; and it was not till 1495, the year of Charles VIII.’s return
from Italy, that the printing of classical books began to revive and
increase.
In 1485, Antoine Verard, the most important figure in the early
history of Parisian printing, begins his career with an edition of the
_Decameron_. He was, however, more of a publisher than a printer, the
majority of the books which contain his name having been printed for
him by other printers. From his establishment came numberless editions
of chronicles and romances, some copies of which were printed on vellum
and illuminated. A very fine series of such books is now in the British
Museum; these were originally bought by Henry VII., and formed part of
the old Royal Library.
Among the more important printers who printed before 1490 should be
mentioned Guy Marchant, Jean du Pré, Guillaume le Fèvre, Antoine
Cayllaut, Pierre Levet, Pierre le Rouge, and Jean Higman. Levet is
especially interesting, for the type which came into Caxton’s hands
about 1490, and was used afterwards by Wynkyn de Worde in some of his
earlier books, was either obtained from him or from the type-cutter who
cut his type, for the two founts seem to be identical. Guy Marchant is
celebrated as the printer of some curious editions of the _Dance of
Death_.
After 1490 the number of printers and stationers increased rapidly.
Panzer enumerates no fewer than eighty-five printers, and nearly 800
books executed during the fifteenth century; and there is no doubt
that his estimate is considerably under the mark. The most important
productions of the Parisian press at that time were service-books, of
which enormous numbers were issued. The best known publisher of such
works was Simon Vostre, who, with the assistance of the printer Philip
Pigouchet, began to issue _Books of Hours_, printed on vellum, with
exquisite borders and illustrations. These books began to be issued
about 1488, and commence with an almanac for the years 1488 to 1508. In
many cases the printers did not take the trouble to make new almanacs,
but were content to copy the old; indeed, we find the same almanac in
use ten years later. This has led to a great deal of confusion in the
bibliography of the subject, for it is a common custom of librarians
and cataloguers to ascribe the printing of a book of this class to the
date which occurs first in the almanac, when there is no date given in
the colophon. The most celebrated publishers of these books were Simon
Vostre, Philippe Pigouchet, Antoine Verard, Thielman Kerver, Gilles
Hardouyn, Guillaume Eustace, Guillaume Godard, and François Regnault.
Vostre and Verard do not seem themselves to have printed, but were
merely publishers, far the most important printer being Pigouchet. Of
the nine or ten _Books of Hours_ for the use of Sarum, printed abroad
during the fifteenth century, Pigouchet probably printed half, and
all but two were printed in Paris. In examining early foreign-printed
English service-books, it is curious to notice that while nearly all
the _Horæ_ were printed at Paris, the majority of Breviaries were
printed at Venice, and only two at Paris. No _Horæ_ is known to have
been printed at Venice.
The end of the century saw the commencement of the celebrated Ascensian
press, the rival in some ways of the Aldine. The founder, Jodocus
Badius Ascensius (Josse Bade of Asch), was a man of great learning,
and was for a time professor of humanity at Lyons, and press-corrector
to Trechsel, whose daughter he married. Trechsel died in 1498, and in
1499, at the invitation of Robert Gaguin, Badius came to Paris and
established himself there as a teacher of Greek and a printer. It was
not, however, till 1504 that the Ascensian press became important.
It is curious to notice that, in spite of the classical tastes of the
first promoters of printing in Paris, and the enormous development of
printing in that city towards the end of the fifteenth century, no
Greek book was produced till 1507. Through the exertions of François
Tissard of Amboise, who had studied Greek in Italy, and was anxious to
introduce Greek learning into France, Gilles Gourmont set up a press
provided with Greek types, and issued in 1507 a book entitled βίβλοϛ
ἡ γνωμαγυρικήο, a small grammatical treatise, the first Greek book
printed in France. From the same press, in the year following, came
the first Hebrew book printed in France, a Hebrew grammar, written
by Tissard. Greek printing, however, did not flourish; the supply of
type was meagre and the demand for books small,[25] and it was not
till 1528, in which year _Sophocles_, _Aristophanes_, _Lucian_, and
_Demosthenes_ were issued, that any signs of a revival were to be seen.
[25] Aleander in 1512, in the preface to his _Lexicon Græco-Latinum_,
complained that the stock of Greek type was so meagre, that sometimes
letters had to be left out here and there, and the work was often at a
standstill for days.
Lyons was the second city in France to receive the art of printing,
and it was introduced into that town by Guillaume le Roy of Liège
soon after 1470. The first dated book, the _Compendium_ of Innocent
III., appeared in September 1473. From its colophon we learn that it
was printed at the expense of Bartholomieu Buyer, a citizen of Lyons;
and we know from other colophons that the press was set up in Buyer’s
house. Bernard doubts whether Buyer was himself a printer, though he
is certainly mentioned as such in several books, such as _La légende
dorée_ of 1476. _Le miroir de vie humaine_, and _La légende des saintz_
of 1477, which are described in their colophons as ‘imprimés par
Bartholomieu Buyer.’ His name is not found in any book after 1483,
so that it is usually supposed that he died about that date. Le Roy
continued to print alone for some years, but had ceased before 1493, in
which year we know that he was still alive.
After Lyons comes Toulouse; and the first dated book issued there
was the _Repetitio solemnis rubrice de fide instrumentorum_, 20th
June 1476. It was not till 1479 that a printer’s name appears in the
colophon to a work by Johannes Alphonsus de Benevento. The printer,
Jean Parix, was a native of Heidelberg. He had founts both of Gothic
and Roman type, the Gothic being especially remarkable for the shapes
of the letters, which are very distinctive, and though eccentric in
form they are not at all unpleasing in appearance. In 1488, Henry
Mayer began to print, issuing in that year a translation of the _De
consolatione philosophiæ_ of Boethius, ‘en romance,’ and the first
French translation of the _Imitatio Christi_. This Henry Mayer has
often been quoted as the first printer at Tolosa in Spain, owing to
the name Tolosa in the colophons being considered to stand for that
town, and not, as it really does, for Toulouse. M. Claudin, however,
has found in the town registers of Toulouse a mention of Henry Mayer
as a printer in 1488; and in the imprint of the _Boethius_ which he
printed in the same year it is distinctly stated that it was ‘impresso
en Tolosa de Francia.’ At the end of the _Cronica de España_, printed
by Mayer in 1489, is along peroration addressed to Queen Isabella as
his sovereign by Mayer, from which it is sometimes argued that the
book was printed in Spain. The real fact is that the book is an exact
reprint, peroration and all, of the edition printed at Seville in 1482
by Dachaver, with the sole difference that Mayer has substituted his
name for that of the Spanish printer.
Angers [Feb. 5, 1476-77], Chablis [April 1, 1478], Vienne [1478], and
Poitiers [1479], are the four remaining towns into which printing was
introduced before 1480. The first book issued at Angers, printed by
Johannes de Turre and Morelli, is an edition of Cicero’s _Rhetorica
Nova_, printed in a curious Roman type, apparently copied from that
used by Kaiser and Stoll at Paris. The first printer at Chablis was
Pierre le Rouge; but some time after 1483 he removed to Paris, and his
place was taken by Guillaume le Rouge, who moved about 1492 to Troyes,
and finally also settled in Paris. Johannes Solidi and Peter Schenck
are the two most important of the early printers at Vienne. Solidi was
the first; but Schenck, who began in 1481, printed the most interesting
books, and always in French. Two of these are of great rarity, _L’Abuze
en court_ and _Le hystoire de Griseldis_. The first book printed at
Poitiers, the _Breviarium Historiale_, 1479, has no printer’s name,
nor indeed have any of the earlier books. [Hain *13,811] gives a book,
_Casus longi super sextum decretalium_, printed by John and Stephen
de Gradibus in 1483. The discovery of some fragments of _Heures à
l’usage de l’eglise d’Angers_, with the names of the printers, Jean
Bouyer et Pierre Bellescullée, printed partly in the types of the first
books, make it possible that these two may have been the printers. The
fragments were found in the binding of a book by M. Delisle.
Caen was the first town in Normandy where printing was practised,
but only one book was printed there in the fifteenth century. It is
an edition of _Horace_, the first to appear in France, and of the
very greatest rarity, only three copies being known, one of which,
printed on vellum, is in the Spencer Library. The printers were Jacobus
Durandas and Egidius Quijoue, and the book was issued 6th June 1480.
It is a quarto of forty leaves, with twenty lines to the page, printed
in a good, bold Gothic type. There were several privileged booksellers
attached to the University of Caen, but it is improbable that any of
them printed, at any rate in the fifteenth century. They obtained their
books from either Paris or Rouen.
Within the next seven years ten towns set up presses in the following
order:—Albi (1481), Chartres (1482), Metz (1482), Troyes (1483),
Chambéry (1484), Bréhant-Loudéac (1484), Rennes (1484), Tréguier
(1485), Salins (1485), Abbeville (1486).
At Albi, on 17th November 1481, the wonderful edition of the
_Meditationes_ of Turrecremata, supposed to have been printed by
Numeister, was issued. This was preceded by a book of _Æneas Sylvius_,
without date, but ascribed to the same printer, though printed with
a different type; and Hain [8723] quotes a third book, also without
date, _Historia septem sapientum_. The arguments of M. Claudin, who has
written a book to prove that Numeister was the printer at Albi, though
ingenious, are very far from conclusive.
Two books were executed at Chartres in the fifteenth century, a
_Missal_ in 1482 and a _Breviary_ in 1483, both for the use of that
diocese. The printer was Jean du Pré of Paris.
The first printers at Metz, Johannes Colini and Gerhardus de
Novacivitate, who printed in 1482 an edition of the _Imitatio Christi_,
used a very peculiar type of Gothic with a number of Roman capitals
mixed with it, resembling that of Nicholas Götz at Cologne, and which,
leaving Cologne in 1480, appeared at Treves in 1481. In 1499, Caspar
Hochfeder came to Metz from Nuremberg.
The earliest book with the name of Troyes in the colophon is a
_Breviarium secundum usum ecclesiæ Trecensis_, of 25th September 1483.
It was executed by Pierre le Rouge, who probably came over from Chablis
for the purpose. In 1492, Guillaume le Rouge, who had before this
printed at Chablis, set up the first permanent press in the town.
Bréhant-Loudéac was the first town in Brittany where books were
printed; and from 1484 to 1485 the two printers, Robin Foucquet and
Jean Crès, issued ten books, all in French, in a ragged Gothic type.
The first printers at Abbeville, Jean du Pré of Paris and Pierre
Gérard, to judge by their books, were well-skilled workmen, for both
the printing and illustrations are very fine. Their first book was
an edition of the _Somme Rurale_, and it was followed by a splendid
edition, in two volumes, of _La cité de Dieu_ of Augustine, a large
folio with wonderful woodcuts. Their third work was _Le Triomphe des
neuf Preux_; and this is the last book known to have been printed at
Abbeville in the fifteenth century.
Though Rouen was without a printer till 1487, it became within a very
few years one of the most important towns in the history of French
printing. Its fortunate position on the Seine, equally advantageous
for sending books to Paris or exporting them to England, was doubtless
the chief cause of its great prosperity, and its influence over the
book trade was felt, not only over all France, but over England as
well. The first printer was Guillaume le Talleur, and his first
book, _Les Chroniques de Normandie_, was published in May 1487. He
printed several law books for Richard Pynson about 1490, and was
very probably his teacher. The most important export from Rouen was
certainly service-books, and of these endless numbers were issued for
various uses. Martin Morin, who began to print in 1490, was especially
connected with this kind of work, and some of the most beautiful of
the Salisbury Missals are from his press. The printers were, however,
not nearly so numerous as the booksellers, though it is not always
very easy to distinguish between them. Morin, Le Talleur, Noel de
Harsy, Jean le Bourgeois, and Jacques le Forestier, may safely be given
as printers; others, like Richard and Regnault, were probably only
booksellers or stationers. Besançon also had a printing press in 1487,
but who the first printer was is not very certainly known. Several
writers consider him to have been Jean du Pré; but M. Thierry-Poux,
judging from the types, considers that Peter Metlinger, who printed
later at Dôle, is more likely to have been the printer. In 1488 (26th
March 1487), Jean Crès printed the first book at Lantenac, an edition
in French of _Mandeville’s Travels_. Its colophon mentions no name of
place, but the type and the printer’s name are identical with those of
the _Doctrinal des nouvelles mariées_ of 1491, which has the name of
the place, Lantenac, in the colophon.
Between 1490 and the end of 1500 printing was introduced into twenty
towns. In 1490, to Embrun, Grenoble, and Dôle; but the first and second
of these places only produced a single book each. In 1491, to Orleans,
Goupillières, Angoulême, Dijon, and Narbonne.
M. Jarry[26] mentions a certain Jehan le Roy, who was spoken of at
Orleans in 1481 as a printer and stationer, but nothing printed by him
is known. The first book known is a _Manipulus Curatorum_ in French,
printed by Matthew Vivian. Our knowledge of the existence of a press
at Goupillières in the fifteenth century is the result of a fortunate
discovery made by M. Delisle. He found, used as boards for an old
binding, thirty-six leaves of a book of _Hours ‘à l’usage du diocèse
d’Evreux,’_ with a colophon stating that it was printed at Goupillières
on the 8th May 1491, by Michel Andrieu, a priest. At Narbonne also
but one book was printed before 1500, a _Breviarium ad usum ecclesiæ
Narbonensis_.
[26] _Les débuts de l’Imprimerie à Orléans._ Orléans, 1884.
In 1492, printing was introduced into Cluni; and in 1493, to Nantes,
Châlons, Tours, and Mâcon. Châlons and Mâcon are each represented by
one book, which in each case is a _Diurnale_ for the use of its own
church.
In 1495, Jean Berton began to print at Limoges, issuing service-books
for the use of the church. The last six towns to be mentioned are
Provins (1496), Valence (1496), Avignon (1497), Périgueux (1498),
Perpignan (1500), and Valenciennes (1500).
Nothing seems to have resulted from the early attempts at printing at
Avignon, which have been spoken of before, and the first dated book
issued there is an edition of part of _Lucian_, printed for Nicholas
Tepe, by Jean du Pré of Lyons, on the 15th October 1497.
It will be noticed that printing was introduced into many of the
provincial towns of France merely to serve a temporary purpose, and not
for the object of permanent work. In many cases the printer was brought
to the town, probably at the request and expense of the ecclesiastical
authorities, to print such service-books as were required for the
use of the church. For this reason we find printers and types moving
from place to place, so that it is not always easy to assign a book
to a particular town, when the type in which it is printed was used
in several places. The splendid series of facsimiles edited by M.
Thierry-Poux, and published by order of the Government, gives great
assistance to the study of French typography; while from time to time
small monographs have appeared giving the history of printing in all
the more important towns of France.
CHAPTER VI.
THE LOW COUNTRIES.
On no subject connected with printing has more been written, and to
less purpose, than on the Haarlem invention of printing by Lourens
Janszoon Coster. During the fifteenth century much had been said about
the invention, accrediting it always to Germany; and it was not till
1499 that a reference was made to an earlier Dutch discovery in the
following passage of the _Cologne Chronicle_:[27]—
‘This highly valuable art was discovered first of all in Germany, at
Mentz on the Rhine. And it is a great honour to the German nation that
such ingenious men are found among them. And it took place about the
year of our Lord 1440; and from this time until the year 1450, the
art and what is connected with it was being investigated. And in the
year of our Lord 1450 it was a golden year [jubilee], and they began
to print, and the first book they printed was the Bible in Latin; it
was printed in a large letter, resembling the letter with which at
present missals are printed. Although the art [as has been said] was
discovered at Mentz, in the manner as it is now generally used, yet
the first prefiguration was found in Holland [the Netherlands], in
the _Donatuses_, which were printed there before that time. And from
these _Donatuses_ the beginning of the said art was taken, and it was
invented in a manner much more masterly and subtile than this, and
became more and more ingenious. One named Omnibonus wrote in a preface
to the book called _Quinctilianus_, and in some other books too, that
a Walloon from France, named Nicol. Jenson, discovered first of all
this masterly art; but that is untrue, for there are those still alive
who testify that books were printed at Venice before Nicol. Jenson
came there and began to cut and make letters. But the first inventor
of printing was a citizen of Mentz, born at Strasburg, and named
Junker Johan Gutenberg. From Mentz the art was introduced first of all
into Cologne, then into Strasburg, and afterwards into Venice. The
origin and progress of the art was told me verbally by the honourable
Master Ulrich Zell of Hanau, still printer at Cologne, anno 1499, and
by whom the said art came to Cologne.’
[27] _The Haarlem Legend_, by Dr. Van der Linde, translated by J. H.
Hessels. London, 1871, 8vo, p. 8.
This narrative, it will be seen, breaks down, if we examine its
accuracy strictly, in several places. To get over this apparent
difficulty, we are told that the compiler of the Chronicle took the
various parts of his statement from various sources. The statement that
printing was invented at Mainz, from Hartmann Schedel’s _Nuremberg
Chronicle_ of 1493; that from 1440 to 1450 it was being investigated,
is an addition of his own; that about 1450 people began to print,
and that the first book printed was the _Bible_ in Latin, was told
him by Ulric Zel, and so on. But evidence which on certain points is
inaccurate, cannot be implicitly trusted on other points; and since
it is impossible to trust absolutely the statement of the Chronicle,
we must seek information from the best source, that is, the earliest
productions of the press.
Coster himself was not heard of as a printer till about a hundred
years after he was supposed to have printed, when Junius wrote in his
_Batavia_ the wonderful legend of the letters cut in beech bark. That
a person called Lourens Janszoon lived at Haarlem from 1436 to 1483
seems to be an established fact; but, at the same time, all the entries
and notices relating to him show that he was a chandler or innkeeper.
Von der Linde very justly, therefore, considers he was not a printer;
and this view is certainly reasonable, for we can hardly suppose that
a man could have printed all the so-called Costeriana and at the same
time have attended to his business so carefully, that all the entries
which relate to him speak of him only as an innkeeper, and no mention
of any kind is made of him as a printer, though he was, so believers in
him assert, the only printer in Holland for thirty years.
Coming to the books themselves, what do we find? The first printed date
is 1473, in which year books were issued at both Utrecht and Alost.
M. Holtrop mentions that the Hague copy of the _Tractatus Gulielmi de
Saliceto de salute corporis et animæ_ and _Yliada_ was bought by a
certain Abbat Conrad for the library of his house; and as the Abbat in
question was Abbat only from 1471 to 1474, the book cannot have been
printed later than 1471-74; and this and the rubricated 1472 in the
Darmstadt copy of the _Saliceto_ are at present the only dates which we
can use for our purposes.
There are, however, a large number of fragments of books known, printed
in a rude type and with the appearance of early printing, all of which
are frequently asserted to have been printed before 1473. These
books, consisting for the most part of editions of the _Donatus_ or
the _Doctrinale_, are known by the name of Costeriana, as being the
supposed productions of Coster. Among them also are the four editions
of the _Speculum_, which we have examined at length in Chapter I.
Fragments of at least fifty books or editions are known, which may
be separated by their types into eight groups. Concerning the types
Mr. Hessels says: ‘Type 2 is inseparably connected with type 1; and
as the former is so much like type 3 that some consider these two
types identical, nothing would be gained by separating them. Type 4
and 5 occur in one and the same book; and as certain letters of type
5 are identical with some of type 3, they may all be linked together.
Type 6 is identical with type 5 except the P, which is larger and of
a different form. Types 7 and 8 are linked on to the types 1-6, on
account of the great family-likeness between them, they all having that
peculiar perpendicular stroke to the cross-bar of the _t_, and a down
stroke or curl attached to the _r_, which is found in no other types of
the Netherlands.’
[Illustration: PAGE OF A “DOCTRINALE.”
(_One of the so-called “Costeriana.”_)]
The close connection of all these types points to the books having
been produced in one place; but where this one place was, cannot be
determined. The account written by Junius, in 1568, of the invention
of printing by Coster, mentions Haarlem as the place where he printed,
and they have therefore been always ascribed to Haarlem by such writers
as believe in the Costerian invention. Mr. Bradshaw, who refused to
assign books to particular places without reason, said: ‘I am compelled
to leave the _Speculum_ at Utrecht until I know anything positive to
the contrary; because it is at Utrecht that the cuts first appear, cut
up into pieces in a book printed by Veldener at that place in 1481.’
This statement does not mean that the Costeriana were necessarily
printed at Utrecht, but that the place where we find the materials as
soon as they can be connected with any place, is Utrecht, and that
therefore such little evidence as exists is in favour of these books
having been printed there. One point which tells in favour of Utrecht,
is the fact that one of the Costeriana is a _Donatus_ in French, and
Utrecht is one of the few places in the Netherlands where such a book
is likely to have been produced.
There is no direct evidence in favour of Haarlem or Utrecht; and
indirect evidence is not particularly in favour of Haarlem, unless
it is considered that some belief may be placed in Junius’ wonderful
narrative. It is certainly wiser to leave the matter open, or, with
Bradshaw, place the books provisionally at Utrecht till we have a
better reason for placing them elsewhere.
The more important question as to the date when these Costeriana were
produced, seems still as far as ever from any satisfactory solution.
Mr. Hessels takes them back to 1446 by the ingenious method of putting
eighteen months between each edition. This method of working is based
on no sound principle, and leads to no result of any value. Another
argument of Mr. Hessels, and one that is hardly worthy of so learned a
writer, is that since the Costeriana look older than the first Mainz
books, therefore they are older. The foolishness of this reasoning is
too apparent to need any explanation, for it amounts to the assertion
that the same phase of development in different countries means the
same date. But if the earliest dated books of the Low Countries are
compared with the productions of Germany, it needs a prejudiced eye to
see in the former any approach to the exquisite beauty and regularity
of the German type and printing.
