in 1868, has also received the undeserved honor of an inventor of
printing. This commemoration of the man by the people of a great nation
seems to require in this book at least a statement of the legend on
which his claims are based. This is the legend, abridged from a long
panegyric on Castaldi’s services by one of his countrymen:
Pamphilo Castaldi was born in Feltre, of noble parents, at the end
of the fourteenth century. He was highly educated and intelligent.
Although a poet and a lawyer of good reputation, his love for
literature induced him to open a school for polite learning, which
soon became famous, and attracted students from foreign countries.
None of his pupils acquired greater fame than John Fust, who is called
by the historians of Feltre, Fausto Comesburgo. This Faust resided
with [p487] Castaldi in Feltre as early as 1454. In the year 1442,
Castaldi had seen a proof of Gutenberg’s attempts at the invention
of typography. Gutenberg at that time (1442) was supported by the
money of Faust and the skill of Schœffer, his partners. After ten
years of experiment, Gutenberg had done nothing more than print from
blocks of wood and with metallic characters. He had not yet invented
movable types, for the _Bible of 1456_ should be classified with the
block-books.
Castaldi, more ingenious or more fortunate, had already discovered
movable types before the arrival of Faust in Feltre. It is well known
that, a century before the publication of the _Mentz Psalter of 1457_,
initial letters and capital letters formed of glass were manufactured
at Murano, and used in Italy. These glass letters were, probably, the
invention of Pietro de Natali, bishop of Equilo. Castaldi had noticed
that these letters were of advantage to the scribes, who printed them
in their manuscript books. He at once saw that it would be possible
to print entire books, instead of occasional letters, with movable
types. The facility with which this discovery had been made caused
him to undervalue its importance. He gave the idea to Faust, who,
returning to his partners in 1456, or a little before, enabled them
to appropriate the invention of Castaldi. They greedily adopted this
invention, and, in 1457, they produced the _Psalter_, the first book
printed with movable characters of wood.[336]
The only portion of this absurd story which has any claim to respect is
that about the early use in Italy by copyists of engraved or moulded
initial letters. That they were, or could have been, made by the
glass-blowers of Murano, and that Castaldi may have amused himself with
experiments in stamping consecutive letters or lines, is possible. All
else is pure fiction. It does not appear that Castaldi printed anything
of value: we have no relics of his experiments in the form of a book,
or even of a leaf, a line, or a letter. Nor did his dreams or teachings
about the possible value of types ever incite any of his Italian pupils
to make and use types.
To those who think that the merit of the invention of printing is in
the conception of the idea of movable types, this legend about Castaldi
is instructive. It reveals to us a man who is represented as having
a very clear idea of the [p488] importance of types, who did nothing
with his great discovery. His discovery, if it can be so called, was
useless. He cannot be rated as an inventor of printing, for he printed
nothing.
John Mentel, of Strasburg, who died in December, 1478, and was buried
in the great cathedral of that city, has there a tablet to his memory,
which contains the following inscription:
Here I rest: I, John Mentel, who, by the grace of God, was the first
to invent, in Strasburg, the characters of typography, and to develop
this art of printing, which should be perpetuated to the end of the
world, to such a degree of perfection that a man can now write as much
in a day as another could have done in a year. It is but just that
thanks should be rendered to God, and without vanity, to me myself;
but as this homage could not otherwise be rendered in a proper manner,
God has ordained, as the reward for my invention, that the stones of
this cathedral should serve for my mausoleum.[337]
The claim that Mentel was the inventor of typography was first made
in 1520 by John Schott,[338] son of Martin Schott, who had married
Mentel’s daughter and inherited his business. [p489] In the year 1521,
Jerome Gebwiler, misled by the assertions of Schott, undertook to
controvert the pretensions of Fust and Schœffer as the first printers.
He writes that printing was practised in Strasburg by John Mentel,
who had obtained the new art of chalcography, or of making books with
tin pens (types) about the year 1447; that Mentel, and Eggestein,
his partner, made an agreement that they should keep secret the new
art; that John Schott, whom he praises, showed him a manuscript book,
without date, written by Mentel, in which were drawings of typographic
instruments, and observations on the manufacture of printing ink.
It was by similar methods that John Schott induced James Spiegel to
declare, in a book printed in 1531, that John Mentel invented printing
in Strasburg in the year 1444.[339] John Schott is also the authority
for the following version of the invention which was found in an old
manuscript chronicle attributed to Daniel Specklin.
[Illustration: The Arms of the Typothetæ.
[From Hansard.]]