There is one point which seems to me to argue strongly against the
early date ascribed to the Costeriana. They were produced by ordinary
typographic processes, such as would be used for printing any book, and
there is little or no improvement observable in the latest compared
with the earliest. Yet, during the thirty years to which these books
are ascribed, no work of any size or importance was produced from this
press. It can hardly be assumed that during these years there was no
demand for books, when we consider that immediately after 1473 books
of all kinds were produced in great number. Nor can we reasonably
suppose that the great demand for the _Donatus_ and the _Doctrinale_
ceased about 1473. The printing of school-books did not require to be
ornamental, for they had to be produced as cheaply as possible, so
that this class of work naturally soon fell into the hands of the
poorer printers. We see many examples of this in studying the history
of printing in other places, and find the finest and the rudest work
being produced side by side. Block-books and xylographic _Donatuses_
were printed in Germany up to the last years of the fifteenth century,
as old in appearance as the productions of fifty years earlier. We may
connect certain of these Costeriana with the years 1471-74, within
which period printing presses were started at Utrecht and Alost; but
why should all the rest be placed earlier? It is curious that, while
we have no dates forcing us to fix them early, neither have we dates
preventing us from fixing them late.
Because certain of these books were written by Pius II., who became
Pope in 1458, Mr. Hessels seizes on 1458 as one of the dates we may
take as relating to their printing, and groups the Costeriana round
that date. He might equally well have grouped others round the fourth
century, when Ælius Donatus lived, or round 1207, when Alexander de
Villa Dei finished his _Doctrinale_. The only date as regards the
printing of a book that can be derived from the authorship is a date
before which the book cannot have been printed. M. Dziatzko mentions
one point which he considers conclusive as giving a late date to the
Costeriana. In them is _wrongly_ used a particular form of the letter
x, which is not found in Dutch manuscripts, and which was used at the
first Mainz press for a special purpose.
Putting aside, then, the useless mass of conjecture and sophistry that
obscures the subject, the case stands thus. The first printed date in
the Low Countries is 1473, and there are a group of undated books which
may perhaps be placed before or round this date; beyond this we have no
information whatever.
Before leaving this subject, it is worth noticing that there is
a simple explanation for the fact that almost all the Costeriana
fragments are on vellum. They have in most cases been found in
the bindings of books, and it was the almost invariable habit of
Netherlandish binders to line the boards of their bindings with vellum.
They used if possible clean vellum, or printed or written only on one
side, the used side being pasted down and the clean side exposed. In
this way many indulgences have been preserved.
In 1473, printing starts simultaneously at Utrecht and Alost, and from
that time onward its history is clear. More attention has been paid to
the history of printing in the Netherlands than to that of any other
country, and the work of Holtrop, Campbell, and Bradshaw offers a firm
foundation to rest upon.
The first printers at Utrecht were Nicholas Ketelaer and Gerard de
Leempt, and their first book was the _Historia Scholastica_ of Petrus
Comestor. Though they printed a large number of books, only three are
dated, two in 1473 and one in 1474. About 1475 a printer named William
Hees printed some books at Utrecht; and in 1478, Veldener moved to
that town from Louvain, where he had been printing up to that time.
The first printer at Alost was Thierry Martens, an accomplished
linguist and scholar, who is supposed by many bibliographers to have
learned to print at Venice. He says in the colophon to the _De vita
beata libellus_ of Baptista Mantuanus—
‘Hoc opus impressi Martins Theodoricus Alosti,
Qui Venetum scita Flandrensibus affero cuncta.’
On this basis the story has arisen, and it is perhaps hardly sufficient
to justify the conclusions. The first books, four in number, printed
in 1473 and the beginning of 1474, were printed in partnership with
John of Westphalia, a printer who in 1474 migrated to Louvain. Thierry
Martens continued by himself at Alost for a while, but moved on, in
1493, to Antwerp, and in 1498 to Louvain. According to Van der Meersch,
he left Louvain in 1502 to return to Antwerp, but left this town again
in 1512, and settled definitely at Louvain till the end of his career
in 1529.
Printing was introduced at Louvain in 1474, and it is, after Antwerp,
the most important town in that respect in the Low Countries. The
first printer was John of Westphalia,[28] whom we have just mentioned
as a printer at Alost in partnership with Thierry Martens. He seems
to have been the owner of the type used at Alost, for he continued to
print with it, and in June 1474 issued the _Commentariolus de pleuresi_
by Antonius Guainerius, the first book known to have been issued at
Louvain. John of Westphalia continued to print up to the year 1496; and
Campbell[29] enumerates over one hundred and eighty books as having
been printed by him in these twenty-two years. In some of his books we
find a small woodcut portrait of himself, used first in the _Justinian_
of 1475; and a few of his books have the red initial letters printed in
by hand. John Veldener, the second printer at Louvain, was matriculated
at the university there, in the faculty of medicine, 30th July 1473.
His first book was probably the _Consolatio peccatorum_ of Jacobus de
Theramo, which contains a prefatory letter, addressed ‘Johanni Veldener
artis impressoriæ magistro,’ dated 7th Aug. 1474. Veldener continued to
print at Louvain till 1478, and he is found in that year at Utrecht,
where he printed till 1481. After this he moved to Kuilenburg, issuing
books there in 1483 and 1484.
[28] John de Paderborn de Westphalia was in 1473 still a scribe, for in
that year he wrote a MS. of the _Scala_ of Johannes Climacus at and for
the Augustinian House at Marpach.
[29] _Annales de la Typographie Néerlandaise au xv. Siècle._ 1874. 8vo.
Besides those that have been mentioned, seven other printers worked at
Louvain before the close of the fifteenth century. These were--Conrad
Braem (1475), Conrad de Westphalia (1476), Hermann de Nassou (1483),
Rodolphe Loeffs (1483), Egidius vander Heerstraten (1484), Ludovicus de
Ravescot (1487), and Thierry Martens (1498).
Bruges, one of the most prosperous and artistic of the towns in the
Netherlands, is intimately associated with the history of English
printing; for it was there that our first printer, Caxton, began to
print. It was not, however, a productive town as regards printing,
for only two printers, or at most three, were at work there in the
fifteenth century. Of these the most important was Colard Mansion. He
was by profession a writer and illuminator of manuscripts, and his
name is found year by year from 1454 to 1473 in the book of the Guild
of St. John. It was probably about 1475 that he began to print; but
his first dated book appeared in the following year. About the years
1475-77, Caxton was in partnership with Mansion, whether generally or
only for the production of certain books, we do not know. But together
they printed three books, _The Recuyell of the Histories of Troye_,
_The Game and playe of the Chesse_, and _Les quatre derrennieres
choses_. After Caxton’s departure, in 1477, Mansion continued to print
by himself. It is worth noticing that in 1477 he first made use of a
device. The first dated book issued by Mansion, _De la ruyne des nobles
hommes et femmes_, by Boccaccio, has a curious history. It was issued
first without any woodcuts, and no spaces were left for them. Then
the first leaf containing the prologue was cancelled, and reprinted
so as to leave a space for a cut of the author presenting his book.
At a later date, the first leaves of all the books, excepting books
i. and vi., were cancelled, and reissued with spaces for engravings.
Mansion printed altogether about twenty-four books, the last being a
moralised version of Ovid’s _Metamorphoses_, issued in May 1484. Almost
immediately after this book was finished, the printer fled from Bruges,
and his rooms over the porch of the Church of St. Donatus were let to
a bookbinder named Jean Gossin. This latter paid the rent still owing
by Mansion, and is supposed to have come into possession of the stock
of the _Ovid_, for several copies of the book are known in which the
leaves 113-218, 296-389 have been reprinted, presumably by Gossin, and
these examples do not contain Mansion’s device.
The other printer, Jean Brito, is little more than a name. Campbell
gives four books as having been printed by him, but only one contains
his name. This, however, is a book of exceptional interest, the
_Instruction et doctrine de tous chrétiens et chrétiennes_, by Gerson;
and but one copy is known, now in the Bibliothèque Nationale. It has
the following curious colophon in verse:—
‘Aspice presentis scripture gracia que sit
Confer opus opere, spectetur codice codex.
Respice quam munde, quam terse quamque decore
Imprimit hec civis brugensis brito Johannes,
Inveniens artem nullo monstrante mirandam
Instrumenta quoque non minus laude stupenda.’
The last two lines, which, translated literally, say, ‘Discovering,
without being shown by any one, the wonderful art, and also the tools,
not less objects for wonder and praise,’ would seem to imply that Brito
claimed to be a self-taught printer. That this may have been the case
is quite possible, and it is the only reasonable interpretation to put
upon the lines. They suggest, however, still a further inference. The
type in which this book is printed seems to be identical with that
used afterwards by William de Machlinia at Holborn, in London, and
extraordinarily similar to the type used by Veldener at Utrecht. If
Brito was a self-taught printer, who invented his own tools, he must
also have been a type-founder; and if so, may very likely have supplied
William de Machlinia with his type.
After Bruges comes Brussels, where but one press was established before
1500. This was set up by the Brothers of the Common Life, who must have
found their old industry of copying manuscripts seriously interfered
with by the competition of the new art. They therefore started a press
at their house, called ‘Nazareth,’ and in 1476 issued their first dated
book, the _Gnotosolitos sive speculum conscientiæ_, by Arnoldus de
Gheilhoven, a large folio of 472 leaves. From 1476 to 1484[30] they
worked industriously, producing about thirty-five books, only one
of which clearly states who and what the printers were. This is the
_Legenda Henrici Imperatoris et Kunigundis Imperatricis_ of 1484, where
we read in the colophon: ... ‘impresse in famosa civitate bruxellensi
per fratres communis vite in nazareth’.... There is no doubt that,
as types come to be studied and recognised, more books will be found
printed by this Brotherhood. Other establishments of the same Order
had practised, or were shortly to practise, the art of printing. That
at Marienthal, important in the history of printing, had been at work
for some years; others at Rostock, Nuremberg, and Gouda were to follow;
while, as we have seen, if we are to believe M. Madden, the monastery
at Weidenbach was the instructor of all the more noted printers of
Europe. The similarity in appearance between the Brussels type and that
of Ther Hoernen at Cologne is very striking, and has deceived even M.
Van der Meersch, Ther Hoernen’s bibliographer. The distinguishing mark
of this type, or the one most readily to be distinguished, is a very
voluminous capital S in the later books.
[30] A book of 1487 is quoted by Lambinet, but the date has probably
been either misprinted or misread.
Gerard Leeu, the first printer at Gouda, is the most important of all
the Low Country printers of the fifteenth century. His first book was
issued in 1477, a Dutch edition of the _Epistles and Gospels_; and
five other books followed in the same year. His first illustrated
book, the _Dialogus creaturarum moralisatus_, was issued in 1480.
About the middle of the year 1484 he removed to Antwerp, and printed
there till 1493. In that year, while the _Chronicles of England_
were being printed, a letter-cutter named Henric van Symmen, one of
Leeu’s workmen, struck work. In a quarrel which followed, Leeu was
struck on the head, and died after three days’ illness. The workman
who gave the blow was fined forty gulden, not a very heavy punishment
for manslaughter. At the end of the _Chronicles_ the workmen put the
following colophon: ‘Enprentyd ... by maister Gerard de Leew, a man of
grete wysedom in all maner of kunnying: whych nowe is come from lyfe
unto the deth, which is grete harme for many a poure man. On whos sowle
god almyghty for hys hygh grace have mercy. Amen.’
Leeu must have employed a good deal of labour, for he printed a very
large number of books; Campbell gives about two hundred, and his
numbers are always being added to. But what makes Leeu especially
interesting to us is the fact of his printing English books. Of
these, he issued seven between 1486 and 1493--a Grammar, two Sarum
Service-books, and four other popular books which will be noticed later.
Another interesting printer who was settled at Gouda was Gotfried de
Os, whom Bradshaw considers to have been identical with Govaert van
Ghemen. He began to print at Gouda in 1486, but about 1490 removed to
Copenhagen, printing at Leyden on his way. Before he went there he
parted with some of his printing materials, type, initial letters, and
woodcuts, which came into the hands of W. de Worde, and were used in
England.
Five other towns in the Netherlands possessed printing presses before
1480--Deventer (1477), Delft (1477), St. Maartensdyk (1478), Nÿmegen
(1479), and Zwolle (1479).
At Deventer there were only two printers, R. Paffroed and J. de Breda;
but between them they printed at least five hundred books, about a
quarter of the whole number issued in the Netherlands in the fifteenth
century.
At St. Maartensdyk in Zeeland only one book was printed, _Der zyelen
troeste_, the work of a printer named Peter Werrecoren, in November
1478. Of this book only one copy is known, preserved in the library
of the abbey of Averbode. In the colophon the printer apologises for
the short-comings of his book, saying that it is his first, and that
he hopes by the grace of God to improve. We have, however, no record
of his ever printing again. Nÿmegen had also but one printer, Gerard
Leempt, who issued four books, Zwolle, where Peter van Os of Breda
printed from 1479 onwards, is an interesting place in the history
of printing, for there, in 1487, appeared portions of the original
blocks of the _Biblia Pauperum_ used to illustrate a Dutch edition of
the _Epistles and Gospels_, and in 1494 a block from the _Canticum
Canticorum_. Peregrinus Barmentlo, the only printer at Hasselt, was
at work from 1480 to 1490. He seems to have had some connection with
Peter van Os, as was only natural from the situation of Hasselt and its
nearness to Zwolle; and we find the cuts of one printer in the hands of
the other.
Arend de Keysere commenced to print at Audenarde in 1480, his first
book being the _Sermons_ of Hermannus de Petra. By April 1483 he had
moved from Audenarde and settled at Ghent, where he remained till his
death in 1489. His wife, Beatrice van Orrior, continued to print for a
short time, but no copy is known of any of her productions. At a later
date she married again, her husband being a certain Henry van den Dale,
who is mentioned in the St. Lucas-gilde book at Bruges as a printer in
that town in 1505-6.
In the fifteenth century more printers were settled in Antwerp than in
any other Netherlandish town. The first to settle there was Matthew
van der Goes, and his first book is dated 29th April 1482. In the
same year he issued the _Bœck van Tondalus vysioen_, which has the
misprinted date 1472, and has for that reason been sometimes quoted
as the first book printed in the Low Countries, or more often as the
first book printed with signatures. We have already spoken of Gerard
Leeu, who was the next to settle at Antwerp; and shortly after his
appearance in 1484, Nicolas Kesler of Basle opened a shop there for
the sale of his books. There are said to be three books with Kesler’s
name, and the name of Antwerp given as the town; and though his press
at Basle was at work without a break from 1486 onward, still in 1488
his name appears amongst the list of members of the St. Lucas-gilde
at Antwerp. It is very probable, as Campbell suggests, that Kesler
was entered as a member to enable him to sell his books in Antwerp.
The most interesting among the remaining printers of the town was
Thierry Martens, who began to print in 1493, and stayed till 1497.
His various movements have been spoken of before. Leyden, Ghent,
Kuilenburg, and Haarlem all started presses in 1483. The first printer
of Haarlem, Bellaert, seems to have obtained his materials for the
most part from Leeu, both type and woodcuts; but the town cannot have
been a flourishing one from a printer’s point of view; for, though
another workman, Joh. Andreæ, printed a few books in 1486, both presses
disappear after that year. At Bois-le-duc, Gerard Leempt, from Nÿmegen,
printed a few books between 1484 and 1490. In 1495 the Canons of St.
Michael’s in den Hem, near Shoenhoven, began to print books in order to
obtain means to rebuild their convent, which had been destroyed by fire
the year before. They printed one or two editions of the _Breviary_ of
different uses, but the rest of their books were all in the vernacular.
Schiedam was the last town in the Netherlands where printing was
practised before 1500, and there, about 1498, an unknown printer issued
a very remarkable book.
There were altogether in the Netherlands twenty-two towns whence books
were issued before 1500, and in this list it will be noticed that
Haarlem stands near the end. When printing had once been introduced
it spread rapidly, all but three towns starting within the first ten
years.
CHAPTER VII.
SPAIN AND PORTUGAL--DENMARK AND SWEDEN.
The first book printed in Spain, according to some authorities, is
a small volume of poems by Bernardo Fenollar and others, written in
honour of the Virgin on the occasion of a congress held at Valentia in
March 1474. It is said to have been printed in that town in the same
year; but it has never been fully described, nor is it known where a
copy is preserved.
According to M. Salvá, the first two books printed in Spain with a
certain date are the _Comprehensorium_ (23rd February 1475), and the
_Sallust_ (13th July 1475), both printed at Valentia. As, however, the
year began on Easter Day, the second book is really the earlier, and
with it the authentic history of printing in Spain begins. The book
itself is a small quarto, printed in Roman letter, without signatures
or catchwords, and but two copies seem to be known, one in the Royal
Library of Madrid, the other in the Barberini Library at Rome. The
printers were Lambert Palmart, a German, and Alonzo Fernandez of
Cordova; but their names are found, for the first time, in a _Bible_ of
1478 known only from four leaves, one of them fortunately containing
the colophon. It is very probable that Alonzo Fernandez, whose name
only occurs in this one colophon, was not a printer, though it is not
known in what capacity he was associated with Palmart. He was certainly
known as a celebrated astronomer. Lambert Palmart continued to print
at Valentia up to the year 1494, and by that time other printers had
settled in the town. Jacobus de Villa is mentioned by Panzer in 1493
and 1495; and in this latter year we find also Peter Hagembach, who
later on, at Toledo, printed the celebrated _Mozarabic Missal_ and
_Breviary_.
In 1475 a certain Matthæus Flandrus printed an edition of the
_Manipulus Curatorum_ at Saragossa. He is supposed to have been a
wandering printer, and considered by some to be the Matthew Vendrell
who printed at Barcelona in 1482, and at Gerona in 1483. Between 1475
and 1485 no book is known to have been printed at Saragossa; but
in the latter year a press was started by Paul Hurus, a native of
Constance, who printed till almost the end of the fifteenth century;
and was followed by three Germans, George Cock, Leonard Butz, and Lupus
Appentegger.
Seville was the third city of Spain where printing was practised, and
the first dated book issued there was the _Sacramental_ of Clemente
Sanchez de Vercial, printed by three partners, Anton Martinez,
Bartholomé Segura, and Alphonso del Puerto, in 1477. An undated edition
of the same work is ascribed by Mendez and others to an earlier
date, and a third edition was issued in May 1478. Another book, the
_Manuale seu Repertorium super Abbatem Panormitanum per Alphonsum Diaz
de Montalvo_, was issued by the same printers in the same year. Hain
mentions sixteen printers who worked in Seville during the fifteenth
century; and of these many were Germans.
The first printers at Barcelona were Peter Brun and Nicholas Spindeler,
who issued, in 1478, two books by Aquinas, commentaries on parts of
Aristotle. These are almost certainly the first two books printed in
that town, though a large number of supposititious books, with dates
from 1473 onwards, are quoted by different writers. Amongst other
printers who worked at Barcelona may be mentioned John Rosembach of
Heidelberg, who paid visits to various towns, being found at Tarragona
in 1499, and at Perpignan in 1500. Another printer, Jaques de Gurniel,
left Barcelona about the end of the century and went to Valladolid,
where he printed during the first years of the sixteenth century.
The first book printed at Lerida has a curious history. It is a
_Breviary_, according to the use of the church at Lerida, printed by a
German, Henry Botel, in 1479, and the whole expense of its publication
was undertaken by a certain Antonio Palares, the bell-ringer of the
church. It is an extremely rare book; but there is a copy of it in the
Bodleian Library, and another in the Carmelite convent at Barcelona.
Two other books were printed in this town in the fifteenth century, but
they bear no printer’s name; they are both commentaries on parts of
Aristotle by Petrus de Castrovol, and were printed in 1488 and 1489.
A book is quoted by Caballero as having been printed at Segorbe in
1479, the _Constitutiones synodales Bartholomæi Marti_; but its
existence is a little doubtful. Besides this one book, no other is
known to have been printed at Segorbe until well on in the sixteenth
century; and it is therefore quite probable that the book, if it really
exists, was printed at some other town, and that the writer who saw it
was misled by the occurrence of the name in the title.
Printing is said to have been introduced at Toledo in 1480. The book
which bears this date, _Leyes originales de los Reyes de España_, has
no name of place, but has been assigned to Toledo by several Spanish
bibliographers who have examined a copy, and who are clear that it
is printed in the same type as the _Confutatorium errorum_ of Peter
Ximenes de Prexamo, which was printed there by John Vasqui in July
1486. This latter book has been considered by many to be the first,
since, as it was written by a canon of Toledo in 1478, it is argued
that had that city possessed a press it would have been issued before
1486.
Salamanca, Zamora, Gerona, follow in 1481, 1482, and 1483 respectively,
though the existence of a press at the last place is very doubtful.
The one book said to have been printed there, _Memorial del pecador
remut_, has the following words in the colophon: ‘impressa a despeses
de Matheu Vendrell mercader en la ciutat de Girona.’ This Matthew
Vendrell appears also at Barcelona in 1484; but he seems to have been
a stationer rather than a printer, and the wording of the colophon
mentioned above tends to confirm that idea. Unfortunately, the very
great rarity of early Spanish books, at any rate in this country,
precludes the comparative study of the types, and very little has yet
been done to distinguish them. If this were done, it would be easy
to settle the printers of such doubtful books. As there is no other
book known to have been printed at Gerona till near the middle of
the sixteenth century, it will be safer, until a fuller account be
forthcoming, to ascribe this book, following M. Nèe de la Rochelle, to
a press at Barcelona.
In 1485 we have Burgos, where Frederick of Basle (at one time an
associate of Wenssler’s) printed; Palma, where Nicolas Calafati
printed; and probably also Xeres, though the existence of the press
in this latter place is doubtful. The only known book quoted by
M. Caballero is the _Constitutiones synodales urbis vel ecclesiæ
Xericanæ_, per Barth: Marti, 1485. This bibliographer, however, gives
no information about the book, or any indication of the size or type;
and as no other book is known to have been printed at Xeres within the
next fifty years, it is quite probable that the book mentioned above,
though relating to the town, was not printed there.
At Murcia only two or three books were issued in the fifteenth century,
printed by a German named Lope de Roca. The first is the _Copilacion
de las Batallas campales_, finished the 28th of May 1487. Panzer,
Maittaire, and others speak erroneously of the printer as Juan de Roca.
Lope de Roca, after printing two or three books in Murcia, left there
and went to Valentia, where he printed in 1495 and 1497.
In 1489, printing was introduced into San Cucufat, into Coria, where
only one book was printed in the fifteenth century, the _Blason
general de todas las insignias del universo_, printed by Bartholomeus
de Lila (Lille), a Fleming; and it is usually said into Tolosa. The
history of printing in the latter town offers many difficulties.
Bibliographers have confused Toulouse in France with Tolosa in Biscay;
and the difficulty increases when we find that some Spanish books
were certainly printed at the former place. The best authorities seem
unfortunately to agree that the _Cronica de España_, by Diego de
Valera, is the earliest book; printed by Henry Meyer or Mayer in 1489.
M. Nèe de la Rochelle speaks of this _Chronicle_ as printed in 1488,
and also quotes a work by Guillaume de Deguilleville, a translation
into Spanish of the _Pelerinage de la vie humaine_, printed by the
same printer as early as 1480. The date should be 1490, but is given
as 1480 in the _Bibl. Hisp. vetus_ of Antonio (ii. 311), and also by
Hain (No. 7848). This Henry Mayer, however, was certainly a printer
of Toulouse in France, and not of Tolosa, so that all the remarks of
the bibliographers are beside the point. His name is found mentioned
in 1488 in registers at Toulouse; and he says in the colophon to the
_Boethius_ of the same year, ‘impresso en Tolosa de Francia.’ It is
not at all improbable that all the early books with ‘Tolosæ’ in the
colophon were printed in France, and that there was no fifteenth
century press at Tolosa.
The first book printed at Valladolid is the _Tractado breve de
Confession_ of 1492; but it has no printer’s name. In the following
year another book was printed, which gives the name of the printer as
Johan de Francour. The next two places, Cagliari and Monterey, have
each only one book printed in the fifteenth century. The book printed
at Cagliari is a _Speculum Ecclesiæ_, and was printed by Salvador de
Bolonga (Bologna), at the request of Nicholas Dagreda. The only known
copy is in the Municipal Library at Palma. The book printed at Monterey
was a _Missal_, printed by two partners, Gundisalvus Rodericus de la
Passera and Johannes de Porres. Granada (1496), Tarragona (1498), the
Monastery of the Blessed Virgin of Monserrat (1499), Madrid (1499), and
perhaps Jaen (1500), complete the list of places where printing was
practised in Spain before the end of the fifteenth century.
Numerous writers have asserted that printing began at Leiria in
Estremadura as early as 1466. Antonio Ribeiro dos Santos, who wrote
a learned dissertation on the subject, seems to place his chief
reliance on a statement made by Pedro Affonso de Vasconcellos in
1588, that Leiria was the first town to receive the art; and on a
further assertion by Soares de Silva, that he had seen a quarto volume
containing the poems of the Infante Dom Pedro, which had at the end a
note that it was printed nine years after the invention of printing.
The particular copy here referred to was destroyed in 1755; other
copies of the book contain no imprint. Whatever may be said about
the probability of printing having been introduced at an early date
into Portugal, the fact remains that the first authentic dated book
appeared at Lisbon in 1489. It is a _Commentary on the Pentateuch_, by
Moses ben Nachman, and was printed by two Jews, Rabbi Samuel Zorba and
Rabbi Eliezer. It was through the Jews, shortly to be so ungratefully
treated, that printing was introduced into two out of the three towns
of Portugal in which it was practised in the fifteenth century. They
were, however, a people apart, and the books which they printed were
for their own use, and in a tongue not understood by others. It was not
till 1495 that two other printers, Nicolaus de Saxonia and Valentinus
de Moravia, started at Lisbon to issue books in other languages than
Hebrew. Another Jew, Abraham, son of Don Samuel Dortas or de Orta,
printed the earliest books of Leiria, The first book, the _Proverbs
of Solomon_, with a commentary, was issued in 1492; and other books
appeared in 1494 and 1496. The third and last town in Portugal where
we find a printing press in the fifteenth century was Braga. Here, in
1494, a certain German named John Gherlinc, who seems to have printed
later at Barcelona, printed a _Breviary_ according to the use of the
church of Braga. No other book is known to have been printed in this
important town for the next forty years.
In the British Museum is a _Hebrew Pentateuch_, printed at ‘Taro’ in
1487. It is not known where this place was; but it has been conjectured
that the name is a misprint for Faro, a town of Portugal (though it
might stand for Toro in Leon); and if this is so, the date of the
introduction of printing into Portugal must be placed two years farther
back.
DENMARK AND SWEDEN.
The first book printed in Denmark, or indeed in the whole of the
Northern countries, was an edition of _Gulielmi Caorsini de obsidione
et bello Rhodiano_, of which a single copy is now preserved in
the library at Upsala. It was printed in 1482 at Odensee, by John
Snell, with the colophon: ‘Per venerabilem virum Johannem Snel artis
impressorie magistrum in Ottonia impressa sub anno domini 1482.’ After
the printing of this one book, Snell went to Stockholm. In 1486 one
book was printed at Schleswig, by Stephen Arndes, who had already
printed at Perusia, and who in 1487 appears at Lubeck. The book was
the _Missale secundum Ordinarium et ritum Ecclesiæ Sleswicensis_, and
no other was issued at this town in the fifteenth century. Next in
order comes Copenhagen, to which, about 1490, Govaert van Ghemen moved
from the Netherlands. The first dated book issued was the _Regulæ
de figuratis constructionibus grammaticis_ of 1493. According to M.
Deschamps, this was preceded by a _Donatus_, without date, but having
the name of the printer; and it is supposed that Govaert van Ghemen
began to print in March 1490. He seems to have printed up to the year
1510.
John Snell, who has already been noticed as a printer at Odensee,
came to Stockholm in 1483, and in that year printed the _Dialogus
Creaturarum Moralizatus_, a small quarto of 156 leaves, with
twenty-three lines to the page. [Hain, 6128.] Of this book four
examples were known; one unfortunately perished in the fire at Abö in
1827. Of the others, two are at Upsala, and the third at Copenhagen.
No other book appears at Stockholm until 1495, when the _Breviarium
Strengenense_ was printed. The printer’s name is given as Johannes
Fabri. And some writers would have this to be another form of the
name Snell; Snell, they say, being the same ‘practically’ as Smed,
Smed being our Smith, and Faber or Fabri the Latin. This alteration,
however, is not quite satisfactory.
In the same year as the _Breviarium Strengenense_ was issued, the
first book in Swedish was printed by the same printer. It is the _Bok
af Djäfvulsens frästilse_, by John Gerson. The printer, John Fabri,
died in the course of this year; for in the year following we find
issued the _Breviarium secundum ritum ecclesiæ Upsalensis_, printed
by the widow of John Fabri. One other book must be noticed as printed
in the fifteenth century; it is the _De dignitate psalterii_, by
Alanus de Rupe, printed probably at Stockholm, but with no printer’s
name. One book only is known to have been printed at Wadsten in the
fifteenth century; it is an edition of the _Breviarium ad usum cœnobii
Wadstenensis de ordine S. Brigittæ_, printed in 1495, an octavo with
twelve lines to the page. Only one copy is known, which passed after
the Reformation, with the rest of the books belonging to the monastery,
into the library of Upsala. The printing press of this monastery came
to an untimely end, for in the middle of October 1495 the whole of the
part of the building where it stood was destroyed by fire. Of this
occurrence an account is preserved; and we learn from it that not only
did the monastery lose all its printing materials, but that a tub
full of the _Revelaciones Sanctæ Brigittæ_, which had been printed
in 1492 at Lubeck, by Bartholomæus Ghotan, and which the printer had
sent up for sale, were also destroyed. Stockholm and Wadsten are the
only places in Sweden where any books were produced in the fifteenth
century; and the total number of books issued, according to Schröder’s
_Incunabula artis typographicæ in Suecia_, was six.
CHAPTER VIII.
CAXTON--WYNKYN DE WORDE--JULIAN NOTARY.
The history of the Introduction of Printing into England is
comparatively clear and straightforward; for we have neither the
difficulties of conflicting accounts, as in the case of Germany and the
Low Countries, nor troublesome manuscript references which cannot be
adequately explained, as in the case of France. Previous to 1477, when
Caxton introduced the art in a perfect state, nothing had been produced
in England but a few single sheet prints, such as the Images of Pity,
of which there are copies in the British Museum and the Bodleian, and
the cut of the Lion, the device of Bishop Gray (1454-1479), in Ely
Cathedral.
There was no block-printing (for the verses on the seven virtues
in the British Museum, and formerly in the Weigel Collection, are
comparatively late), and with the one exception of the false date of
1468 in the first Oxford book, which we shall treat of later, there
is nothing to confuse us in forming an absolutely clear idea of the
introduction of the art into England, and its subsequent growth.
William Caxton, our first printer, was born, as he himself tells us,
‘in the Weald of Kent,’ but unfortunately he has given us no clue to
the date; probably it was about 1420; and in 1438 he was apprenticed
to Robert Large, a mercer of the city of London, who was Lord Mayor
in 1439-40. His business necessitated his residence abroad, and he
doubtless left England shortly after his apprenticeship, for in 1469
he tells us that he had been ‘thirty years for the most part in
the countries of Brabant, Flanders, Holland, and Zetland.’ In 1453
he visited England, and was admitted to the Livery of the Mercers’
Company. About 1468 he was acting as governor to the ‘English Nation
residing abroad,’ or ‘Merchant Adventurers’ at Bruges. After some six
or seven years in this position, he entered the service of Margaret,
Duchess of Burgundy, sister of Edward IV. The greater leisure which
this appointment afforded him was employed in literary pursuits. In
March 1469 he commenced a translation of the _Recueil des Histoires de
Troyes_, by Raoul le Fèvre, but it was not finished till 19th September
1471, when Caxton was staying at Cologne.
This visit to Cologne marks an interesting period in Caxton’s career,
for it is most probable that it was there he learnt to print. Wynkyn
de Worde tells us that the first book printed by Caxton was the
_Bartholomæus de proprietatibus rerum_, and that it was printed at
Cologne. It has been the general custom of writers to condemn this
story as impossible, perhaps without sufficiently examining the facts.
W. de Worde says in his preface to the English edition—
‘And also of your charyte call to remembraunce
The soule of William Caxton the first prynter of this boke
In laten tongue at Coleyn, hymself to avaunce
That every well disposed man may thereon loke.’
[Illustration: PAGE FROM SARUM BREVIARY.
(_Printed at Cologne._)]
Now, there is a Latin edition, evidently printed at Cologne about
the time that Caxton was there, in a type almost identical with that
of N. Gotz or the printer of the _Augustinus de fide_; and it was in
conjunction with a very similar type, in 1476, that the ‘gros bâtarde’
type, which is so intimately connected with Caxton, first appeared.
Though Caxton worked in partnership with Colard Mansion about 1475-77,
he had probably learnt something of the art before; and, taking into
consideration his journey to Cologne, the statement of Wynkyn de Worde,
and the typographical connexion between the _Bartholomæus_ and Caxton’s
books, we may safely say that the story cannot be put aside as without
foundation. It is not, of course, suggested that Caxton printed the
book by himself, but only that he assisted in its production. He was
learning the art of printing in the office where this book was being
prepared, and his practical knowledge was acquired by assisting to
print it.
Another Cologne book which may have been printed for Caxton, or
produced through his means, is the first edition of the Breviary
according to the use of Sarum. Unfortunately we only know of its
existence through a few leaves in the libraries at Oxford, Cambridge,
Lincoln, and Paris, and have therefore no means of knowing by whom it
was printed, or whether it had any colophon at all. It is a quarto,
printed in two columns, and with thirty-one lines to the column. Such
a book would hardly have been printed without the help of an English
stationer,—and who more likely than Caxton?
In 1477 an eventful change took place in Caxton’s career. ‘On June
21, 1476, was fought the bloody battle of Morat between the Duke of
Burgundy and the Swiss, which resulted in the ruin of the Burgundian
power. In the following January, the Duke, while engaged in a murderous
battle at Nanci, was overpowered and fell, covered with wounds,
stubbornly fighting to the last. Caxton’s mistress was now no longer
the ruling power at the court of Bruges. The young daughter of the
late Duke succeeded as the reigning sovereign, and the Dowager Duchess
of Burgundy resigned her position at court, retiring into comparative
privacy on a handsome jointure. Caxton’s services as secretary would
now be no longer required by the Duchess in her altered position.’[31]
[31] _Who was Caxton?_ By R. Hill Blades. London, 1877.
Early, therefore, in 1477, Caxton returned to England, and set up his
press in the Almonry at Westminster. On 18th November of the same year
he finished printing the _Dictes or Sayengis of the Philosophers_,
the first book printed in England. Copies of this book vary, some
being without the imprint. This was followed by an edition of the
_Sarum Ordinale_, known now only from fragments, and the curious
little ‘cedula’ relating to it, advertising the ‘pyes of two or three
commemorations.’
The productiveness of Caxton’s press in its earliest years was most
remarkable, for we know of at least thirty books printed within the
first three years. A good many of these, however, were very small, the
little tracts of Chaucer and Lydgate containing but a few leaves each.
These were the ‘small storyes and pamfletes’ with which, according to
Robert Copland, Caxton began his career as printer. On the other hand,
we have the _History of Jason_ (150 leaves), _The Canterbury Tales_
(374 leaves), Chaucer’s _Boethius_ (94 leaves), the _Rhetorica Nova_
of Laur: Gulielmus de Saona (124 leaves), the _Cordyal_ (78 leaves),
the second edition of the _Dictes or Sayengis_ (76 leaves), and the
_Chronicles of England_ (182 leaves).
The starting of Lettou’s press in London, in 1480, may probably account
for some of the changes introduced by Caxton in that year. His first
indulgence, printed this year in the large type, was at once thrown
into the shade by the editions of the same indulgence issued by Lettou
in his small neat letter, which was much better adapted for such work.
Lettou also in this year used signatures, Caxton doing the same. The
competition caused Caxton to make his fount of small type, and to
introduce many other improvements. It was about this time that he
introduced woodcuts into his books; and the first book in which we
find then is the _Mirrour of the World_. The cuts in this volume may be
divided into two sets, those given for the first time by Caxton, and
those copied from his predecessors. The first are ordinary woodcuts,
the second what we should call diagrams. The woodcuts are of the
poorest design and coarsest execution. Several are of a master with
four or five pupils, others of single figures engaged in scientific
pursuits. The diagrams are more or less carefully copied from the
MSS.: they are numbered in the table of contents as being eight in
part I., nine in part II., and ten [X. being misprinted for IX.] in
part III. Of the eight belonging to part I., Nos. 2 and 3 are put to
their wrong chapters, and consequently No. 4 is omitted altogether. The
diagrams to part II. are wrongly drawn, and in some cases misplaced.
The nine diagrams to part III. are the most correct. Some writers have
contended that the cuts in Caxton’s books are from metal and not from
wood-blocks; but some of them which are found in use at a considerably
later date show marks of worm holes; a conclusive proof of the material
being wood.
To the year 1480 we can ascribe seven books, almost all in the new
type, No. 4. These are the French and English phrase-book, Lidgate’s
_Curia Sapientiæ_, the _Chronicles of England_, and the _Description
of Britain_; and three liturgical books, the _De Visitatione B.M.V._,
the _Psalterium_, and a _Horæ ad usum Sarum_, the two latter printed in
type 3. Of the _Horæ_, but a few leaves are known, which formed part
of the wonderful find of fragments in the binding of a copy of the
_Boethius_ at St. Albans Grammar School. This volume was found by Mr.
Blades in 1858, and from the covers were taken no less than fifty-six
half sheets of printed paper, proving the existence of three works from
Caxton’s press quite unknown before, the _Horæ_ above mentioned, the
_Ordinale_, and an indulgence of Pope Sixtus IV.
About 1481 appeared the first English edition of _Reynard the Fox_; and
in that year two other books, both dated, _Tully of Old Age_, and the
_Siege of Jerusalem_.
These were followed by the _Polycronicon_, the _Chronicles of England_
(edit. 2), _Burgh’s Cato_, and the second edition of the _Game of the
Chesse_, which is illustrated with woodcuts, the first edition having
none. There are altogether sixteen different woodcuts used in the
volume, and eight occur twice.
Between 1483 and the end of 1485, Caxton was at his very busiest,
issuing in that time about twenty-two books; and amongst them are some
of the most important. There are the _Pilgrimage of the Soul_, the
_Festial_ and _Quattuor Sermones_, the _Sex Epistolæ_, of which the
unique copy is now in the British Museum; the _Lyfe of Our Lady_, the
second edition of the _Canterbury Tales_ (the first with woodcuts),
Chaucer’s _Troilus and Cresida_ and _Hous of Fame_, the _Confessio
Amantis_, the _Knight of the Tower_, and _Æsop’s Fables_. This book,
which appeared 26th March 1484, has a full page frontispiece and no
less than 185 woodcuts, the work of two, if not three, different
cutters. They are of the very poorest execution, and not original in
design, being more or less carefully copied from a foreign edition.
The whole of the earlier part of 1485 must have been expended upon the
production of the _Golden Legend_, the largest book which issued from
Caxton’s press. It contains 449 leaves, and is printed on a much larger
sheet than was generally used by Caxton for folios, the full sheet
measuring as much as 24 inches by 16 inches. It has, as illustrations,
a large cut for the frontispiece, representing heaven, and two
series of eighteen large and fifty-two small cuts, the large series
including one of the device of the Earl of Arundel, to whom the book is
dedicated. Most copies of the _Golden Legend_ now in existence are made
up partly of this and partly of the second edition. As far as can be
judged, the distinguishing mark is the type of the headlines, which in
the first edition are in type 3, and in the second edition in type 5.
No copy is known made up entirely of one edition.
For the latter part of 1485 we have three dated books, the _Morte
d’Arthur_ (31st July), the only perfect copy of which is now,
unfortunately, in America; the _Life of Charles the Great_ (1st
December), the only existing copy of which is in the British Museum;
and _The Knight Paris and the Fair Vienne_ (19th December), of which
again the only known copy is in the British Museum.
In 1487, Caxton tried a new venture, and had printed for him at Paris,
by George Maynyal, an edition of the _Sarum Missal_. Only one copy is
known, slightly imperfect, which is in private hands. In this book, for
the first time, Caxton used his well-known device, probably for the
purpose of emphasising what might easily have been overlooked,—that the
book was printed at his expense. So much has been written on Caxton’s
device, and such extraordinary theories made about its hidden meanings,
that it may be as well to point out that it consists simply of his
mark standing between his initials, with a certain amount of unmeaning
ornament. It was probably cut in England, being coarsely executed,
while those used in France at the same time are well cut and artistic.
About 1487-88 we find two more books ornamented with woodcuts, the
_Royal Book_ and the _Speculum Vite Christi_. The _Speculum_ contains a
number of well-executed cuts, the _Royal Book_ only seven, six of which
had appeared in the _Speculum_.
About 1488 a second edition of the _Golden Legend_ was issued, almost
exactly the same as the first, but with the life of St. Erasmus added,
so that this edition does not end, like the first, with a blank leaf.
At the time of Caxton’s death, he seems to have had a large stock
of this book still on his hands, for he left fifteen copies to the
Church of St. Margaret, and a large number of copies to his daughter
Elizabeth, the wife of Gerard Croppe, a tailor in Westminster. It is
hard to understand how, with this large stock still for sale, Wynkyn de
Worde could afford to print a new edition in 1493 and another in 1498;
for even at the latter date copies of Caxton’s edition were, as we
happen to know, still to be obtained.
To about this time may be ascribed the curious _Image of Pity_ in the
University Library, Cambridge. It is not printed on a separate piece
of paper, but is a sort of proof struck off on the blank last page of
a book with which the indulgence has nothing to do. The book is a copy
of the _Colloquium peccatoris et Crucifixi J. C._, printed at Antwerp
by Mathias van der Goes about 1487, which must have been accidentally
lying near when the printer wanted something to take an impression
upon.[32]
[32] For a detailed account of this and other English _Images of Pity_,
see a paper by Henry Bradshaw, reprinted as No. 9 in his _Collected
Papers_, p. 135.
In 1489, Caxton printed two editions of an indulgence of great
typographical interest. This indulgence was first noticed by Dr.
Cotton, who mentions it in his _Typographical Gazetteer_ under Oxford,
supposing it to have been printed at that place. Bradshaw, on seeing a
photograph of it, at once conjectured from the form and appearance of
the type that it was printed by Caxton, though Blades refused to accept
it as a product of his press without further proof, and it was never
admitted into any of his books on Caxton. The same type was afterwards
found by Bradshaw used for sidenotes in the 1494 edition of the
_Speculum Vite Christi_, printed by W. de Worde, and the type being in
his possession at that date, could have belonged in 1489 to no one but
Caxton.
In a list of Caxton’s types this type would be known as type 7.
In addition to these two indulgences, a number of books may be assigned
to this year. The _Fayttes of Arms_ is dated; but besides this there
are the _Statutes of Henry VII._, the _Governayle of Health_, the _Four
Sons of Aymon_, _Blanchardyn and Eglantyne_, _Directorium Sacerdotum_,
second edition, the third edition of the _Dictes or Sayengis_, the
_Doctrinal of Sapience_, and an _Image of Pity_ printed on one leaf.
The second edition of _Reynard the Fox_, known only from the copy
preserved in the Pepysian Library, may also be assigned to this year.