In the year 1440, the admirable art of printing was discovered in
Strasburg by John Mentel. His son-in-law, Peter Schoiffer, and Martin
Flach at once made use of the discovery; but a servant of Mentel,
called John Gensfleisch, after stealing the secret, fled to Mentz,
where he soon established the new art, through the help of Gutenberg,
a very rich man. Mentel was so affected with grief by this perfidy
that it caused his death. In honor of the art, he was buried in the
monastery or cathedral church, and a representation of his press was
cut on his tombstone. God swiftly punished the servant Gensfleisch, by
striking him with blindness for the remnant of his life. I have seen
the first press (of Mentel) and the types cut on wood, which were of
syllables and words. They were pierced through the sides, that they
could be conjoined by a wire and kept in line. It is to be regretted
that these types, the first of the kind, should have been lost.[340]
[p490]
These impudent falsifications of history would have been soon
forgotten if they had not been renewed in the seventeenth century, by
one James Mentel, a physician of Paris, the supposed descendant of John
Mentel, who published two little books on the history of printing,
in which he enlarged and distorted the versions of Gebwiler, Spiegel
and Specklin. To support his claim, he did not scruple to alter the
text and pervert the meaning of the authors from whom he pretended to
quote.[341] It was a useless work, for no impartial critic can accept
the statements of Mentel or of his predecessors. For these statements,
like those in behalf of Coster, Castaldi and Schœffer, were made, for
the first time, long after the invention had been perfected, by men who
had the desire and the temptation to misrepresent the facts. All of
them are tainted with the same calumny—the accusation that Gutenberg
stole his knowledge of the invention—and all of them are contradicted
by public records of undoubted authority.
Neither Mentel’s books nor the records of Strasburg give any warrant
to the hypothesis that Mentel was an inventor of printing. His name
appears for the first time on the tax list of the city of Strasburg, in
the year 1447. He is called a _goltschriber_, and is enrolled with the
goldsmiths. In another record of the city, for the same year, his name
appears in a list of artists and painters, but he is not described as
a printer. The earliest notice of him as a printer was made by Philip
de Lignamine of Rome, who said, in 1474, that John Mentel of Strasburg,
_since 1458_, had there a printing office, in which he printed three
hundred sheets a day, “after the manner of Fust and Gutenberg.” By this
statement we may suppose that Mentel practised printing soon after
the dissolution of the partnership between Fust and Gutenberg. It
was, no doubt, from Mentz that he got a knowledge of typography, for
it cannot be shown that he was taught the art by any of Gutenberg’s
early associates in Strasburg, nor is there any reason to believe
that he was an independent inventor. We [p491] have no evidence that
he experimented with types, or that he printed anything in Strasburg
between 1439 and 1457. It is not even established that Mentel was the
first practical printer in Strasburg, for there is evidence that he
began to print there in partnership with one Henry Eggestein, who was
a man of superior ability and of greater distinction, a master of arts
and philosophy.[342]
Mentel did not affix his name to any of his books before 1473, but he
had then printed many large theological works.[343] Schœpflin says
that he soon made himself rich by his industry and his sagacity in the
selection of salable books. He was a shrewd publisher, the first who
issued a descriptive catalogue, and employed agents for the sale of his
works.
[p492]
XXV
The Spread of Printing.
First Printers of Germany . . . Mentel at Strasburg . . . Zell at
Cologne . . . Keffer and Koburger at Nuremberg . . . Fac-simile of
a part of Koburger’s Map . . . Zainer at Augsburg . . . Fac-simile
of Zainer’s Birth of Eve . . . John of Westphalia and Martens at
Louvain . . . Mansion at Bruges . . . Gerard Leeu at Antwerp . . .
First Printers of Italy . . . Sweinheym and Pannartz at Rome . . . De
Spira at Venice . . . Jenson’s Types . . . Venice famous for Printing
. . . Cennini at Florence . . . The Ripoli Press . . . Zarot at Milan
. . . Appearance of Publishers . . . First Printers of France . . .
Gering, Crantz and Friburger at Paris . . . The Printers of Elegant
Books . . . First Printers in Spain and Portugal . . . In England
. . . Caxton at Westminster . . . Printing did not find a general
Welcome . . . Made Popular by the Cheapness of Books . . . Injudicious
Selection of Books for Publication . . . Demand for Books in the
Vernacular . . . First Check on the Liberty of the Press.
* * * * *
About this time, the crafte of Enpryntyng was fyrste founde in
magounce in Almayne, which crafte is multiplyed through the world in
many places, and bookes ben had grete chepe and in grete nombre by
cause of the same crafte.
_Caxton, 1482._
* * * * *
IN CENTRAL AND NORTHERN EUROPE.
When two rival printing offices had been established at Mentz it was
no longer possible to keep secret the processes. Every printer who
handled the types and every goldsmith who helped to make the tools
must have felt a weakening of the obligation of secrecy. The sack of
Mentz was a greater misfortune, for it dissolved all obligations and
sent the printers to other cities to found new offices. Not one of
these printers has told us when and how he began to print on his own
account. All we know about the introduction of printing in many of the
large cities has been gathered from the dates of books and the chance
allusions of early chroniclers. It is from these imperfect evidences
[p493] that the following tables of the spread of printing have been
made up. They are based on the chronological arrangement of Santander’s
_Dictionary_, but the names and dates have been collated with those of
Cotton’s _Typographical Gazetteer_, and other works of authority, and
some alterations have been made.
Place. Printer. Date.
Mentz John Gutenberg 1450
Bamberg Albert Pfister —
Strasburg Mentel and Eggestein 1458
Cologne Ulric Zell 1462
Augsburg Gunther Zainer 1468
Nuremberg Henry Keffer 1469
Munster in Argau Helyas Helye 1470
Spire Peter Drach 1471
Ulm John Zainer 1473
Buda (Hungary) Andrew Hess 1473
Mersburg Lucas Brandis 1473
Laugingen 1473
Esslingen Conrad Fyner 1473
Marienthal Bros. of Life-in-Com 1474
Lubec Lucas Brandis 1475
Burgdorf — 1475
Blaubeuren Conrad Mancz 1475
Pilsen — 1475
Rostock Bros. of Life-in-Com. 1476
Geneva Ad. Steynschauer 1478
Prague — 1478
Eichstadt M. and G. Reyser 1478
Wurtzburg Dold, Ryser, _et al._ 1479
Leipsic Marcus Brand 1481
Aurach Conrad Fyner 1481
Erfurt Wider de Hornbach 1482
Memmingen Albert de Duderstadt. 1482
Passau Stahl, Mayer, _et al._ 1482
Reutlingen John Ottmar 1482
Vienna John Winterburg 1482
Magdeburg Rauenstein _et al._ 1483
Stockholm John Snell 1483
Winterberg John Alacraw 1484
Heidelberg Fred. Misch 1485
Ratisbon John Sensenschmidt 1485
Brinn Stahl & Preinlein 1486
Munster John Limburg 1486
Sleswick Stephen Arndes 1486
Frisia — 1488
Kuttenberg Von Tischniowa 1489
Ingolstadt John Kachelofen 1490
Hamburg J. and T. Borchard 1491
Wadstein — 1491
Czernigov Tzernoevic 1492
Zinna — 1492
Fribourg Kilianus Piscator 1493
Luneburg John Luce 1493
Copenhagen Gothof. de Ghemen 1493
Oppenheim — 1494
Freisingen John Schæffler 1495
Offenburg — 1496
Tubingen John Ottmar 1498
Cracow John Haller 1500
Munich John Schobser 1500
Olmutz De Baumgarten 1500
Pfortzheim Thomas Anselmus 1500
This is but a brief list for the vast and populous country north of
Italy and east of France and the Netherlands.[344] Not less remarkable
is the fact that some cities now deservedly famous for their printing
were among the last to acquire a knowledge of the art, and those that
gave it feeble support.
The master printers at Mentz before 1500, not previously named, were:
Erhardus Reuwich, whose first book was dated 1486; Frederic Misch,
who began after 1490; Jacob Meydenbach (a witness at the trial of
1455), between 1491 and 1496; and Peter Friedburg, between 1494 and
1497. There may [p494] have been others, whose names are lost, but
the printers are few; they cannot be compared, either in number or in
influence, with those of many smaller cities during the same period.
Long before Schœffer died,[345] Mentz had ceased to be a great school
and centre of printing.
STRASBURG. The statement of Lignamine, that Mentel printed at
Strasburg after 1458, has been corroborated by the recent discovery
in the Freiburg library of a Latin _Bible_ in two volumes folio,
which is known to have been printed by Mentel, and which contains the
subscriptions of the illuminator and the written dates, in one volume
of 1460, in the other of 1461.[346] As this book should have been in
press at least two years, it may be regarded as evidence that printing
was practised here as early as in Bamberg. Strasburg gave greater
encouragement to printers than Mentz, for sixteen master printers were
working there before 1500.