With the exception of the _Eneydos_, the remainder of Caxton’s books
are of a religious or liturgical character. Amongst them we must
class an edition probably of the _Horæ ad usum Sarum_ not mentioned
by Blades; for though no copy or even fragment is now known, it is
certain that such a book was printed. A set-off from a page of it was
discovered by Bradshaw on a waste sheet of the _Fifteen Oes_. All that
could be certainly distinguished was that it was printed in type 5,
that there were twenty-two lines to a page, and that each page was
surrounded by a border.
The _Fifteen Oes_ itself is a most interesting book. It was printed
originally, no doubt, as an extra part for an edition of the _Horæ ad
usum Sarum_ now entirely lost. It contains a beautifully executed
woodcut of the crucifixion,—one of a series of five which occur
complete in a _Horæ_ printed by Wynkyn de Worde in 1494, and it is
also the only existing book from this press which has borders to the
pages. Caxton printed altogether about one hundred books, using in
them altogether eight types. Blades gives ninety-nine books printed
by Caxton, two of which were certainly printed by his associate in
Bruges after Caxton had left for England. On the other hand, he does
not mention the newly-discovered Grammar, the two editions of the
Indulgence of 1489, a second edition of the _Lyf of our Lady_, known
from a fragment in the Bodleian, and one or two other indulgences.
One or two books which Blades includes were printed undoubtedly by De
Worde, such as the _Book of Courtesye_ (which, indeed, contains his
small device), _The Chastysing of God’s Children_, and the _Treatise of
Love_. The genuine Caxtons catalogued by Blades number ninety-four.
As regards types, Blades gives six of Caxton’s, and a seventh which he
conjectures only to have been used by Wynkyn de Worde, though in this
he was mistaken, for it occurs in books printed while Caxton was alive.
Again, the type of the 1489 Indulgence which he does not mention, was
conclusively proved by Bradshaw to be one of Caxton’s types. This type
should be considered as type 7, and the former type, which does not
appear until 1490-91, as type 8. The woodcut initials which occur in
the _Chastysing of God’s Children_ were not used till after Caxton’s
death.
But while we venerate Caxton as our first printer, we must not overlook
the claims which he has upon us as a translator and editor. Wonderful
as his diligence in press-work may appear, it is still more wonderful
to consider how much literary work he found time to do in the intervals
of his business. He was the editor of all the books which he printed,
and he himself translated no less than twenty-two, including that great
undertaking the _Golden Legend_. Even on his deathbed he was still at
work, as we learn from the colophon of the _Vitas Patrum_, printed by
Wynkyn de Worde in 1495: ‘Thus endyth the moost vertuouse hystorye
of the deuoute and right renowned lyves of holy faders lyvynge in
deserte, worthy of remembraunce to all wel dysposed persones, which
hath ben translated oute of Frenche into Englysshe by William Caxton of
Westmynstre late deed and fynysshed at the laste daye of hys lyff.’
On Caxton’s death, in 1491, his materials passed into the hands of
Wynkyn de Worde, his assistant, who continued to print in the same
house at Westminster. Up to 1493 he continued to use Caxton’s type,
with the addition of some woodcut initials obtained from Godfried van
Os, from whom he also obtained a complete set of type, which was not
used till 1496, and then only for printing one book.
W. de Worde, though he must have lived for some time previously in
England, only took out letters of denization in 1496. The grant is
dated 20th April to ‘Winando de Worde, de ducatu Lothoringie oriundo,
impressori librorum.’
The earliest books which he printed have no name, and are all in
Caxton’s type, Nos. 6 and 4*, but with some additional types which
distinguish his works from Caxton’s.
From the time of Caxton’s death, in 1491, to the time when his own name
first appears in an imprint, Wynkyn de Worde printed five books. They
are the _Chastysing of God’s Children_, the _Treatise of Love_, and the
_Book of Courtesye_, all printed in type 6; and the _Golden Legend_ and
the _Life of St. Catherine_, printed in a modification of type 4*, a
type which is used in no other books. The _Chastysing_ is interesting
as having a title-page, the first in any book from this office; while
in the _Book of Courtesye_ we find the device of W. de Worde used for
the first time.
In 1493 we find for the first time a book containing De Worde’s name.
This is the _Liber Festivalis_, probably printed towards the end of the
year, for the _Quattuor Sermones_, generally issued with it, is dated
1494. The next book to appear was Walter Hylton’s _Scala Perfectionis_;
and in the same year was issued a reprint of Bonaventura’s _Speculum
Vite Christi_, a book of very great interest, for the sidenotes are
printed with the type which Caxton used for his Indulgence of 1489,
and which was used for no other book than this. To this year 1494 we
may ascribe a beautiful edition of the Sarum _Horæ_, adorned with
woodcuts and borders, nearly all of which were inherited from Caxton.
The type which De Worde used for these books seems to have come into
Caxton’s hands from France, during the last year of his life, and
resembles closely certain founts which belonged to the Paris printers
P. Levet and Higman, if indeed it is not the same. After 1494, De Worde
discarded it, using it only occasionally for headings or titles. Blades
wrongly says that the use of this type separates the early W. de Worde
books from the Caxton’s; but Caxton certainly possessed and used it.
The distinctive mark of the early Wynkyn de Worde books is the use of
the initials obtained from G. van Os. Bradshaw, speaking of these,
says, ‘Indeed, the woodcut initials are what specially serve at once to
distinguish W. de Worde’s earliest from Caxton’s latest books.’
In 1495 we have three dated books, the _Vitas Patrum_, which Caxton
was engaged in translating up to the day of his death; Higden’s
_Polycronicon_, the first English book containing musical notes,
and the _Directorium Sacerdotum_. Besides these, a fair number of
undated books may be ascribed to this year or the year after. The most
important is the Bartholomæus, _De Proprietatibus Rerum_. Apart from
its ordinary interest, it is considered to be the first book printed on
paper made in England.
‘And John Tate the younger, joye mote he broke,
Whiche late hath in Englond doo made this paper thynne
That now in our englisshe this boke is prynted Inne.’
In 1496 appeared the curious reprint of the _Book of St. Albans_. It
seems never to have been noticed that this book is entirely printed
with the type which was obtained from Godfried van Os about the time
of his removal to Copenhagen. Besides the _Book of St. Albans_, it
has an extra chapter on fishing with an angle, the first treatise on
the subject in English. An edition of the _Dives and Pauper_, with
a handsome title-page, was issued this year, as well as a number of
smaller books of considerable interest, as the _Constitutions_ of
Lyndewode, the _Meditacions_ of St. Bernard, and the _Festial_ and
_Quattuor Sermones_. Among the dated books of 1497 are the _Chronicles
of England_, an edition copied from the one printed at St. Albans; and
it is from the colophon to this edition that we learn that the printer
at St. Albans was ‘sometyme scole mayster’ there.
In 1498 three large and important books were printed; of these the
first was an edition of the _Golden Legend_, of which only one perfect
copy is known, in the Spencer Collection; the next, a second edition
of the _Morte d’Arthur_, the first illustrated with woodcuts. The only
known copy of this book, wanting ten leaves, is also in the Spencer
Library. The third book was an edition of the _Canterbury Tales_. In
1499 a large number of books were printed, the most curious being an
edition of _Mandeville’s Travels_, illustrated profusely with woodcuts
of the wonders seen by the traveller, who got as far as the walls
of Paradise, but did not look in. Of this book two copies, both
imperfect, are known. _A Book of Good Manners_ and a _Psalterium_, both
known from single copies, were also printed in this year. An _Ortus
Vocabulorum_, printed in 1500, is the last book which was issued by
De Worde at Westminster. Altogether, from 1491 to the time he left
Caxton’s old house at Westminster, W. de Worde printed about a hundred
books, certainly not less; and he also had a few books printed for him,
and at his expense, by other printers.
In a very large number of De Worde’s early books he inserted the cut
of the crucifixion, which is first found in Caxton’s _XV Oes_. In 1499
the block split at the time when they were printing an edition of the
_Mirror of Consolation_, sometime after the 10th July, so that all the
books which contain the cut in its injured state must be later than
10th July 1499.
The year 1500 gives us an excellent date-mark for W. de Worde’s books,
for in that year he moved from Westminster ‘in Caxton’s house,’ to
London, in Fleet Street, at the sign of the Sun. Upon moving he seems
to have destroyed or disposed of a good deal of printing material. Some
of his woodcuts passed to Julian Notary, who was also at that time a
printer in Westminster. One of his marks and some of his type disappear
entirely at this time. The type which he had used in the majority of
the books printed in the last few years of the fifteenth century we
find in use up to 1508 or 1509, when it disappears from London to
reappear at York; but his capitals and marks had changed. From 1504
onward he used in the majority of his books the well-known square
device in three divisions, having in the upper part the sun and moon
and a number of stars, In the centre the W. and C. and Caxton’s mark;
below this the ‘Sagittarius’ shooting an arrow at a dog. It has not
hitherto been noticed that of this device there are three varieties,
identical to a superficial view, yet quite distinct and definitely
marking certain periods. The first variety in use from 1505 to 1518
has in the upper part eleven stars to the left of the sun and nine to
the right, while the white circular inlets at the ends of the W. are
almost closed. The second variety used from 1519 to the middle of 1528
has the same number of stars, but the circular inlets at the ends of
the letters are more open. The last variety has ten stars to the left
of the sun and ten to the right. It was used from 1528 to the time of
De Worde’s death. In the colophons of some of his early books De Worde
mentions that he had another shop in St. Paul’s Churchyard, with the
sign of Our Lady of Pity.
Wynkyn de Worde was essentially a popular printer, and he issued
innumerable small tracts; short romances in prose and verse, books of
riddles, books on carving and manners at table, almanacs, sermons,
grammars, and such like. Many of these books were translations from
the French, and were made by Robert Copland, who was one of De Werde’s
apprentices. The later books of De Worde are often puzzling. He seems
to have employed John Scot to print for him, and many books which have
only De Worde’s name are in Scot’s type. One book is particularly
curious. It is an edition of _The Mirror of Golde for the Sinful Soul_,
29th March 1522. Some copies have a colophon, ‘Imprinted at London
withoute Newgate, in Saint Pulker’s Parysche, by John Scot.’ Other
copies have the first sheet and the last leaf reset, while the colophon
runs, ‘Imprinted at London in Fletestrete, at the sygne of the Sone, by
Wynkyn de Worde.’
De Worde died at the end of 1534. His will is dated 5th June 1534, and
it was proved 19th January 1535. His executors were John Bedill, who
succeeded him in business, and James Gaver, probably a bookbinder, and
one of the numerous family of that name who exercised their craft in
the Low Countries. In the forty years that he printed, Wynkyn de Worde
produced over six hundred books, that is, more than fifteen a year, a
much higher average than any other early English printer attained.
About the year 1496 three printers started in partnership at the sign
of St. Thomas the Apostle in London. They were Julian Notary, Jean
Barbier, and a third whose name is not known, but whose initials were
I. H., and who may perhaps have been Jean Huvin. The first book which
they printed was the _Questiones Alberti de modis significandi_, a
quarto of sixty leaves, printed in a clear, handsome black letter.
At the end of the book is a printer’s mark, with the initials of
the printers, but there is no colophon to tell us either their names
or the date of printing. In 1497 they issued an edition of the _Horæ
ad usum Sarum_, printed, as we learn from the colophon, for Wynkyn
de Worde. The same printer’s mark is in this book, but again we have
no information about the names of the printers. In 1498 the firm had
changed,—I. H. had left, and the two remaining printers, Notary and
Barbier, had moved to Westminster, perhaps in order to be nearer the
printer for whom they worked. In this year they printed an edition of
the _Sarum Missal_ for Wynkyn de Worde, and after this Jean Barbier
returns to France, leaving Notary at Westminster by himself. There he
continued to print up to some time before 1503, and in that year we
find him living ‘without Temple Bar, in St. Clement’s Parish, at the
sign of the Three Kings.’ Before moving, he had printed, besides the
books mentioned above, a _Festial_ and _Quattuor Sermones_ in 1499, a
_Horæ ad usum Sarum_ in 1500, and the Chaucer’s _Complaint of Mars and
Venus_, without date. About this time he obtained some woodcuts from
Wynkyn de Worde, and we find them used in the first book he printed at
his new address, the _Golden Legend_ of 1503[4], and in it also are
to be found some very curious metal cuts in the ‘manière criblée.’ An
undated _Sarum Horæ_, in which the calendar begins with 1503, should
most probably be put before the _Golden Legend_. From 1504 to 1510
Notary printed about thirteen books, and in that latter year (as we
learn from the imprint of the _Expositio Hymnorum_) he had, besides his
shop without Temple Bar, another in St. Paul’s Churchyard, of which the
sign was also the Three Kings.
[Illustration: PART OF A PAGE FROM GOLDEN LEGEND.
(_Printed by Notary, 1503._)]
Between 1510 and 1515, Notary issued no dated book, but in the latter
year appeared the _Chronicles of England_, and in the year following
two _Grammars_ of Whittington. The old printing-office ‘Extra Temple
Bar’ seems to have been given up, for at this time Notary was printing
in Paul’s Churchyard, at the sign of St. Mark. After 1518 there is
another interval of three years without a dated book; but between 1518
and 1520 several were issued from the sign of the Three Kings in Paul’s
Churchyard, and after that Notary printed no more. His movements from
place to place are difficult to understand. In 1497 he is in London at
the sign of St. Thomas Apostle, in 1498 at Westminster in King Street.
About 1502-3, he moves to a house outside Temple Bar, the one probably
that Pynson had just vacated. In 1510, while still printing at the same
place, he had a shop in St. Paul’s Churchyard at the sign of the Three
Kings. In 1515 he is at the sign of St. Mark in Paul’s Churchyard,
in 1518 again at the Three Kings. It seems probable that some of his
productions must have entirely disappeared, otherwise it is hard to
account for the number of blank years.
The latest writer on Julian Notary conjectures that the sign of St.
Mark and the sign of the Three Kings were attached to the same house;
that Julian Notary, on moving to Paul’s Churchyard, went to a house
with the sign of St. Mark, and after printing under that sign for two
years, altered it, for commercial reasons, to his old emblem of the
Three Kings. This is ingenious, but impossible, for the writer has
ignored the fact that Notary had a shop in St. Paul’s Churchyard at the
Three Kings five years before we hear of the one with the sign of St.
Mark.
CHAPTER IX.
OXFORD AND ST. ALBAN’S.
As early as 1664, when Richard Atkyns issued his _Original and Growth
of Printing_, the assertion was put forward that printing in England
was first practised at Oxford. ‘A book came into my hands,’ says
Atkyns, ‘printed at Oxon, Anno Dom. 1468, which was three years before
any of the recited Authours would allow it to be in England.’
The book here referred to is the celebrated _Exposicio sancti Jeronimi
in simbolum apostolorum_, written by Tyrannius Rufinus of Aquileia;
and in the colophon it is clearly stated that the book was printed in
1468. ‘Impressa Oxonie et finita anno domini.M. cccc. lxviij xvij. die
decembris.’
Many writers have argued for and against the authenticity of the date;
and though some are still found who believe in its correctness, it is
generally allowed to be a misprint for 1478. In the first place, the
book has printed signatures, which have not been found in any book
before 1472. Again, copies of this book have been found bound up in
the original binding with books of 1478, In the library of All Souls
College, Oxford, is a copy bound up with one of the 1479 books, and
though the present binding is modern, they were originally bound
together; and we find a set-off from the damp ink of the second volume
on the last leaf of the first. A copy in another Oxford library, bound
up with the 1479 books, has been marked for or by the binder with
consecutive signatures all through the several tracts. Instances of
misprinted dates are far from rare. The _Mataratius de componendis
versibus_, printed at Venice by Ratdolt, is dated 1468 instead of
1478, and was on that account sometimes put forward as a proof of
early printing there. Spain, too, claimed printing for the same year
on account of a misprinted ‘1468’ in a grammar printed at Barcelona.
A _Vocabularius rerum_, printed by John Keller at Augsburg, has the
same misprint of 1468. However, the surest test of the date of a book
is to place it alongside others from the same press, and compare the
workmanship. In this case the book falls naturally into its place at
the head of the Oxford list in 1478, taking just the small precedence
of the two books of 1479, which the slightly lesser excellence of its
workmanship warrants. A break of eleven years between two books which
are in every way so closely allied would be almost impossible, and
quite unsupported by other instances. Accepting 1478 as the correct
date, it is clear that Oxford lost no time in employing the new art,
for Caxton had only commenced at Westminster the year before.
The first three books, the _Exposicio_ of 1478 before mentioned, and
the _Ægidius de originali peccato_, and _Textus ethicorum Aristotelis
per Leonardum Aretinum translatus_, both of 1470, form a group of
themselves. They are printed in a type either brought from Cologne or
directly copied from Cologne work, and strongly resembling that used by
Gerard ten Raem de Berka or Guldenschaff. None have a printer’s name,
but they are ascribed to Theodore Rood of Cologne, the printer of the
other early Oxford books.
The earliest of these three, the _Exposicio_, is a small quarto of
forty-two leaves, with twenty-five lines to the page, and the other
two are generally similar in type and form. There are, however, one or
two differences to be noted in it. The edges on the right-hand margin
are often uneven, the letters Q, H, g are often wrongly used, the text
begins on A1 instead of on the second leaf, and it was printed one page
at a time. These faults were all rectified in the two later books,
which leave little to be desired in the way of execution.
The next dated book appeared in 1481, and it has the advantage of a
full colophon giving the name of the printer. It is a Latin commentary
on the _De Animâ_ of Aristotle, by Alexander de Hales; a folio of 240
leaves, printed in type which had not been used before,—a curious,
narrow, upright Gothic, not unlike in general appearance some of the
founts used at Zwoll, or by Ther Hoernen at Cologne. A copy of this
book was bought in the year that it was published for the library
of Magdalen College, Oxford, where it still remains, for the sum of
thirty-three shillings and fourpence. In 1482 was issued a _Commentary
on the Lamentations of Jeremiah_, by John Lattebury, a folio of 292
leaves. This is one of the least rare of the early Oxford books, and
three copies of it are known printed upon vellum. The most interesting
of these is in the library of All Souls College, Oxford. It is a
beautiful copy in the original Oxford binding, and the various quires
are signed by the proof-readers. Shortly after the issue of the
_Lattebury_, the press acquired an extremely beautiful woodcut border,
and the copies still remaining in stock of the _Lattebury_ and the
_Alexander de Hales_ were rendered more attractive by having this
border printed round the first page of text, and at the beginning of
some of the divisions. In this second issue of the two books, some
sheets also appear to have been reprinted.
With these two books may be classed two others, in both cases known
only from fragments, an edition of _Cicero pro Milone_ and a Latin
Grammar. The _Cicero pro Milone_ is a quarto, and would have contained
about thirty leaves. At present only eight leaves are known; four in
the Bodleian, and four in Merton College Library. This was the first
edition of a classic printed in England. Of the Latin Grammar only two
leaves are known, which are in the British Museum.
The third and last group contains eight books, of which only one
contains a printer’s name. This is found in the colophon to the
_Phalaris_ of 1485, a curious production in verse running as follows:—
‘Hoc Teodericus rood quem collonia misit
Sanguine germanus nobile pressit opus
Atque sibi socius thomas fuit anglicus hunte.
Dij dent ut venetos exuperare queant
Quam ienson venetos decuit vir gallicus artem
Ingenio didicit terra britanna suo
Celatos veneti nobis transmittere libros
Cedite nos alijs vendimus o veneti
Que fuerat vobis ars primum nota latini
Est eadem nobis ipsa reperta patres
Quamvis semotos toto canit orbe britannos
Virgilius, placet his lingua latina tamen.’
From this we learn that Rood had taken as his partner one Thomas Hunt,
an Englishman, who had been established as a stationer in Oxford as
early as 1473. He was probably associated with Rood in the production
of all the books in the last group, and his influence may be perhaps
traced in the new founts of type used in them, which are much more
English in appearance than any which had been used at this press before.
One of the earliest of the books of this last group is the Latin
Grammar by John Anwykyll, with the _Vulgaria Terencii_. Of the first
part, the Grammar, which contained about 128 leaves, only one imperfect
copy, now in the Bodleian, is known. Of the other part, the _Vulgaria_,
at least four copies are known, and an inscription on the copy
belonging to the Bodleian gives us a clue to the date. On its first
leaf is written the following inscription:—‘1483. Frater Johannes
Grene emit hunc librum Oxonie de elemosinis amicorum suorum’—Brother
John Grene bought this book at Oxford with the gifts of his friends.
1483 is, then, the latest date to which we can ascribe the printing of
the book; and this fits it into its place, after the books of 1481 and
1482 printed in the earlier type.
[Illustration: FIRST PAGE OF THE “EXCITATIO.”
(_Printed at Oxford_, c. 1485.)]
After the _Anwykyll_ comes a book by Richard Rolle of Hampole,
_Explanationes super lectiones beati Job_, a quarto of sixty-four
leaves, of which all the three known copies are in the University
Library, Cambridge. With this may be classed a unique book in the
British Museum, a sermon of Augustine, _Excitatio ad elemosinam
faciendam_, a quarto of eight leaves. This book, bound with five other
rare tracts, was lot 4912 in the Colbert sale, and brought the large
price of 1 livre, 10 sous, about half-a-crown in our money. Another
quarto, similar to the last two, follows, a collection of treatises on
logical subjects, usually associated with the name of Roger Swyneshede,
who was most probably the author of one only out of the nineteen
different parts. It is a quarto of 164 leaves, and the only perfect
copy known is in the library of New College, Oxford; another copy,
slightly imperfect, being in the library of Merton College.
Next in our conjectural arrangement comes the Lyndewode, _Super
constitutiones provinciales_, a large folio of 366 leaves. This is the
first edition of the celebrated commentary of William Lyndewode, and
of the Provincial Constitutions of England. On the verso of the
first leaf is a woodcut, the first occurring in an Oxford book.
Ascribed to the year 1485 are the _Doctrinale_ of Alexander Gallus and
the Latin translation of the _Epistles of Phalaris_, whose colophon has
been already noticed.
The _Doctrinale_ of Alexander Gallus is known only from two leaves in
the library of St. John’s College, Cambridge. These leaves are used
as end papers in the binding of a book; and a volume in the library
of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, bound in identically the same
manner, has also as end papers two leaves of an Oxford printed book.
That these two books must have been bound by the same man, almost at
the same time, is shown from the fact that in both we find used vellum
leaves from one and the same manuscript along with the refuse Oxford
leaves.
The Latin translation of the _Epistles of Phalaris_, by Franciscus
Aretinus, is in many ways the most interesting of this last group
of Oxford books, containing as it does a very full colophon. It was
printed, so the colophon tells us, in the 297th Olympiad, which those
who write on the subject say was the year 1485. It is a quarto of
eighty-eight leaves, and a very fine perfect copy is in the library of
Wadham College, Oxford; two other copies are known, belonging to Corpus
Christi College, Oxford, and the Spencer Library.
The last book issued by the Oxford press was the _Liber Festialis_,
a book of sermons for the holy days, by John Mirk. Several imperfect
copies of this book are known, the most complete being in the library
of Lambeth Palace. It is a folio of 174 leaves, and contains a series
of eleven large cuts and five small ones. This series of large cuts
(together with the cut of an author at work on his book, which occurs
in the _Lyndewode_, and which is clearly one of the set), were not cut
for the _Festial_, but appear to have been prepared for some edition of
the _Golden Legend_. It was to have been a large folio book, for when
we find the cuts used in the _Festial_, they have been cut at one end
to allow them to fit the smaller sized sheet.
The _Festial_ is dated 1486, but has no printer’s name. After this we
know of no other book produced in Oxford during the fifteenth century,
and we have no information to account for the cessation of the press.
It is possible, however, that Rood left Oxford and returned to Cologne.
Panzer (vol. iv. p. 274) mentions two books, _Questiones Aristotelis
de generatione et corruptione_ and _Tres libri de anima Aristotelis_,
printed at Cologne by a printer named Theodoricus in 1485 and 1486. In
the library at Munich is a copy of the first book, and a facsimile of
a page was published lately in Burger’s _Monumenta Germaniæ et Italiæ
Typographica_.
Now the type in which this book is printed bears the very strongest
resemblance in many respects to that used by Rood at Oxford in 1481
and 1482, and the similarity of the names makes it possible, if not
probable, that Rood was the printer. The _Questiones Aristotelis
de generatione et corruptione_ was finished at Cologne, ‘anno
incarnationis dominice 1485 in vigilia S, Andreæ apostoli per
Theodoricum impressorem colonie infra sedecim domos.’[33]
[33] At this same address, where, in 1470, Ther Hoernen was living,
we afterwards find John Landen. It is not, however, quite clear that
‘infra sedecim domos’ was the denomination of a particular house.
The vigil of St. Andrew was the 29th of November, so that Rood had not
much time to move from Oxford and start his new office between the date
of the publication of the _Phalaris_, 1485, and the 29th of November of
the same year.
Ennen and Madden consider that this Theodoricus was a certain Theodoric
de Berse, whose name occurs in a list of printers and stationers of
Cologne in 1501.
It is impossible with our present knowledge to say any more on the
question; but if Rood did return to Cologne, the _Festial_ must have
been printed by Hunt alone. With it the fifteenth century printing
at Oxford suddenly ceased, after a fairly prosperous career of eight
years, during which at least fifteen books were issued.
From 1486 onward we have no further record of printing there till the
year 1517. In the meanwhile the stationers supplied such books as were
required; and to some of them we find incidental references, both in
accounts and in the colophons of books printed for them.
In 1506, Pynson printed an edition of the _Principia_ of Peregrinus
de Lugo, at the expense of Georgius Castellanus, who was living at
the sign of St. John the Evangelist. Between 1512 and 1514, Henry
Jacobi, a London stationer, moved to Oxford, and started business at
the sign of the Trinity, the sign which he had used when in London.
He died at Oxford in 1514. In 1517 the new press was started by John
Scolar, who lived ‘in viculo diui Joannis baptiste.’ The first book
he issued was a commentary by Walter Burley on apart of Aristotle,
and this was followed in the next year by another book by the same
author, _De materia et forma_. In 1518 were also issued the _Questiones
super libros ethicorum_, by John Dedicus [15 May], the _Compendium
questionum de luce et lumine_ [5 June], and Robert Whitinton’s _De
heteroclitis nominibus_ [27 June]. To the same year may be assigned
a _Prognostication_ by Jasper Laet, of which there is a copy in the
Cambridge University Library. In 1519 there is only one book, printed
by a new man, for Scolar has disappeared. It is the _Compotus manualis
ad usum Oxoniensium_, printed by Charles Kyrfoth, who lived like Scolar
‘in vico diui Joannis baptiste,’ and perhaps succeeded the latter in
business. From this time forward no books were printed in Oxford till
1585, when the University Press was started by Joseph Barnes, and
commenced its career by issuing the _Speculum moralium quæstionum_ of
John Case.
One more early Oxford stationer must be mentioned as connected with
printing, and this is John Dorne or Thorne, who was in business about
1520, and whose most interesting Day-book was edited some years ago by
Mr. Falconer Madan for the Oxford Historical Society. He was originally
a stationer, and perhaps printer, at Brunswick. A small educational
work, the _Opusculum insolubilium secundum usum insignis scole paruisi
in alma universitate Oxonie_, printed by Treveris, was to be sold ‘apud
I. T.’ These initials stand probably for John Thorne, and we find the
book mentioned in his accounts.
ST. ALBAN’S.
The schoolmaster printer of St. Alban’s has left us no information
as to his life, or even told us his name, and we should know nothing
whatever about him had not W. de Worde referred to him as ‘sometime
schoolmaster of St. Albans.’
The press was probably started in 1479; for though the earliest dated
book is dated 1480, an edition from this press of _Augustini Dacti
elegancie_, in quarto, is evidently earlier, being printed throughout
in one type, the first of those used by this printer. Of this book one
copy only is known, in the University Library, Cambridge.
In 1480 the schoolmaster printer issued the _Rhetorica Nova_ of
Laurentius de Saona, a book which Caxton was printing about the
same time, and very soon after it the _Questiones Alberti de modo
significandi_. These were followed by three more works in Latin,
the _Questiones super Physica Aristotelis_ of Joannes Canonicus,
the _Exempla Sacræ Scripturæ_, and Antonius Andreæ _super Logica
Aristotelis_. The remaining two books from this press, in contrast to
those that had preceded them, are of a popular character. These are the
_Chronicles of England_, and the treatise on hawking, hunting, and coat
armour, commonly known as the _Book of St. Alban’s_.
All the eight St. Alban’s books are of the greatest rarity. More than
half are known only from single copies; of some, not a single perfect
copy remains.
The very scholastic nature of the majority of the books from this press
renders it more or less uninteresting; but the two latest works, the
_Chronicles_ and the _Book of St. Alban’s_, appeal more to popular
taste. Editions of the _Chronicles_ were issued by every English
printer, and there is nothing in this particular one to merit special
remark. The _Book of St. Alban’s_, on the other hand, is a book of very
particular interest. It consists of three parts; the first is devoted
to hawking, the second to hunting, and the third to coat armours or
heraldry. Naturally enough it was a popular book--so popular that no
perfect copy now exists. It also possesses the distinction of being the
first English book which contains specimens of printing in colour; for
the coats-of-arms at the end are for the most part printed in their
correct colour. Later in the century, in 1496, W. de Worde issued
another edition of this book, adding to it a chapter on ‘Fishing with
an angle.’
In these eight St. Alban’s books we find four different types used. The
first is a small, clear-cut, distinctive type, but is only used for the
text of one book and the signatures of others. Type NO. 2, which is
used for the text of the two English and one of the Latin books, is a
larger ragged type, with a strong superficial resemblance to Caxton’s.
Type No. 3, which is used in four Latin books, is a smaller type, full
of abbreviations and contractions; while the last type is one which had
belonged to Caxton (his type 3), but which he gave up using about 1484.
This use of Caxton’s type has led some people to imagine that there was
a close connection between the Westminster and St. Alban’s press; and
a writer in the _Athenæum_ went so far as to propound a theory that
Caxton’s unsigned books were really printed at St. Alban’s.
CHAPTER X.
LONDON.
JOHN LETTOU, WILLIAM DE MACHLINIA, RICHARD PYNSON.
In 1480, printing was introduced into London by John Lettou, perhaps a
native of Lithuania, of which Lettou is an old form. The first product
of the press was an edition of John Kendale’s Indulgence asking for aid
against the Turks, another edition having just been issued by Caxton in
his large No. 2* type. As we have said, Lettou’s small neat type was
very much better suited for printing indulgences, and its appearance
very probably caused Caxton to make his small type No. 4, which he used
in future for such work. Besides two other editions of the indulgence,
Lettou printed only one book in this year, the _Quæstiones Antonii
Andreæ super duodecim libros metaphysice Aristotelis_. It is a small
folio of 106 leaves, of very great rarity, only one perfect copy being
known, in the library of Sion College, London. In 1481 another folio
book was printed, _Thomas Wallensis super Psalterium_, and probably in
the same year a work on ecclesiastical procedure, known only from two
leaves which were found in the binding of one of the Parker books in
Corpus Christi College, Cambridge.
From the workmanship of these books we can clearly see that Lettou was
a practised printer, though we know nothing as to where he learnt his
art. His type, which bears no resemblance to any other used in England,
is very similar to that of Matthias Moravus, the Naples printer; so
similar, indeed, as to make it certain that there must have been some
connexion between the two printers, or some common origin for their
types. Lettou was assisted by a certain William Wilcock, at whose
expense the two large books were printed.
About 1482, Lettou was joined by another printer, William de Machlinia,
a native no doubt of Malines in Belgium. These two printers employed a
new fount of type of the same school as the other English types, and
one suitable for the printing of the law-books, which were their sole
productions. In partnership they printed but five books, the _Tenores
Novelli_, the _Abridgment of the Statutes_, and the _Year-Books_ of
the 33rd, 35th, and 36th years of Henry VII. The first of these books
is the only one which has a colophon. It gives the names of the two
printers, and states that the book was printed in the city of London,
‘juxta ecclesiam omnium sanctorum;’ a rather vague address, since,
according to Arnold’s Chronicle, there were several London churches
thus dedicated.
After these books had been issued, about 1483-84, John Lettou
disappears, and Machlinia carried on his business alone. By himself he
printed at least twenty-two books or editions. Out of all this number
only four contain his name, and not one a date. He printed at two
addresses, ‘By Flete-brigge,’ and in Holborn. If these two addresses
refer to two different places, and we have no reason for supposing the
contrary, there is no doubt that ‘By Flete-brigge’ is the earlier.
How late he continued to carry on business it is not possible to find
out, as none of his books are dated. The Bull of Innocent VIII.,
relating to the marriage of Henry VII., which he printed, cannot
have been issued till after 2nd March 1486; and the occurrence of a
title-page in one of his books points to a still later date, for we
know of no other book having a title-page printed in England before
1491-92.
Machlinia’s use of signatures and initial directors seems to have been
entirely arbitrary, and it is impossible to arrange the books in any
certain order from their typographical peculiarities.
In the ‘Flete-brigge’ type there are nine books. Two works of Albertus
Magnus, the _Liber aggregationis_ and the _De secretis mulierum_;[34]
a _Horæ ad usum Sarum_, known only from fragments rescued from old
bindings; the _Revelation of St. Nicholas to a monk of Evesham_, of
which the two known copies show curious instances of wrong imposition.
There are, besides, three law-books and a school-book, the _Vulgaria
Terencii_. Of the _Horæ ad usum Sarum_ twenty leaves are known, all
printed on vellum. In size it might be called a 16mo, and was made up
in gatherings of eight leaves, each gathering containing two sheets of
vellum. These gatherings were folded in a peculiar way. As an ordinary
rule, when we find a quire of eight leaves formed of two sheets, leaves
1, 2, 7, 8 were printed on one sheet, leaves 3, 4, 5, 6 on the other.
But Machlinia adopted a different plan, and printed leaves 1, 4, 5,
8 on the one sheet, leaves 2, 3, 6, 7 on the other. It is impossible
to say whether there were any cuts in the volume; there are none in
the remaining fragments, but at the beginning of certain portions a
woodcut border was used, which surrounded the whole page. This border
was afterwards used by Pynson. A curious thing to be noticed about the
type in which these books are printed, is its very strong resemblance
to some of the founts of type used about the same period in Spain.
[34] The copy of this book in the University Library, Cambridge,
wanting all signature _c_, but in fine condition, and uncut, has on
the first blank leaf some early writing which refers to the year 1485,
showing probably that the book was not printed after that date.
[Illustration: PAGE OF THE SARUM HORÆ.
(_Printed by Machlinia._)]
In the Holborn type there are a larger number of books, at least
fourteen being known. Of these the best known and most common is the
_Speculum Christiani_, supposed, from the occurrence of the name in a
manuscript copy, to have been compiled by one Watton. It is interesting
as containing specimens of early poetry. Another book was popular
enough to run through three editions; this was the _Treatise on the
Pestilence_, written by Kamitus or Canutus, bishop of Aarhuus. It is
impossible to say when it was printed, or whether some panic connected
with the plague caused a run upon it. One of the editions must have
been almost the last book which Machlinia issued, for it contains the
title-page already referred to. The most important book in this set
in point of size is the _Chronicles of England_, of which only one
perfect copy is known. In the copy in the British Museum occurs a
curious thing. The book is a folio, but two of the leaves are printed
as quarto. In this type are three law-books, _Year-Books_ for years 34
and 37 of Henry VI., and the _Statutes_ of Richard III. There are also
two school-books, the _Vulgaria Terentii_ and an interesting _Donatus_
in folio, whose existence is known only from duplicate copies of one
leaf. The remaining books are theological, and comprise two separate
_Nova Festa_, or services for new feasts; one for the Visitation of
the Virgin, the other for the Transfiguration of our Lord. These
services were almost at once incorporated in the general volume of the
_Breviary_, so that in a separate form they are very uncommon. The last
book to be mentioned is the _Regulæ et ordinationes_ of Innocent VIII.,
which must have been printed some time after 23rd September 1484, when
that pope was elected. Of a later date still is a _Bull_ of the same
pope relating to Henry VII.’s title and marriage. It must have been
printed after 7th November 1485 (the date of Parliament), and after 2nd
March 1485-86 (the date of the _Bull_).
Another book should be mentioned here, which, though it cannot with
certainty be ascribed to any known English printer, resembles most
of all the work of Machlinia. It is an English translation by Kay of
the Latin description of the _Siege of Rhodes_, written by Caorsin; a
small folio of twenty-four leaves. Many of the letters seem the same as
Machlinia’s, but with variations and modifications.
The number of founts of type used in this office throughout its
existence was eleven, and of these two are very peculiar. One of the
larger sets of type seems to have been obtained from Caxton, but it was
hardly used at all. Another set of capital letters, which must have
been obtained from abroad, occur in some of the latest books. They bear
no resemblance to anything used by any other printer, and look rather
as though they belonged to a fount of Roman type.
Though 1486 is the latest date which we can fix to any of Machlinia’s
productions, it is probable that he continued to print up till about
the year 1490.
Soon after the cessation of Machlinia’s press, his business seems to
have been taken on by Richard Pynson, whose first dated book appeared
in 1493. Though it is impossible to prove conclusively that Pynson
succeeded Machlinia in business, many small points seem to show that
this was the case. We find leaves of Machlinia’s books in bindings
undoubtedly produced by Pynson, and he was also in possession of a
border used by Machlinia in his edition of the _Sarum Horæ_. It is
often said that Pynson was an apprentice of Caxton’s; but we have no
evidence of this beyond the words in the prologue to the _Chaucer_,
where Caxton is called ‘my worshipful master’—a title applied sometimes
to Caxton by printers living fifty years after.[35]
[35] Blades, in his _Life of Caxton_, not only says that Pynson was
Caxton’s apprentice, but that he used his mark in some of his books.
This mistake has arisen from a doctored copy of Bonaventure’s _Speculum
vite Christi_ in the British Museum, which has a leaf with Caxton’s
device inserted at the end.
In his patent of naturalisation of 30th July 1513, Pynson is described
as a native of Normandy; and we know that he had business relations
with Le Talleur of Rouen, who printed some law-books for him. These
books, three in number, may be ascribed to about 1490, or to some time
after Machlinia had ceased printing, and before Pynson had begun. It
was probably very soon after 1490 that Pynson set up his printing
establishment at the Temple Bar; for though his first dated book, the
_Dives and Pauper_, is dated the 5th July 1493, there are one or two
other books that can with certainty be placed before it.
A fragment of a grammar, consisting of the last leaf only, among the
Hearne fragments in the Bodleian, is all that remains of one of his
earliest books. It is printed entirely in his first large coarse type,
which bears so much resemblance to some of Machlinia’s; and was used as
waste to line the boards of a book before Passion Week, 1494.
The _Chaucer_, in which two types are used, one for the prose and
another for the verse, is also earlier than the _Dives and Pauper_.
It is illustrated with a number of badly executed woodcuts, cut
specially for the book, of the various pilgrims in the _Canterbury
Tales_. Some of these cuts were altered while the book was passing
through the press, and serve again for different characters. The
Sergeaunt with a little alteration reappears as the Doctor of Physick,
and the Squire is turned into the Manciple.
[Illustration: FROM THE ‘FESTUM NOMINIS JESU.’
PYNSON, C. 1493.]
In 1493 the _Dives and Pauper_ appeared. It is printed in a new type,
copied evidently from a French model, and strongly resembling some
used in Verard’s books. This type superseded the larger type of the
_Chaucer_, which we do not find in use again. To 1493 a number of
small books can be assigned, all printed in the type of the _Dives and
Pauper_, and having twenty-five lines to the page. Amongst them we may
mention the _Festum Nominis Jesu_; an edition of Lydgate’s _Churl and
Bird_; a _Life of St. Margaret_, which is known only from fragments,
and a legal work of which there is one leaf in Lambeth Palace Library.
The method of using signatures, which Pynson adopted in these early
books, affords another small piece of evidence to prove that he learnt
to print at Rouen, and not in England. In the quartos, the first leaf
of the quire is signed A 1, the second has no signature, while the
third is signed A 2. This way of signing (by the sheet instead of by
the leaf), not a very ordinary one, was commonly in use at Rouen; while
Caxton and De Worde signed in the more usual manner, with consecutive
signatures to each leaf for the first half of the quire.
For some unknown reason, Pynson was dissatisfied with the _Dives and
Pauper_ type, for after 1493 it never seems to have been used again.
From this time onwards, till about 1500, the majority of his books were
printed in the small type of the _Chaucer_, or in some newer types of
a more severe and less French appearance. In his earliest books Pynson
used a device consisting of his initials cut in wood, so as to print
white upon a black background. It resembles in many ways that of his
old associate Le Talleur, and may therefore have been cut in Rouen. In
1496 we find him using two new devices, one a large woodcut containing
his mark, and a helmet surmounted by a small bird,[36] which began to
break about 1497, and was soon disused. The other, which is a metal
cut, is in two pieces, a border of men and flowers, and an interior
piece with the mark on a shield and supporters. The border of this
device is a most useful guide in determining the dates of the books
in which it occurs. In the lower part is a ribbon pierced for the
insertion of type. The two ends of the piece below the ribbon were too
thin to be strong, so that the piece gets gradually bent in, the ribbon
becoming narrower and narrower. According to the bend of this piece
the exact year can be ascertained, from 1499, when it began to get
displaced, to 1513, when it broke off altogether.
[36] The bird above the helmet is a finch, no doubt a punning allusion
to Pynson’s name, Pynson being the Norman word for a finch. Very
probably the birds in the large coat of arms are finches also, though
Ames calls them eagles.
Among the books which appeared in 1494, the _Fall of Princis_,
translated by Lydgate from Boccaccio, is the most remarkable. It is
printed throughout in the smaller type of the _Chaucer_, and at the
head of each part is a woodcut of particularly good execution. The
copy of this book in the British Museum, unfortunately imperfect,
was rescued from the counter of a small shop where it was being used
to make little bags or ‘twists’ to hold pennyworths of sweets. Each
leaf has been divided into four pieces. A _Grammar of Sulpitius_ and
a _Book of Good Manners_ were also printed with a date in this year.
In 1495 no dated books were issued, but the _Petronylla_ and _The Art
and Craft to know well to Dye_ must have been issued about this time.
In 1496, Pynson printed a small supplement to the first edition of
the _Hymns and Sequences_ printed at Cologne by Quentell, and in the
following year he issued a complete edition of the book, and an edition
of the _Horæ ad usum Sarum_. In the same year (1497) he printed six of
Terence’s plays, each signed separately so that they could be issued
apart. About this year were issued two interesting folios, _Reynard the
Fox_, and a _Speculum vite Christi_, with illustrations. In 1500 was
issued the _Book of Cookery_, of which the only known copy is in the
library at Longleat, and the splendid _Sarum Missal_, printed at the
expense of Cardinal Morton, and generally known as the Morton Missal.
Of updated books printed about this time we may notice especially,
editions of _Guy of Warwick_, _Maundeville’s Travels_, _Informatio
Puerorum_, a few small school-books, and a number of year-books and
other legal works.
About 1502-3, Pynson changed his residence from outside Temple Bar to
the George in Fleet Street, where he continued to the end of his life.
His career as a printer is curiously different from Wynkyn de Worde’s.
The latter was the popular printer, publishing numbers of slight books
of a kind likely to appeal to the public. Pynson, on the other hand,
was in a more official position as King’s printer, and seems to have
been generally chosen as the publisher of learned books. Wynkyn de
Worde printed ten slight books for every one of a more solid character;
with Pynson the average was about equal.