COLOGNE. The first printer at Cologne was Ulric Zell. He was an
industrious printer for more than forty years, but he never printed
a book in German, nor did he adopt any of the improvements of the
printers of Italy. He adhered rigidly to the severe style of his
master, Schœffer, printing all his books from three sizes of a rude
face of Round Gothic types. He was not a skillful nor even a correct
printer, but he was a shrewd publisher, and accumulated a large
property. Madden supposes that he went to Cologne in 1462, and [p495]
was engaged by the Brotherhood of the Life-in-Common at Weidenbach,
near that city, to assist them with his new art of printing in their
pious task of making books.[347] His name appears for the first time in
a book dated 1466, which date may be accepted as indicative of the time
when he left the monastery and began to print on his own account in the
city.
At the close of the fifteenth century, twenty-two printing offices had
been established at Cologne. Among them was that of Arnold Ter Hoorne,
who, despite his occasional bad presswork, deserves special notice as
one of the first printers who made use of Arabic figures.
[Illustration: Fac-simile, reduced, of part of Koburger’s Map of Europe.
[Photographed from Mr. Bruce’s copy of the Nuremberg Chronicle.]]
NUREMBERG. Henry Keffer, who appeared as a witness for Gutenberg in
the suit at law in 1455, is supposed to have established himself as
a printer at Nuremberg about 1469. His name appears, for the first
time, in the imprint of a book dated 1473, from which it seems that he
was hired by John Sensenschmidt, a wealthy man of that city,[348] who
aspired to be a publisher. In 1473, Anthony Koburger began to print
at Nuremberg. In a few years he acquired great reputation as printer
and publisher: he had twenty-four presses at Nuremberg and offices
at Basle and at Lyons. Lichtenberger says that he printed twelve
editions of the _Bible_ in Latin and one in German. That he merited
his honors is implied by the testimony of Jodocus Badius, his rival
at Paris, who frankly said he was an honest merchant and the prince
of printers. The success of Koburger did not materially interfere
with the [p496] prosperity of his rivals, for there were seventeen
master type-printers and many block-printers at Nuremberg before 1500.
Koburger’s most curious book is the _Nuremberg Chronicle_ of 1493, a
large and thick folio, edited or compiled by Hartmann Schedel, as a
summary of the history, geography and wonders of the world. It contains
more than two thousand [p497] impressions[349] of wood-cuts, “made by
Wolgemuth and Pleydenwurff, mathematical men, and cunning as designers.”
[Illustration: The Birth of Eve, from Zainer’s Edition of the Speculum
Salutis.
[From Heineken.]]
AUGSBURG. The practice of typography was brought to Augsburg in 1468
by Gunther Zainer of Reutlingen, who is supposed to have been taught
at Strasburg. He was the first printer in Germany who printed a book
in Roman characters. [p498] He and his rivals, Bamler, Schüssler
and Sorg,[350] illustrated their books so freely with wood-cuts as
to provoke the remonstrance of the fraternity of block-printers of
Augsburg.[351] This opposition may have caused Zainer’s retirement from
business in 1475, but it did not check the business of the others.[352]
There were twenty master printers at Augsburg before 1500.
IN THE NETHERLANDS.
UTRECHT. It is probable that the unknown printer of the four notable
editions of the _Speculum_ was at Utrecht before the arrival of
Ketelaer and De Leempt in 1473.[353]
LOUVAIN. John of Westphalia came to Louvain in 1472, with some
matrices of Round Gothic and Roman types which he had acquired in
Venice, and began to fit up a printing office. In 1473, he published
his first book. During the twenty-two years he was in business, he
printed 120 works. Many were editions of the classics, and all were
selected with reference to the requirements of the University, from
which he received the honorary title of Master of Printing. John
Veldener, who began to print at Louvain in 1473, received a similar
title. He boasted that he was expert in all branches of the graphic
arts, but his skill was that of a mechanic. As [p499] a publisher, he
could not compete with John of Westphalia.[354] Thierry Martens, of
Alost, was employed by John of Westphalia, probably as editor, soon
after he arrived at Louvain. After receiving suitable instruction,
Martens was allowed to print some little books at Alost in 1473. He
began to print at Alost in his own name in 1487. Necessity or the
love of change compelled him to move his printing office many times
between Louvain and Antwerp. In 1529, he forsook printing and retired
to Alost, where he died in 1534, at the age of eighty-eight years.
In his business life of almost sixty years he printed, beside many
other works, about 150 books in Greek, Hebrew and Latin. He had a
critical knowledge of six languages, and his ability as an editor was
acknowledged by many scholars who were his friends and correspondents.