From 1510 onwards we find frequent entries relating to Pynson in all
the accounts of payments made by Henry VIII., and these show that
he was clearly the royal printer, and in receipt of an annuity. In
September 1509, he issued the _Sermo fratris Hieronymi de Ferraria_,
which contains the first Roman type used in England. In 1513 appeared
the _Sege and Dystruccyon of Troye_, of which there are several copies
known, printed upon vellum.
Pynson’s will is dated 18th November 1529, and was proved on 18th
February 1530. He was succeeded in business by Robert Redman, who had
been for a few years previously his rather unscrupulous rival.
The last few years of the fifteenth century saw a great change in the
development of English printing. Up to the time of Caxton’s death
in 1491, there seems to have been little foreign competition, but
immediately after this date the state of things altered entirely.
Both France and Italy produced books for the English market, and sent
over stationers to dispose of them: Gerard Leeu at Antwerp printed a
number of English books, mostly of a popular character, while Hertzog
in Venice; and a number of printers in Paris, printed service-books of
Sarum use.
By 1493 two stationers were settled in England; one, Frederick Egmondt,
as an agent for Hertzog, the other, Nicholas Lecompte, who sold books
printed in Paris. Though we only know of these two as stationers
through their names appearing in the colophons of books with which
they were connected, there must have been many others of whom we have
no trace. After the Act of 1483, which so strongly encouraged foreign
importations, a very large number of books for the English market were
printed abroad. This was at first occasioned by the small variety
in the number of types and the scarcity of ornamental letters and
woodcuts. In 1487, Caxton commissioned George Maynyal, a Paris printer,
to print an edition of the _Sarum Missal_, and this is the first
foreign printed book for sale in England whose history we know. About
ten years previously, a _Sarum Breviary_ had been printed at Cologne,
and in 1483 another edition at Venice. The first edition of the _Sarum_
_Missal_ was printed about 1486 by Wenssler at Basle. In the fifteenth
century, at least fifty books are known to have been printed abroad
for sale in England. Most of these were service-books, but there were
a few of other classes. Gerard Leeu reprinted three of Caxton’s books,
_The Chronicles_, _The History of Jason_, and the _History of Paris
and the fair Vienne_, and added a fourth popular book to these, which
had not previously appeared in English, the _Dialogues of Salomon and
Marcolphus_. In addition to these, he printed editions of the _Sarum
Directorium Sacerdotum_ and _Horæ_.
Another class of books produced abroad were school-books, and the
earliest of these for English use is an edition of the grammatical
tracts of _Perottus_, printed at Louvain in 1486 by Egidius van der
Heerstraten. In the same year Leeu printed the _Vulgaria_, and very
shortly afterwards editions of the Grammars by Anwykyll and the
_Garlandia_ were issued from Deventer, Antwerp, Cologne, and Paris.
The greater portion, however, of this foreign importation consisted
of service-books, at least forty editions being sent over from abroad
before 1501. From Venice were sent Breviaries and Missals, printed for
the most part by Johannes de Landoia dictus Hertog. As we have said,
the first edition of the _Sarum Breviary_ was printed at Cologne by an
unknown printer, and the first edition of the _Sarum Missal_ at Basle
by Wenssler about 1486. From Paris and Rouen came the greater number
of _Horæ_, and such books as the _Legenda_, _Manuale_, and _Liber
Festivalis_.
It is impossible to enter here with any fulness into the history of the
earliest stationers and the books printed abroad for sale in England.
It is rather foreign to our present subject, but would well repay
careful study.
CHAPTER XI.
THE SPREAD OF THE ART IN GREAT BRITAIN.
The introduction of printing into Scotland did not take place till
1508, in which year a printer named Andrew Myllar set up his press in
the Southgait at Edinburgh. At this time the countries of Scotland and
France were in close business communications, and many Scotsmen sought
employment on the Continent. In 1496 a certain David Lauxius, a native
of Edinburgh, was in the employment of Hopyl, the Paris printer, as a
press corrector, an employment often undertaken by men of learning.
Lauxius afterwards became a schoolmaster at Arras, and is several
times spoken of by Badius Ascensius in the prefatory letters which he
prefixed to his grammars. Such books as were needed were sent over to
Scotland from France, and the probable cause of the introduction of
printing into the former country was the desire of William Elphinstone,
Bishop of Aberdeen, to have his adaptation of the _Sarum Breviary_ for
the use of Aberdeen produced under his own personal supervision. Two
men were readily found to undertake the work; one, Walter Chepman,
a wealthy merchant, who supplied the necessary capital; the other,
Andrew Myllar, a bookseller, who had several times employed foreign
presses to print books for him, and had himself been abroad on business
expeditions.
The books which had been printed for Myllar were, _Multorum vocabulorum
equivocorum interpretatio magistri Johannis de Garlandia_, in 1505,
and _Expositio sequentiarum secundum usum Sarum_, in 1506; both being
without a printer’s name, but most probably from the press of P.
Violette of Rouen.[37]
[37] Dr. Dickson, relying on the authority of M. Claudin, has ascribed
these books to the press of Lawrence Hostingue of Rouen. From the
facsimiles which he gives it is clear that the types are not identical.
The books should rather be ascribed to Pierre Violette, who used, as
far as can be seen, the same type; and who also used in his _Expositio
Hymnorum et Sequentiarum ad usum Sarum_, printed in 1507, the woodcut
of a man seated at a reading desk, which is found on the title-page of
Myllar’s _Garlandia_.
As was to be expected, Myllar obtained his type from France, and
probably from Rouen, but it bears no resemblance to that used in the
books printed for him. Among the Rouen types it is most like that used
by Le Talleur, but the resemblance is not very close. The capital
letters seem identical with those used by De Marnef, at Paris, in his
_Nef des folz_, and are also very like those of the Lyons printer,
Claude Daygne.
Supplied with these types, Myllar returned to Edinburgh, and in the
spring of 1508 issued a series of nine poetical pamphlets, the only
known copies being now preserved in the Advocates’ Library, Edinburgh.
These were all issued within a few days of each other, and neither
the type nor the woodcuts show any indication of wear or blemishes
which might enable some order to be assigned to them. These books, like
Pynson’s early-quartos, are signed by the sheet, an indication that the
printer learnt his art at Rouen.
In 1510 the _Breviary_ was issued, and, were it not for the colophon,
would pass as the production of a Norman press, It is in two volumes;
the Pars Hiemalis, containing 400 leaves, the Pars Estivalis, 378. Only
four copies are known, all imperfect. With the production of this book
the Edinburgh press stopped for some while.
There is no doubt much yet to be learnt about the history of the first
Scottish press, especially in its relations to those of Normandy, and
there seems no reason why in time it should not become quite clear. Not
only are the original books in existence, but also the acts relating to
them. One other book must be noticed as having been printed in Scotland
before 1530. This is the _De compassione Beate Virginis Marie_, a
‘novum festum’ issued for incorporation into the _Breviary_, and
printed at Edinburgh, by John Story, about 1520. Of this little tract
but one copy remains, which is bound up in the copy of the _Aberdeen
Breviary_ belonging to Lord Strathmore at Glamis. It consists of a
single sheet of eight leaves, and, according to Dr. Dickson, is not
printed in the same type as the _Breviary_.
From this time onward till Davidson began to print, it seems as though
Scotland had no practised typographer. Hector Boece, John Vaus, and
others, were obliged to send their books to be printed at a foreign
press; Vaus indeed went over to Paris to superintend the printing of
his Grammar by Badius, who was at that time the printer most favoured
by Scottish authors.
* * * * *
No book was actually printed at York till 1509, but for many years
before that date there had been stationers in the city who imported
foreign books for sale. Frederick Frees, who was enrolled as a free-man
in 1497, is spoken of as a book printer, but no specimen of his work
exists. His brother Gerard, who assumed the surname of Wanseford,
imported in 1507 an edition of the _Sarum Hymns and Sequences_, printed
for him at Rouen by P. Violette. Of this book only two copies are
known. Shortly after Gerard Wanseford’s death, an action was brought
against his executor, Ralph Pulleyn, by Frederick Frees, the brother,
about the stock of books which had been left, and which consisted
mostly of service-books, bound and unbound, with some _alphabeta_ and
others in Latin and English.
In 1509 a certain Hugo Goes printed an edition of the _Directorium
Sacerdotum_, the first dated book printed at York. Two copies are
known, one in the Chapter Library at York, and the other in the library
of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge. Davies[38] incorrectly states
that both copies are imperfect, and want the leaf upon which the
colophon was printed; but it is certainly in the Cambridge copy, for
this wants only the last leaf, which would either be blank or with
a printer’s mark. The book is for the most part printed in the type
which W. de Worde used at Westminster just before 1500. Goes printed
also editions of the _Donatus_ and _Accidence_, but no copies are now
known, though in 1667 copies were in possession of a Mr. Hildyard, a
York historian. Bagford, among his notes on printing [Harl. MS. 5974,
95], mentions a _Donatus cum Remigio_, ‘impressus Londiniis juxta
Charing Cross per me Hugonem Goes and Henery Watson’—with the printer’s
device H. G. This book also is unknown, but may perhaps be the Grammar
mentioned by Ames as being among Lord Oxford’s books. If the copy of
the colophon is correct, it shows that Goes was at some time printing
in London. He is said to have also printed at Beverley.
[38] Davies’ _Memoir of the York Press_, 1868, 8vo, pp. 16-18.
In 1516, ‘Ursyn Milner, prynter,’ was admitted to the freedom of the
city. He was born in 1481, and by 1511 was living in York, when he gave
evidence in the suit between Ralph Pulleyn and Frederick Frees. He
printed only two books, a _Festum visitationis Beate Marie Virginis_,
and a _Grammar_ of Whittington’s.
The _Festum_ was issued doubtless between 1513 and 1515, for in 1513
the Convocation of York ordered the feast of the Visitation of the
Blessed Virgin Mary to be kept as a ‘Festum principale.’ It is quoted
by Ames, p. 468, and has the following colophon: ‘Feliciter finiunt
(?) festum visitationis beate Marie virginis secundum usum ebor.
Noviter impressum per Ursyn Milner commorantem in cimiterio Minsterii
Sancti Petri.’ It is in 8vo, and a copy formerly belonged to Thomas
Rawlinson.
The second book, the _Grammar_, is a quarto of twenty-four leaves, made
up in quires of eight and four leaves alternately, a peculiar system
of quiring much affected by Wynkyn de Worde. Below the title is a cut
of a schoolmaster with three pupils, which was used by Wynkyn de Worde
in 1499, and which he in turn had obtained from Govaert van Ghemen
about 1490. (The cut was first used in the _Opusculum Grammaticale_,
Gouda, 13th November 1486.) Below the colophon, which tells us that the
book was printed in ‘blake-strete’ on the 20th December 1516, is the
printer’s device, consisting of a shield hanging on a tree supported by
a bear and an ass, the bear being an allusion to his name Ursyn. On the
shield are a sun and a windmill, the latter referring to his surname
Milner. Below this device is an oblong cut containing his name in full
on a ribbon, his trade-mark being in the centre.
The connexion between the early York stationers and Wynkyn de Worde is
very striking, and has yet to be explained. Gerard Wanseford in his
will, dated 1510, leaves forty shillings to Wynkyn de Worde, which he
(the testator) owed him. The next stationer and printer, Hugo Goes,
was in possession of some of De Worde’s type; and Milner, the last of
the early York printers, used one of his cuts, and copies his peculiar
habit of quiring. Perhaps the type and cuts were originally bought by
Wanseford and obtained successively by the others; at any rate, both
the type and cut were out of W. de Worde’s hands at an early date.
The most important of the York stationers remains still to be noticed,
though he was unfortunately only a stationer and not a printer. John
Gachet appears at York in 1517, and in the same year is mentioned as a
stationer at Hereford. He was in business in the former town at least
as late as 1533, when the last book printed at his expense was issued.
* * * * *
Printing was introduced into Cambridge in 1521, when John Lair de
Siberch, perhaps at the instigation of Richard Croke, who from 1522 was
professor of Greek and public orator, set up his press at the sign of
the Arma Regia. In 1521 he printed six books, and of these the _Oratio
Henrici Bulloci_ is the first. The five other books follow in the
following order: _Augustini Sermo_, _Luciani_ περἰ ὁιψἀὁων, _Balduini
sermo de altaris sacramento_, _Erasmus de conscribendis epistolis_,
and _Galeni de Temperamentis_. In the next year Siberch printed only
two books, _Joannis Roffensis episcopi contio_, and _Papyrii Gemini
Eleatis Hermathena_. It is needless to describe these books more fully
here, for an extremely good and full bibliography of them was compiled
by Bradshaw, and published as an introduction to one of the Cambridge
facsimiles in 1886.[39]
[39] _Doctissimi viri Henrici Bulloci Oratio_ ... reproduced in
facsimile ... with a bibliographical introduction by the late Henry
Bradshaw, M.A. Cambridge, 1886. 4to.
Since the publication of this bibliography, the existence of another
book from the first Cambridge press has been discovered. In 1889, among
some other fragments forming the covers of a book in Westminster Abbey
Library, were found part of the first sheet of the Cambridge _Papyrius
Geminus_, and two leaves of a grammar in the same type, in quarto, with
twenty-six lines to the page besides headlines. These turned out to be
part of the small grammar, _De octo orationis partium constructione_,
written for use in Paul’s School. It was written by Lily and amended by
Erasmus, and finally issued anonymously. After the printing of these
nine books Siberch is lost sight of; but that he was still alive in
1525 we know from a letter of Erasmus, who, writing on Christmas Day to
Dr. Robert Aldrich of King’s College, sends greetings, among others,
to ‘Gerardum, Nicolaum et Joannem Siburgum bibliopolas.’ Amongst the
fragments taken from the binding spoken of above, was a letter to
Siberch from the well-known Antwerp and London bookseller, Peter Kaetz,
relating to the purchase of books, but it has unfortunately no date,
though certainly earlier than 1524.
Two books were printed at Tavistock in the first half of the sixteenth
century; and as the monks possessed a printing press of their own, it
is quite probable that other books were issued which have now entirely
perished. The first book is an English metrical translation of the _De
Consolatione Philosophiæ_ of Boethius made by Thomas Waltwnem. It has
the following colophon: ‘Emprented in the exempt monastery of Tavestock
in Denshyre. By me Dan Thomas Rychard, monke of the sayd monastery.
To the instant desyre of the ryght worshypful esquyer Mayster Robert
Langdon, anno d. MDXXV.’ Several copies of this book are known.
Of the other book but one copy is known, now in the library of Exeter
College, Oxford. It is a small quarto of twenty-six leaves, with thirty
or thirty-one lines to the page, The tithe runs, ‘Here foloyth the
confirmation of the Charter perteynynge to all the tynners wythyn the
countey of Devonshyre, wyth there statutes also made at Crockeryntorre
by the hole assent and consent of al the sayd tynners yn the yere
of the reygne of our souerayne Lord Kynge Henry ye VIII. the-secund
yere.’ The book ends on the reverse of signature d 3, ‘Here endyth the
statutes of the stannary. Imprented yn Tavystoke ye xx day of August
the yere of the reygne off our soveryne Lord Kynge Henry ye VIII. the
xxvi yere.’
At Abingdon a book was printed in 1528 by John Scolar, who had beer
printing at Oxford about ten years previously. It is the _Breviary_
for the use of Abingdon, and the only known copy is in the library of
Emmanuel College, Cambridge. The colophon runs: ‘Istud portiforium fuit
impressum per Joannem Scholarem in monasterio beate marie virginis
Abendonensi. Anno incarnationis dominice Millesimo quingentesimo
vicesimo octavo. Et Thome Rowlonde abbatis septimo decimo.’
Two other towns must be mentioned, which, though not possessing
resident printers, had stationers who published books printed for them.
In 1505 the Hereford _Breviary_ was issued under the superintendence
of Inghelbert Haghe, and under the patronage of the ‘Illustrissime
viraginis,’ Margaret, Countess of Richmond and Derby. It has the
following colophon: ‘Impressum est hoc breviarium secundum eiusdem
diocesis usum in clarissimo rathomagensi emporio: impensis et cura
Inghelberti Haghe dicte comitis bibliopole ac dedititii. Anno salutis
christi Millesimo quingentesimo quinto. II. non. augusti.’ Of this book
only three copies are known. One, textually perfect, and containing
both parts, is in Worcester Cathedral Library. The Bodleian has a Pars
Estivalis, slightly imperfect, and another copy is in private hands.
We can trace this bookseller to a later date, for his name occurs in a
note written on a fragment in the Bodleian, which formed at one time
the lining of a binding, ‘Dedi bibliopole herfordensi Ingleberto
nuncupato pro isto et sex reliquis libris biblie xliii^s iiij^d quos
emi ludlowie anno domini incarnationis millesimo quingentesimo decimo
circiter die nundinarum lichefeldensium.’
The other town is Exeter, where, about 1510, a stationer named Martin
Coeffin was living. Two books were printed for him, both of which were
without date. One of these was the _Vocabula magistri Stanbrigi, primum
jam edita, sua saltem editione_, printed, so Ames tells us, by Lawrence
Hostingue and Jamet Loys at Rouen. He adds further, that the ‘piece’
had five leaves, which we may take to be impossible; it must have had
six leaves, of which the last was blank, or had a printer’s device
upon it. The second book was a _Catho cum commento_, printed at Rouen
by Richard Goupil, ‘juxta conventum sancti Augustini ad intersignum
regulæ auræ commorantis.’ On the subject of this book Ames is no more
explicit; he tells us it was printed at the expense of Martin Coeffin
at Exeter, beyond that he has nothing to say. The two pieces are quoted
by him in his _General History of Printing_ between the Years 1510 and
1517, and the date which he thus assigns is probably fairly correct,
for Frère quotes Goupil under the year 1510, and Hostingue under
1505-10.
CHAPTER XII.
THE STUDY OF BOOKBINDING.
Too little attention has been paid, in this country at any rate, to the
fact that some knowledge about early bookbinding is essential to the
student of early printing. At first the printer was also a stationer
and bookbinder, and the three occupations were hardly clearly defined
or definitely separated within the first hundred years after the
invention of printing. Books always required some kind of binding, and
the early printer sold his books to the purchaser ready bound, though
copies seem always to have been obtainable in sheets by such as wished
them in that state. The binder ornamented his books in certain ways and
with a limited number of stamps, and there is no reason why a careful
study should not make his binding ornamentation as easily recognisable
as his woodcuts or his type. Of course the majority of early bindings
are unsigned, and therefore it is not often possible to assign
particular bindings to particular men; but comparison may enable us to
attribute them to particular districts and even to particular places,
so that they may often afford additional evidence towards placing books
which contain no information of their origin.
A very little attention paid to a binding might often result in most
valuable information, and with the destruction of the binding the
information disappears. Many years ago there came into the hands
of a certain Mr. Horn a very valuable volume consisting of three
block-books, the _Biblia Pauperum_, the _Ars Moriendi_, and the
_Apocalypse_, all bound together, and in their original binding, which
was dated. Incredible as it may seem, the volume was split up and the
binding destroyed. Mr. Horn asserted from memory that the date was
1428; of the first three figures he was sure, and of the last he was
more or less certain. Naturally the date has been questioned, and it
has been surmised that the 2 must have been some other figure which
Mr. Horn deciphered incorrectly. The destruction of the binding made
it impossible that this question could ever be set at rest, and a very
important date in the history of printing was lost absolutely.
In the last century no regard whatever seems to have been paid to
old bindings, the very fact of their being old prejudiced librarians
against them; if they became damaged or worn they were not repaired,
but destroyed, and the book rebound. Nor did they fare better in
earlier times. Somewhere in the first half of the seventeenth century
all the manuscripts in the Cambridge University Library were uniformly
rebound in rough calf, to the utter destruction of every trace of their
former history.
Casley, in his catalogue of the manuscripts in the Royal Library,
specially mentions a curious old binding, with an inscription showing
that it was made at Oxford, in Catte Street, in 1467. Even the special
note in the catalogue did not save this binding, which, if it had been
preserved, would have been one of the earliest, if not the earliest,
dated English example.
There is no need to multiply examples to show how widespread the
destruction of old bindings has been as regards public libraries;
indeed, their escaping without observation was their only chance of
escaping without destruction, In private libraries much the same thing
has happened. The great collectors of the period of Dibdin thought
nothing worthy of notice unless ‘encased’ in a russia or morocco
leather covering by Lewis or some bookbinder of the time. Nor are
collectors of the same opinion now obsolete, for many of our better
known binders can show specimens of rare and interesting old bindings
which they have been ordered to strip off and replace with something
new. Ignorance is the cause of much of what we lament. So many
collectors are ruled entirely by the advice of their booksellers and
binders, and these in their turn are influenced purely by commercial
instincts. Collectors with knowledge or opinions of their own are
beginning to see that the one thing which makes a book valuable (not
simply in the way of pounds, shillings, and pence) is that it shall be,
as far as possible, in its original condition. Our greatest books of
the seventeenth century were issued in simple calf bindings, with no
attempt at ornamentation but a plain line ruled down the cover about an
inch from the back. If a collector wants modern ornamental bindings,
let him put them on modern books, there only are they not out of place.
About the German binders, who necessarily concern us most at the
time of the invention of printing, we know very little; but, on the
other hand, there is a great deal to be learnt. Their bindings,
both of pigskin and calf, are impressed with a large number of very
beautiful and carefully executed dies, which could with a little care
be separated into groups. Many of them, curiously enough, are very
similar to some used on London and Durham bindings of the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries. There are the same palm-leaf dies and drop-shaped
stamps containing dragons.
It is in Germany that the earliest dated bindings are found. A copy
of the Eggesteyn forty-one line _Bible_, in the Cambridge University
Library, has the date 1464 impressed on the metal bosses which protect
the corners; and as the book is without a colophon, this date is of
importance. A binder named Jean Richenbach dated all his bindings, and
added, as a rule, the name of the person for whom they were bound.
The earliest date we have for him is 1467, and they run from that
year to 1475. Johannes Fogel is another name often found on early
German bindings. A few printers’ names occur, such as Ambrose Keller,
Veldener, Zainer, Amorbach. About the time of Koburger, great changes
were introduced into the style of German binding, a harmonious design
being produced by means of large tools, and the use of small dies given
up. The custom was also introduced of printing the title on the side in
gold. The panel stamp, so popular in other countries, was not much used
in Germany for calf books; it is found, however, on innumerable pigskin
and parchment bindings of the latter half of the sixteenth century. The
earliest of the bindings of this class have often the boards of wood;
at a later date they are almost invariably of paper or millboard. On
early French books the work is finer, but as a rule less interesting;
but the panel stamps, especially the early ones, are very good. A
very large number are signed in full. One with the name of Alexandre
Alyat, a Paris stationer, is particularly fine, as are also the series
belonging to Jean Norins. The Norman binders produced work very like
the English, no doubt because many of the books printed there were
intended especially for the English market.
The bookbinding of the Low Countries was always fine; but the great
improvement which was first introduced there was the use of the panel
stamp, invented about the middle of the fourteenth century. It was not
till after the introduction of printing, and when books were issued
of a small size, that this invention became of real importance; but
at the end of the fifteenth and during the first twenty or thirty
years of the sixteenth centuries, innumerable bindings of this class
were produced. The majority of Netherlandish panels are not pictorial,
but are ornamented with a double row of fabulous beasts and birds in
circles of foliage; round this runs a legend, very often containing
the binder’s name. _Discere ne cesses cura sapientia crescit Martinus
Vulcanius_ is on one binding; on another, _Ob laudem christi hunc
librum recte ligavi Johannes Bollcaert_. Some binders give not
only their name, but the place also—_Johannes de Wowdix Antwerpie
me fecit_. Though there are few pictorial Flemish panels, some of
these are not without interest. A number were produced by a binder
whose initials are I. P., and who was connected in some way with the
Augustinian Monastery of St. Gregory and St. Martin at Louvain. One
which contains a medallion head, a small figure of Cleopatra, and a
good deal of arabesque ornament of foliage, is his best; while another
panel, large enough for a quarto book, with a border of chain work,
and his initials on a shield in the centre, is his rarest, and is in
its way very artistic. At a still later date the binders in the Low
Countries produced some panels, which, though still pictorial, show how
rapidly the art was being debased. The designs are ill drawn, and the
inscription, originally an important part, has come to be degraded into
a piece of ornamentation without meaning, cut by the engraver purely
with that object, ignoring the individual letters or legibility of the
inscription, and anxious only that the finish which an inscription gave
to his models might be apparent to the eye in his copies. A similar
debasement is not uncommon in late English examples.
Italian and Spanish binding, though interesting in itself, affords
little information as regards printers or stationers. No bindings were
signed, and the designs are in all cases so similar as to afford little
clue to the place from which they originally came.
The earliest English bindings are extremely interesting and
distinctive. Caxton, our first printer, always bound his books in
leather, never making use of vellum or pigskin. Bindings of wrapping
vellum, which he is erroneously said to have made, were not used in
England till a very much later period. His bindings, if ornamented
at all, were ruled with diagonal lines, and in the centre of each
compartment thus formed a die was impressed. A border was often placed
round the side, formed from triangular stamps pointing alternately
inwards and outwards, these stamps containing the figure of a dragon.
The number of bindings which can with certainty be ascribed to Caxton
is necessarily small. We can, in the first place, only take those
on books printed by him, and which contain, besides this, distinct
evidence, from the end-papers or fragments used in the binding, that
they came from his workshop. Under this class we can place the cover
of the _Boethius_, discovered in the Grammar School at St. Alban’s,
an edition of the _Festial_ in the British Museum, and a few others;
and from the stamps used on these we can identify others which have no
other indication. It must always be remembered that these dies were
almost indestructible, and therefore were often in use long after their
original owner was dead. The Oxford bindings, though very English in
design, are stamped with dies Netherlandish in origin. An ornament of
three small circles arranged in a triangle occurs very often on these
bindings, and is a very distinctive one. These bindings when in their
original condition are almost always, like those of the Netherlands,
lined with vellum, and have vellum guards to the centre of the quires.
The only two copies known of one of Caxton’s indulgences were found
pasted face downwards, used to line the binding of a Netherland
printed book. Another binder, about the end of the fifteenth century,
whose initials, G. W., and mark occur on a shield-shaped die, used
always printed matter to line his bindings and make end-papers, though
they were not necessarily on vellum. All the leaves now known of the
Machlinia _Horæ ad usum Sarum_ whose provenance can be ascertained,
came from bindings by this man, scattered about in different parts of
the country. It is not known in what part of the country he worked.
Trade bindings between 1500 and 1540 form an important series. All
small books were stamped with a panel on the sides, and these often
have the initials or mark of the binder. Pynson used a stamp with his
device upon it; many others used two panels, with the arms of England
on one side and the Tudor rose on the other, both with supporters. On
the majority of these panels, below the rose, is the binder’s mark and
initials; on the other side, below the shield, his initials alone.
Not many of these binders’ or stationers’ names have been discovered,
and there are few materials to enable us to do so. Pynson and Julian
Notary’s bindings have the same devices as they used in their books,
and some of Jacobi’s have the mark which occurs on the title-page to
the _Lyndewode_ of 1506 printed for him. Reynes’ various marks are well
known and of common occurrence.
[Illustration:
_James Hyatt._
PYNSON BINDING.]
Without a distinguishing mark of some kind beyond the initials, it is
hopeless to try and ascribe bindings to particular stationers, though
a careful examination of the style or evidences as to early ownership
may help us to determine with some accuracy the country at least from
which the binding comes. Even a study of the forwarding of a binding
is of great help. The method of sewing and putting on headbands is
quite different in Italian books from those of other countries. Again,
all small books were, as a rule, sewn on three bands in England and
Normandy; in other countries the rule is for them to have four. The
leather gives sometimes a clue, _e.g._ in parts of France sheepskin
was used in place of calf. Cambridge bindings can often be recognised
from a peculiar red colouring of the leather. So little has been done
as yet to classify the different peculiarities of style or work in
these early bindings, that it can hardly be expected that much should
be known about them; at present the study is still in its infancy,
but there is no doubt that, if persevered in, it will have valuable
results. These bindings were for the most part produced, certainly in
the sixteenth century, by men who were not printers, and whose names we
have consequently few chances of discovering. All that can therefore
be done is to classify them according to style, and according to such
extraneous information as may be available. It is useless with no other
information to attempt to assign initials.
But while the bindings and the designs afford valuable information, the
materials employed in making the bindings are also of great importance.
The boards were often made of refuse printed leaves pasted together,
and were always lined, after the binding was completed, with leaves of
paper or vellum, printed or manuscript. On this subject I cannot do
better than give the following quotation from one of Henry Bradshaw’s
Memoranda, No. 5, _Notice of the Bristol fragment of the Fifteen Oes_:—
‘After all that has been said, it cannot be any matter of wonder that
the fragments used for lining the boards of old books should have
an interest for those who make a study of the methods and habits of
our early printers, with a view to the solution of some of many
difficulties still remaining unsettled in the history of printing.
I have for many years tried to draw the attention of librarians and
others to the evidence which may be gleaned from a careful study from
these fragments, and if done systematically and intelligently, it
ceases to be mere antiquarian pottering or aimless waste of time. I
have elsewhere drawn attention[40] to the distinction to be observed
between what may be called respectively _binder’s waste_ and _printer’s
waste_. When speaking of fragments of books as _binder’s waste_, I
mean books which have been in circulation, and have been thrown away
as useless. The value of such fragments is principally in themselves.
They may or may not be of interest. But by _printer’s waste_ I mean
... waste, proof, or cancelled sheets in the printer’s office, which,
in the early days when printers were their own bookbinders, would be
used by the bookbinder for lining the boards, or the centres of quires,
of books bound in the same office where they were printed. In this
way such fragments have a value beyond themselves, as they enable us
to infer almost with certainty that such books are specimens of the
binding executed in the office of the printer who printed them; and
thus, once seeing the style adopted and the actual designs used, we are
able to recognise the same binder’s work, even when there are none of
these waste sheets to lead us to the same conclusion.’
[40] Lists of Founts of Type and Woodcut Devices used by printers in
Holland in the Fifteenth Century. Memorandum No. 3. No. 14 in the
_Collected Papers_.
The number of books known only from fragments rescued from bindings is
much larger than is generally supposed. Of books printed in England
before 1530 more than ten per cent. are only known in this way; and now
that more attention is being paid to the subject, remains of unknown
books are continually being discovered.
Blades in his _Life of Caxton_ [edit. 1861, vol. ii. p. 70] gives a
most interesting account of a find of this sort in the library of the
St. Alban’s Grammar School. ‘After examining a few interesting books,
I pulled out one which was lying flat upon the top of others. It was
in a most deplorable state, covered thickly with a damp, sticky dust,
and with a considerable portion of the back rotted away by wet. The
white decay fell in lumps on the floor as the unappreciated volume
was opened. It proved to be Geoffrey Chaucer’s English translation
of _Boecius de consolatione Philosophiæ_, printed by Caxton, in the
original binding as issued from Caxton’s workshop, and uncut!... On
dissecting the covers they were found to be composed entirely of waste
sheets from Caxton’s press, two or three being printed on one side
only. The two covers yielded no less than fifty-six half-sheets of
printed paper, proving the existence of three works from Caxton’s press
quite unknown before.’
Off a stall in Booksellers Row the writer some few years ago bought for
a couple of shillings an imperfect foreign printed folio of about 1510
in an original stamped binding, lined at each end with printed leaves.
From one end came the title-page and another leaf of an unknown English
_Donatus_ printed by Guillam Faques; from the other end, two leaves,
one having the mark and colophon of a hitherto unknown book printed
by Richard Faques, and which is at present the earliest book known to
have been issued from his press. The finding of these two fragments is
further of interest as showing a connection between the two printers
called Faques.
Nor do these early fragments always come out of very old bindings.
From a sixpenny box at Salisbury the writer bought a large folio of
divinity, printed about 1700, in its original plain calf binding. The
end leaves were complete pages of the first book printed in London, the
_Questiones Antonii Andreæ_, printed by Lettou in 1480.
The boards of a book in Westminster Abbey Library, which must have been
bound at Cambridge in the second quarter of the sixteenth century, were
composed of leaves of the _Pontanus de Roma_, one of the ‘Costeriana.’
Service-books were very largely used by the bookbinders, for the
many Acts passed for their mutilation or destruction soon turned the
majority of copies into waste paper. Several copes of Henry VIII.’s
_Letters to Martin Luther_ of 1526, which remain in their original
bindings, have their boards made of such material, a practical
commentary on the King’s opinions.
Manuscripts, many of the utmost importance, have been cut up by the
bookbinders; sometimes in early days the librarian handed out what he
considered a useless manuscript to the bookbinder whom he employed.
Bradshaw notes that Edward VI.’s own copy of the Stephen’s _Greek
Testament_ of 1550 contains in the binding large fragments of an early
manuscript of Horace and Persius. Vellum was often used in early books
to line the centre of each quire so as to prevent the paper being cut
by the thread used for the sewing. Many pieces of _Donatuses_ and
_Indulgences_ have been found in this manner cut up into long strips
about half an inch wide. The copy of the Gotz _Bible_ of 1480 in Jesus
College, Cambridge, bound in London by Lettou, has the centres of the
quires lined with strips of two editions of an indulgence printed by
him, and which are otherwise unknown.
When the leaves used to line the boards of an old book are valuable
or important, they should be carefully taken out, if this can be done
without injury to the binding or to the fragments. A note should at
once be put on the fragments stating from what book they were taken,
and a note should also be put in the book stating what fragments were
taken from it. In soaking off leaves of vellum, warm water must on
no account be used, as it causes the vellum to shrink up. Indeed, it
is better to use cold water for everything; it necessitates a much
greater expenditure of time, but it is very much safer.
If the fragments are not of much importance, they should not be taken
from the binding, for the removal, however carefully done, must tend to
hurt the book. It will be sufficient to make a note of their existence
for reference at any time. When important fragments are extracted, it
is best to bind them up separately and place them on the shelves, and
not keep them loose in boxes or drawers, or pasted into scrap-books.
For many typographical purposes the fragment is as useful as the
complete book.
In conclusion, a word may be said on the methods of treating and
preserving old bindings. In the first place, a binding should never be
touched or repaired unless it is absolutely necessary; and if it is of
any value, it should be kept in a plain case. These cases should always
be made so that the side opens, not, as is more usual, open only at the
end, for then every time the book is taken out the sides are rubbed. If
they are made in the form of a book with overlapping edges, they can be
lettered on the back and stand on the shelves with other books.
If it is necessary that the binding should be repaired, nothing should
be destroyed. If, for example, a portion of the back has been lost,
what remains should be kept, and not an entirely new back put on. In
repairing calf bindings, morocco should be used, as near the colour of
the original as possible, and the grain should be pressed out. The old
end-papers should, of course, be retained, and nothing of any kind
destroyed which affords a link in the history of the book. No attempt
should be made to ornament the repaired portion so as to resemble
the rest of the binding; it serves no useful purpose, and takes away
considerably from the good appearance and value of what is left, for a
binding which has been ‘doctored’ must always be looked upon with some
mistrust.
An old calf book should never be varnished; it does not really help to
preserve it, and it gives it an unsightly appearance, besides tending
to fill up the more delicate details in the ornamentation. Some writers
recommend that old bindings should be rubbed with vaseline or other
similar preparations. Nothing is better than good furniture cream or
paste. A few drops should be lightly rubbed on the binding with a
piece of flannel; it should be left for a few minutes, until nearly
dry, and then rubbed with a soft dry cloth. Not only does this soften
the leather and prevent it getting friable, but it puts an excellent
surface and polish upon it, quite unlike that produced by varnish. When
a binding is in good condition and the surface not rubbed through, it
is best to leave it alone; if any dusting or rubbing has to be done, it
should be done with a silk handkerchief.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE COLLECTING AND DESCRIBING OF EARLY PRINTED BOOKS.
It is exactly one hundred years since Panzer, “the one true naturalist
among general bibliographers,” published the first volume of his
_Annales Typographici_, and in this period two distinct methods of
bibliography have grownup.
The more popular, generally associated with the name of Dibdin, treats
specimens of early printing merely as curiosities, valuable only
according to their rarity or intrinsic worth, or for some individual
peculiarity found in them.
The other method, of which Panzer was the first practical exponent,
was called by Henry Bradshaw the Natural History method. Each press
must be looked upon as a _genus_, and each book as a _species_, and the
more or less close connection of the different members of the family
must be traced by the characters which they present to our observation.
Bradshaw’s own work is the best example of this method, and a beginner
can follow no better model than the papers which he wrote on early
printing.
In collecting or studying early printed books, one of the most fatal
and common mistakes is the undertaking of too much. The day is
past when one man will set himself to compile such works as Hain’s
_Repertorium Bibliographicum_, or that very much greater book, Panzer’s
_Annales Typographici_; both wonderful achievements, but unfinished and
imperfect. No one who has not had practical experience can imagine the
amount of information which can be obtained by taking a small subject
and working at it carefully; or conversely, the amount of careful study
and research that is requisite to work a small subject properly.
Take as examples Blades’ _Life of Caxton_ and Edmond’s _Aberdeen
Printers_, the two best monographs we possess. They contain a very
great deal of most careful work, and sufficient material to enable any
one who desires to study those particular subjects to do so thoroughly.
In collecting, in the same way, a beginner who wishes his collection to
be of real value should not be too catholic in his tastes, but confine
his attention to one subject. A collection of fifty miscellaneous
fifteenth-century books has not, as a rule, more interest than may be
associated with the individual books. But take a collection of fifty
books printed in one town, or by one printer. Each book is then a part
of a series, and obtains a value on that account over and above its own
individual rarity or interest.
The arrangement and cataloguing of early printed books is a part of the
subject which presents many difficulties, In many great collections,
these books, for purposes of bibliographical study, are absolutely
lost. They are not bought, at any rate not once in twenty cases, for
their literary value, but simply and solely as specimens of early
printing or curiosities. But, having been bought, they are treated as
any other book bought solely for its literary value, and in no other
way, _i.e._ they are catalogued under the author or concealed in mazes
of cross-reference. If such books are to be bought at all, they should
surely be treated in some way which would enable them to fulfil the
object for which they were acquired.
In the University Library, Cambridge, the fifteenth-century books are
all placed together arranged under countries according to size, with
a press-mark indicating the country, the size, and the consecutive
number. Thus any new acquisition can be added, and placed at once
without disarranging the order on the shelves. Any further subdivision,
as, for instance, under towns, is impracticable on the shelves, but
must be done on paper.
The catalogue slips can then be arranged under towns and printers, so
that any one wishing to study the productions of a particular town or
printer can at once obtain all the books of the particular class in the
library. If he knows his books by the author’s name, they can be found
from the general catalogue of the library. In private collections, the
number of books is, as a rule, so small that they can be arranged in
any order without trouble.
In describing an early printed book, great care should always be taken
not to confuse what is common to all examples of the book with what is
specially the peculiarity of an individual copy. The description should
always be in two parts, the first general and the second particular.
The first part should give the place, the date, the name of the
printer, the size, an exact collation; the second, an account of the
binding, a list of the earlier owners, the imperfections, if any, and
similar information.
As regards the place, there does not yet seem to be any fixed rule
as to the form in which it should be written, whether in Latin or
in English. Many of the older bibliographies having been written in
Latin, and the colophons of the majority of early books being in
the same language, we have grown familiar with the Latin forms of
many names. But now that more books are being written in English, it
seems more sensible to use the English forms. The pedantic habit of
writing the name in the vernacular, as Köln for Cologne, Genève for
Geneva, or Kjøbenhavn for Copenhagen, should be avoided; it simply
tends to confuse, and serves no useful purpose. The great aim of a
bibliographical description should be to give the fullest information
in the most concise and clear form. Since English books are presumably
written for English readers, it is best they should be written in
English, and the exhibition of superfluous learning in the manner is
almost always a sign of a want of necessary learning in the matter.
The date should always be given in Arabic figures; and if there is
any peculiarity in the form of the date as it occurs in the book, it
should be added between brackets. The day of the month, when it is
given in the colophon, should always be put down in the description,
as it is often of great importance. In countries where the new year
began in March we are apt to get confused with the dates, and forget,
for example, that the 20th of January 1490 is later than the 20th of
December 1490.
The beginning of the year varied in different countries, and often in
different towns. The four most usual times for its commencement were:
Christmas Day (December 25), the day of the Circumcision (January 1),
the day of the Conception (March 25), and the day of the Resurrection
(Easter Day). The 25th of March was, on the whole, most common; but in
dating any book exactly, the rule for the particular town where it was
printed should be ascertained.
An approximate date should always be supplied to the description of an
undated book; but this date should not be a mere haphazard conjecture,
but should be determined by an examination of the characteristics of
the book, and comparison with dated books from the same press, so
that the date that is ascribed is merely another expression for the
characteristics noticed in the book. It is only after careful study
that accurate dates can be ascribed to books of a particular press,
and monographs on particular printers must be consulted when it is
possible.
On the question of sizes there seem to be many opinions. There was
originally no doubt on the subject, and there is no reason for any
doubt now.
There are two opposing elements at work, size and form. Originally,
when all paper was handmade, and did not vary very much in measurement,
books were spoken of as folio, quarto, octavo, etc., according to the
folding of the sheet; and these terms apply to the folding of the
sheet. In the present century, when paper is made by machinery, and
made to any size, the folding cannot be taken as a criterion, and the
various sizes are determined by measurement, the old terms, applicable
only to the size by folding, being retained. What has evidently led
to all this confusion is the application of the same terms to two
different things.
In describing old books, the old form size should be used, being the
only one which does not vary. Under the other notation, a cut-down copy
of a book in quarto becomes an octavo, and thus two editions are made
out of one.
The size of an old book is very simply recognised by holding up a page
to the light. Certain white lines, called wire-marks, will be noticed,
occurring, as a rule, about an inch apart, and running at right angles
to the fine lines, These wire-lines are perpendicular in a folio,
octavo, 32mo, and horizontal in a quarto and 16mo. In a 12mo, as the
name implies, the sheet is folded in twelve; and in the earlier part
at least of the sixteenth century this was done in such a way that
the wire-lines are perpendicular; the height of the sheet forming two
pages, as is the case in an octavo, while the width is divided into
six, instead of four as in an octavo. The later habit has been to
fold the sheet differently, the height of the sheet forming the width
of four pages, and the width of the sheet the height of three pages;
consequently the wire-lines are horizontal. Among early printed books
the 12mo is a very uncommon form; quartos are most numerous, and after
them folios.
It should always be remembered that the signature has nothing whatever
to do with the size. It is merely a guide to the binder to show him
how many leaves go to the quire, and the order in which they come. The
binder found it convenient to have his quires of from eight to twelve
leaves each, and the quires were thus made up whether the book was
folio, quarto, or octavo. Let us assume, for example, that the quires
were to consist of eight leaves each, then each quire of the folio book
contained four sheets, of the quarto book two sheets, and of the octavo
book one sheet. A book on Book Collecting, lately published, gives the
following extraordinary remarks on finding the size:—“The leaves must
be counted between signature and signature, and then if there are two
leaves the book is a folio, if four a 4to, if eight an 8vo, if twelve a
12mo, etc.... I should advise the young collector to count the leaves
between signature and signature, and to abide by the result, regardless
of all the learned arguments of specialists.” The absolute folly of
these remarks on the sizes of books will be apparent to any one who has
seen an old book. The earliest folios printed in Germany and Italy are
in quires of ten leaves, _i.e._ there are ten leaves between signature
and signature; in the majority of early folios there are eight. Again,
there is no folio book in existence among early books (excepting the
block-books, which are in a class apart) with only two leaves to the
signature.