Erasmus wrote his epitaph, and the town of Alost has put up a statue to
commemorate his worth.
BRUGES. The name of Colard Mansion, a calligrapher of high merit and
afterward the first typographer at Bruges, is found in the records
of a corporation of book-makers, between the years 1454 and 1473. As
his name does not re-appear before 1482,[355] it is supposed that
he abandoned the guild and learned printing. In 1476, he printed
a little book in a new face of type in the French style. He was a
skillful but not a prosperous printer, for he was obliged to eke out
his scant income as a printer by occasional jobs of illumination. Soon
after 1484, he left Bruges. It is not known where he went or when he
died. John Brito, who succeeded Mansion, was for many years the only
typographic printer at Bruges. This neglect of printing in a city
renowned for the elegance of its manuscripts and the skill of its
calligraphers shows that the professional book-makers regarded printing
as an inartistic and mechanical method of making books. [p500]
GOUDA and ANTWERP. Gerard Leeu, the most industrious[356] printer of
his time, began to print at Gouda in 1477, but he went to Antwerp in
1484, where he continued to print until his death in 1493. Imitating
Verard of Paris, he gave his later years to the translation and
printing of romances and popular books. In 1493, he began to print
Caxton’s _Chronicle of England_, in English and obviously for sale in
England, but he died before the work was finished.[357]
IN ITALY.
This is the order in which printing was established in Italy:
Place. Printer. Date.
Subiaco Sweinheym & Pannartz 1465
Rome Sweinheym & Pannartz 1467
Venice John de Spira 1469
Milan Anthony Zarot 1470
Foligno John Nummeister 1470
Trevi John Reynard 1470
Verona John of Verona 1470
Treviso Gerard de Lisa 1471
Bologna Balthazar Azzoguidi 1471
Ferrara Andrew Belfort 1471
Naples Sixtus Riessinger 1471
Pavia Antonio de Carcano 1471
Florence Bernard Cennini 1471
Fivizano Jacobus and others 1472
Padua Balt. de Valdezochio 1472
Mantua Pietro Adam de Michael 1472
Mondovi Antonio Mathiae, _et al._ 1472
Jesi Frederic Veronensis 1472
Cremona Paravisinus, _et al._ 1472
Parma Andrew Portiglia 1473
Brescia Thomas Ferrandus 1473
Messina Henry Alding 1473
Vicenza John de Reno 1473
Como De Orcho, _et al._ 1474
Turin Fabri and John de Petro 1474
Genoa Matthew Moravus, _et al._ 1474
Modena John Vurster 1475
Trent Hermann Schindeleyp 1476
Palermo Andrew de Wormatia 1477
Ascoli William de Linis 1477
Lucca Bart. de Civitali 1477
Casal William de Canepa 1481
Cotton, in his _Typographical Gazetteer_, specifies thirty-seven other
places in Italy in which printing was done before 1500. [p501]
SUBIACO and ROME. Conrad Sweinheym and Arnold Pannartz, two printers
from Germany, set up a press in the monastery of Subiaco, near Rome,
and there produced in 1465 the books first printed from types in Italy.
To please the tastes of their Roman readers they made a new font of
Roman types. It was not a successful effort, for the traces of Gothic
mannerisms are noticeable in almost every letter. Not meeting with
the encouragement they desired, the two printers removed to Rome in
1467. They began to print on a grand scale, making new fonts of Roman,
Greek and Round Gothic types, enlisting the services of Bishop John
Andrew as reader and corrector, and undertaking the publication of many
large classical works. They did not prosper. In the year 1472, they
petitioned the pope for relief, setting forth that they had printed
11,475 copies of twenty-eight works, a very large portion of which had
not been sold, and that they were in great distress. In 1473, Sweinheym
withdrew from the partnership, and began to engrave on copper maps
for an edition of _Ptolemy’s Geography_. He died before the book was
published, in 1478. Pannartz died in 1476.
Ulrich Hahn, a printer of Bavaria, went to Rome in 1465, and began to
print there in 1467. His first book was in Round Gothic types, but his
Italian readers induced him to make for his second book a rude form of
Roman types. He employed Campanus, an eminent scholar, as reader and
corrector, and associated himself with Simon Nicholas de Lucca, who
acted as editor and publisher of his books. At this time there were in
Rome many printing offices, and the number increased, notwithstanding
the complaints of Sweinheym and Pannartz, and also of Philip de
Lignamine, that more books were printed than could be sold. Before the
year 1500, there were or had been thirty-seven master printers at Rome.