Wynkyn de Worde made up many of his quartos in quires of eight and four
leaves alternately; most early 16mos were made up in quires of eight
leaves, and had therefore two signatures to each complete sheet. In the
same way many 24mos were made up in quires of twelve leaves. All these
books would be wrongly described by counting the leaves between the
signatures; in fact, that method comes right by accident only in the
case of some octavos and a few 12mos and 16mos.[41]
[41] On the subject of the sizes of old books, the reader would do
well to consult the _Athenæum_, 1888, vol. ii, pp. 600, 636, 673, 706,
and 744, where some instructive and amusing letters will be found.
A further series of letters relating generally to the same subject
appeared in the same paper in the early part of 1889.
The collation of a book is the enumeration of the number of leaves
according to the way in which they are arranged in quires, and this
collation should be given whether the quires are signed or not. If
there are signatures, there can be no difficulty in counting the number
of leaves which go to each quire; but when there are no signatures,
as is the case with most books before 1475, the collation is a more
difficult matter. The first thing to be looked at, if the book has
no MS. signatures, is the sewing, which shows us the centre of the
quire,[42] and we can then count from sewing to sewing. This gives
us only the halves of two quires; we must then have recourse to the
watermarks. In a folio, if one leaf has a watermark, the corresponding
leaf which forms the other half of the sheet has none. Again, in a
quarto, corresponding leaves have either no watermark, or each half a
one. Judging from the sewing and the watermarks, there is rarely any
difficulty in making out the collation, the first and last quires being
the most difficult to determine with accuracy; the others present no
difficulty. It is thus always best to settle the arrangement of the
interior quires first, and work from them to the outer ones, which are
more likely to be mutilated.
[42] It was the custom of many binders in the earlier part of the
present century, when they had to rebind an old book, to separate all
the leaves and then fix them together in convenient sections, entirely
ignoring the original “make up.” A very large number of books in the
British Museum were thus misbound, and even the celebrated Codex
Alexandrinus was treated in this way.
This method of collation by the watermarks is very often useful for
detecting made up copies. For instance, in the copy of the thirty-six
line Bible in the British Museum, the first and last leaf of the first
quire have each a watermark, showing absolutely that one of the two
leaves (in this case the first) has been inserted from another copy.
In many old books which have been rebound, the outside pages of the
quire are very much smoother and more polished than the rest, and may
thus be distinguished by touch. This, though a pretty certain test,
may mislead, if the book has been misbound, and should only be used in
conjunction with the other methods. A little practical work will soon
enable the beginner to find for himself various small points, all of
which, though hardly worthy of a lengthy description, are useful in
giving information, but are only useful when they have been acquired by
experience.
In giving an account of a fifteenth century book, a reference should
always be made to Hain’s _Repertorium Bibliographicum_. If Hain gives
a full description, and such description is correct, it will be
sufficient for all purposes to quote the number in Hain. Almost all the
books fully described in that work have an asterisk prefixed to their
number, that being the sign that Hain had himself collated the book;
and in quoting from him the asterisk should never be omitted.
The title and colophon should always be given in extenso, the end of
each line in the original being marked by an upright stroke (|). The
abbreviations should be exactly copied. Notice must always be taken of
blank leaves which are part of the book. The number of lines to the
page, the presence or absence of signatures, all such technical minutiæ
must be noted down.
In fact, the object of a good bibliographical description is to give
as clearly and concisely as possible all the information which can be
derived from an examination of the book itself.
The individual history of a book is of the utmost importance, and
should never be ignored. On this subject I cannot do better than quote
some words of Henry Bradshaw, applicable more to manuscripts than to
printed books, but which explain the writer’s careful method, and
practically exhaust all that has to be said on the subject.
“These notes, moreover, illustrate the method on which I have worked
for many years, the method which alone brings me satisfaction, whether
dealing with printed books or manuscripts. It is briefly this: to work
out the history of the volume from the present to the past; to peel
off, as it were, every accretion, piece by piece, entry by entry,
making each contribute its share of evidence of the book’s history
backwards from generation to generation; to take note of every entry
which shows either use, or ownership, or even the various changes of
library arrangement, until we get back to the book itself as it left
the original scriptorium or the hands of the scribe; noting how the
book is made up, whether in 4-sheet, 5-sheet, or 6-sheet quires, or
otherwise; how the quires are numbered and marked for the binder;
how the corrector has done his work, leaving his certificate on the
quire, leaf or page, or not, as the case may be; how the rubricator
has performed his part; what kind of handwriting the scribe uses; and,
finally, to what country or district all these pieces of evidence
point.... The quiet building up of facts, the habit of patiently
watching a book, and listening while it tells you its own story, must
tend to produce a solid groundwork of knowledge, which alone leads
to that sober confidence before which both negative assumption and
ungrounded speculation, however brilliant, must ultimately fall.”
INDEX OF PRINTERS AND PLACES.
Abbeville, 90, 91.
Abingdon, 182, 183.
Alban’s, St., 140.
Albi, 71, 90.
Aldus, 69, 70.
Alopa, F. de, 75.
Alost, 97, 101, 102, 103, 104.
Alyat, A., 189.
Amorbach, J., 58, 189.
Andreæ, J., 112.
Andrieu, M., 93.
Angers, 88, 89.
Angoulême, 93.
Antwerp, 103, 108, 111, 112, 134, 171, 172, 181, 190.
Appentegger, L., 114.
Arndes, S., 122.
Ascensius, J. B., _see_ Badius.
Audenarde, 110, 111.
Augsburg, 51, 52, 56, 61, 148.
Avignon, 19, 78, 80, 94.
Azzoguidi, B., 72.
Badius, J., 86, 174, 177.
Bamberg, 24, 39, 43, 45, 47.
Bamler, 41, 51.
Barbier, J., 143, 144.
Barcelona, 114, 115, 117, 121, 148.
Barmentlo, P., 110.
Barnes, J., 156.
Basle, 23, 57, 58, 111, 172.
Bechtermuntze, H., 34, 35, 36, 37.
Bechtermuntze, N., 36, 37, 54, 55.
Bedill, J., 143.
Belfortis, A., 65, 72.
Bellaert, 112.
Bellescullée, P., 89.
Benedictis, de, 72.
Bergman de Olpe, P., 51.
Beromunster, 58.
Bertolf von Hanau, _see_ B. Ruppel.
Berton, J., 94.
Besançon, 92.
Beverley, 178.
Bois-le-duc, 112.
Bollcaert, J., 190.
Bologna, 72.
---- S. de, 119.
Bonhomme, P., 83.
Botel, H., 115.
Bourgeois, J. le, 92.
Bouyer, J., 89.
Braem, C., 104.
Braga, 121.
Brandis, L., 57.
Brasichella, G. de, 70.
Breda, J. de, 110.
Bréhant-Loudéac, 90, 91.
Breslau, 57.
Brito, J., 106, 107.
Bruges, 105, 106, 111, 126, 136.
Brun, P., 115.
Brunswick, 157.
Brussels, 107, 108.
Bruxella, A. de, 76.
Buckinck, A., 63, 64.
Burgos, 117.
Butz, L., 114.
Buyer, B., 87.
Cadarossia, D. de, 79.
Caen, 89, 90.
Cagliari, 119.
Calafati, N., 117.
Caliergi, Z., 70, 76.
Cambridge, 180, 194, 197.
Carner, A., 72.
Castaldi, P., 59.
Caxton, W., 48, 49, 84, 105, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132,
133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 141, 142, 148, 157, 159, 160,
165, 166, 167, 171, 172, 191, 192, 196.
Cayllaut, A., 84.
Cennini, B., 74.
Chablis, 88, 89, 91.
Chalcondylas, D., 75.
Châlons, 93.
Chambéry, 90.
Chardella, S. N., 66.
Chartres, 90.
Chepman, W., 174.
Cividad di Friuli, 77.
Clemens Sacerdos, 68.
Cluni, 93.
Cock, G., 114.
Coeffin, M., 184.
Colini, J., 91.
Cologne, 42, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 91, 96, 108, 126, 127, 149, 154,
155, 169, 171, 172.
Copenhagen, 109, 122.
Copland, R., 129, 142.
Coria, 118.
Cosselhac, A. de, 79.
Coster, L. J., 95, 98.
Crantz, M., 81, 83.
Cremona, 77.
Crès, J., 91, 92.
Creusner, F., 53.
Dachaver, 88.
Dale, H. van den, 111.
Davidson, T., 176.
Daygne, C., 175.
Delft, 109.
De Marnef, 175.
Deventer, 109, 110, 172.
Dijon, 93.
Dinckmut, C., 16, 57.
Dôle, 92, 93.
Dorne, J., 157.
Dortas, A., 120.
Drach, P., 37, 54, 55.
Durandas, J., 90.
Durham, 188.
Edinburgh, 174, 175, 176.
Eggestein, H., 39, 41, 42, 56, 188.
Egmondt, F., 171.
Eichstadt, 55.
Eliezer, 120.
Eltvil, 34, 36, 37, 54.
Elyas, C., 57.
Embrun, 93.
Erfurth, 21.
Esslingen, 55, 73.
Eustace, G., 85.
Exeter, 184.
Eysenhut, J., 11.
Fabri, J., 122, 123.
Faques, G., 7, 197.
---- R., 197.
Faro, 121.
Fernandez, A., 113, 114.
Ferrara, 65, 72, 73.
Ferrose, G., 79.
Fèvre, G. le, 84.
Flandrus, M., 114.
Florence, 72, 74, 75, 76.
Fogel, J., 188.
Foligno, 71.
Forestier, J. le, 92.
Foucquet, R., 91.
Francour, J. de, 119.
Frankfort, 20, 32.
Frederick of Basle, 117.
Frees, F., 177, 178.
---- G., 177.
Friburger, M., 81, 83.
Friedberg, P. de, 33.
Froben, J., 58.
Fust, John, 23, 24, 25, 26, 46, 47, 80.
Fyner, C., 55, 56.
Gachet, J., 180.
Gallus, U., _see_ Hahn, U.
Gaver, J., 143.
Geneva, 58.
Gérard, P., 91.
Gerardus de Lisa, 76.
Gering, U., 81, 83.
Gerona, 114, 116, 117.
Ghemen, G. van, 109, 122, 179.
Ghent, 111, 112.
Gherlinc, J., 121.
Ghotan, B., 123.
Giunta, 70.
Godard, G., 85.
Goes, H., 177, 178, 179.
---- M. van der, 111, 134.
Gops, G., 50, 51.
Gossin, J., 106.
Gotz, N., 50, 91, 127, 198.
Gouda, 108, 109, 179.
Goupil, R., 184.
Goupillières, 93.
Gourmont, G., 86.
Gradibus, J. and S., 89.
Granada, 119.
Grenoble, 93.
Gruninger, J., 43.
Guldenschaff, J., 51, 149.
Gurniel, J. de, 115.
Gutenberg, John, 22, 23, 24, 25, 31, 34, 35, 36, 40, 46, 47, 52,
53, 57, 71, 82, 96.
H., I., 143, 144.
Haarlem, 97, 98, 99, 112.
Hagembach, P., 114.
Haghe, L., 183.
Hahn, U., 64, 65, 66.
Hardouyn, G., 85.
Harsy, N. de, 92.
Hasselt, 110.
Heerstraten, E. van der, 104, 172.
Hees, W., 102.
Helyas de Louffen, 58.
Hereford, 180, 183.
Hermann de Stalhœn, 32.
Hermonymus, G., 20.
Hertzog, J., 171, 172.
Higman, J., 84, 139.
Hijst, J. and C., 55.
Hochfeder, C., 91.
Hohenwang, L., 56.
Homery, C., 35, 36.
Hopyl, W., 174.
Hostingue, L., 175, 184.
Hug de Goppingen, J., 56.
Hunt, T., 151, 155.
Hurus, P., 114.
Husner, G., 43.
Jacobi, H., 156, 193.
Jaen, 119.
Janszoon, L., _see_ Coster, L. J.
Jardina, G. de la, 79.
Jenson, N., 48, 66, 67, 68, 80, 96.
John de Colonia, 50, 69.
John of Speyer, 66.
Kacheloffen, C., 16.
Kaetz, P., 181.
Kaiser, P., 82, 83, 89.
Keffer, H., 23, 35, 52.
Keller, A., 189.
---- J., 148.
Kerver, T., 85.
Kesler, N., 111.
Ketelaer, N., 102.
Keysere, A. de, 110.
Knoblochzer, J., 43.
Koburger, A., 53, 189.
Koelhoff, J., 50.
Kuilenburg, 15, 16, 104, 112.
Kyrfoth, C., 156.
Landen, J., 155.
Lantenac, 93.
Lausanne, 58.
Lauxius, D., 174.
Lavagna, P. de, 73.
Laver, G., 63.
Lavingen, 56.
Lecompte, N., 171.
Leempt, G. de, 102, 110, 112.
Leeu, G., 108, 109, 111, 112, 171, 172.
Leipzig, 16, 20.
Leiria, 120, 121.
Lerida, 115.
Lettou, J., 129, 160, 161, 197, 198.
Levet, P., 84, 139.
Leyden, 109, 112.
Lila, B. de, 118.
Limoges, 94.
Lisbon, 120.
Loeffs, R., 104.
Loeslein, P., 69.
London, 6, 107, 141, 143, 145, 156, 160, 161, 178, 181, 188, 197, 198.
Louvain, 15, 103, 104, 172, 190.
Loys, J., 184.
Lubeck, 57, 122, 123.
Ludwig zu Ulm, 10, 56.
Lyons, 72, 86, 87, 94, 175.
Machlinia, W. de, 107, 161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166.
Maçon, 93.
Madrid, 119.
Mainz, 21, 23, 25, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 44,
46, 47, 52, 58, 60, 67, 71, 82, 95, 96, 100, 101.
Mansion, C., 105, 106, 127.
Manthen, J., 69.
Mantua, 77.
Marchant, G., 84.
Marienthal, 37, 38, 108.
Martens, Th., 103, 104, 112.
Marti, B., 117.
Martinez, A., 114.
Mayer, H., 88, 118, 119.
Maynyal, G., 133, 171.
Melchior de Stanheim, 52.
Mentelin, J., 39, 40, 41, 42, 43.
Merseburg, 57.
Metlinger, P., 92.
Metz, 90, 91.
Milan, 68, 72, 73, 74.
Milner, U., 178, 179, 180.
Monreale, 77.
Monserrat, 119.
Monterey, 119.
Moravia, V. de, 120.
Moravus, M., 161.
Morelli, 89.
Morin, M., 92.
Murcia, 118.
Myllar, A., 174, 175.
Nantes, 93.
Naples, 72, 76, 161.
Narbonne, 93.
Nassou, H. de, 104.
Nijmegen, 110, 112.
Norins, J., 189.
Notary, J., 141, 143, 144, 145, 146, 193.
Novacivitate, G. de, 91.
Numeister, J., 71, 90.
Nuremberg, 10, 11, 23, 43, 52, 53, 91, 108.
Odensee, 121, 122.
Orleans, 93.
Orrier, B. van, 111.
Os, G. de, 109, 137, 139, 140.
---- P. van, 110.
Oxford, 125, 134, 147, 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155,
156, 182, 187, 192.
P., I., 190.
Padua, 77.
Paffroed, R., 110.
Palma, 117.
Palmart, L., 113, 114.
Pannartz, A., 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65.
Paris, 18, 20, 32, 80, 86, 89, 90, 91, 92, 133, 139, 171, 172,
174, 175, 177, 189.
Parix, J., 88.
Parma, 72, 77.
Passera, G. R. de la, 119.
Pavia, 72, 76.
Périgueux, 94.
Perpignan, 94, 115.
Perusia, 122.
Pfister, A., 24, 25, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47.
Philippus Petri, 68.
Picheng, 2.
Pictor, B., 69.
Pigouchet, P., 85.
Pistoia, D. de, 74.
Poitiers, 89.
Porres, J. de, 119.
Portilia, A., 72.
Pré, J. du, 84, 90, 91, 92, 94.
Printer of Augustinus de Fide, 50, 127.
---- Dictys, 50.
---- Historia S. Albani, 50.
Promentour, 58.
Provins, 94.
Puerto, A. del, 114.
Pynson, R., 92, 145, 156, 163, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169, 170, 176, 193.
Quentell, H., 51, 169.
Quijoue, E., 90.
R Printer, 42, 43.
Raem de Berka, G. ten, 149.
Ratdolt, E., 29, 69, 148.
Ravescot, L. de, 104.
Redman, R., 170.
Regnault, F., 85, 92.
Rennes, 90.
Reuchlin, 20.
Reutlingen, 56.
Reüwick, E., 33.
Reynes, J., 193.
Reyser, M., 55.
Richard, J., 92.
Richel, B., 58.
Richenbach, J., 188.
Riessinger, S., 76.
Roca, L. de, 118.
Rodt, B., see Ruppel.
Rome, 61, 64, 65.
Rood, T., 149, 151, 154, 155.
Rosembach, 115.
Rostock, 108.
Rouen, 90, 91, 92, 166, 167, 168, 172, 175, 176, 177, 184.
Rouge, G. le, 89, 91.
---- P. le, 84, 89, 91.
Roy, G. le, 87.
---- J. le, 93.
Ruppel, B., 23, 57, 58.
Rusch d’Ingwiller, A., 40, 42.
Rychard, T., 182.
St. Alban’s, 140, 157, 158, 159.
St. Maartensdyk, 110.
Salamanca, 116.
Salins, 90.
San Cucufat, 118.
Saragossa, 114.
Saxonia, N, de, 120.
Schenck, P., 89.
Schiedam, 112.
Schleswig, 122.
Schœffer, Peter, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35,
47, 48, 58, 80.
Schoensperger, J., 52.
Schott, M., 40.
Schussler, J., 52, 61.
Scolar, J., 156, 182.
Scot, J., 143.
Scotus, O., 69.
Segorbe, 116.
Segura, B., 114.
Sensenschmidt, J., 47, 52.
Seville, 88, 114, 115.
Shoenhoven, 112.
Siberch, J. L. de, 180, 181.
Snell, J., 121, 122.
Solidi, J., 89.
Sorg, A., 52.
Spindeler, N., 145.
Spire, 37, 53, 54, 55.
Sporer, Hans, 10, 11.
Spyess, W., 36, 37.
Stockholm, 122, 123, 124.
Stoll, J., 82, 83, 89.
Story, J., 176.
Strasburg, 22, 23, 39, 40, 41, 43, 55, 76, 96.
Subiaco, 31, 52, 59, 60, 61, 62.
Sursee, 58.
Sweynheym, C., 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65.
Talleur, G. le, 92, 166, 168, 175.
Taro, 121.
Tarragona, 115, 119.
Tavistock, 182.
Theodoricus, 154, 155.
Ther Hoernen, A., 50, 108, 149, 155.
Thorne, J., 157.
Toledo, 114, 116.
Tolosa, 88, 118, 119.
Toro, 121.
Torresani, A. de, 70.
Toulouse, 87, 118, 119.
Tours, 93.
Trechsel, J., 86.
Tréguier, 90.
Treveris, P., 157.
Treves, 91.
Treviso, 72, 76.
Trogen, 58.
Troyes, 89, 90, 91.
Turre, J. de, 89.
Udina, 77.
Ulm, 16, 56, 57, 61.
Ulric and Afra, Monastery of, 52.
Urach, 56.
Utrecht, 15, 16, 97, 99, 101, 102, 103, 104, 107.
Valdarfer, C., 68, 73.
Valence, 94.
Valenciennes, 94.
Valentia, 113, 114, 118.
Valladolid, 115, 119.
Vasqui, J., 116.
Vavassore, G. A., 17.
Veldener, J., 15, 16, 99, 103, 104, 107, 189.
Vendrell, M., 114, 117.
Venice, 17, 66, 67, 68, 69, 76, 83, 86, 96, 103, 148, 171, 172.
Verard, A., 84, 85, 167.
Verona, 77.
Vienne, 89.
Villa, J. de, 114.
Violette, P., 175, 177.
Vitalis, M., 78, 79.
Vivian, M., 93.
Vostre, S., 85.
Vulcanius, M., 190.
W., G., 192.
Wadsten, 123, 124.
Waldfoghel, P., 78, 79.
Wanseford, G., 177, 179, 180.
Watson, H., 178.
Weidenbach, 42, 43, 108.
Wenssler, 58, 117, 172.
Werrecoren, P., 110.
Westminster, 128, 141, 144, 145, 148, 178.
Westphalia, C. de, 104.
---- John of, 103, 104.
Windelin of Speyer, 67.
Winters de Homborch, C., 51.
Worde, W. de, 7, 84, 109, 126, 127, 134, 135, 136,
137, 138, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 157, 158,
167, 170, 178, 179, 180.
Woudix, J. de, 190.
Xeres, 117.
York, 141, 177, 179.
Zainer, G., 51, 52, 56.
---- J., 56, 60, 189.
Zamora, 116.
Zarotus, A., 73.
Zel, U., 47, 48, 49, 60, 96.
Zeninger, C., 43.
Zorba, S., 120.
Zwolle, 110, 149.
Printed by T. & A. CONSTABLE, Printers to Her Majesty, at the Edinburgh
University Press.
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Transcriber’s Notes
The illustrated advertisement from the front of the book has been
placed at the end of the book.
Page 54: in the footnote, ondon has been changed to London.
Page 54: Bechtermuncze has been changed to Bechtermuntze which is the
predominant usage throughout the book.
Page 159: abbrevation has been changed to abbreviation.
Hyphenation has been standardised.
In this text version, text in italics is delimited by _underscores_.
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