turn; but it will not be amiss to collect some instances of the special
vaunts of the prototypographers,—the men who claimed to have been the
first to practise their craft in any particular town,—as these are
sometimes of importance in the history of printing. Thus, in the “Lectura
super Institutionum libros quatuor” of Angelus de Gambilionibus de
Aretio, printed by Joannes de Sidriano of Milan, we have a most precise
statement of the day on which the first printed book was finished at
Pavia:
Explicit prima pars huius operis revisa per me Angelum de
Gambilionibus de Aretio die xvi octobris ferrarie. 1448. Fuit
hoc opus impressum Papie per Ioannem de Sidriano Medioanensem
[_sic_] huius artis primum artificem qui in urbe ticicensi
[_sic_] huiusmodi notas impresserit et istud pro primo opere
expleuit die xxx mensis octobris 1473.
Here ends the first part of this work revised by me, Angelus de
Gambilionibus of Arezzo, 16th October, 1448, at Ferrara. This
work was printed at Pavia by Joannes de Sidriano of Milan,
the first practiser of this art who printed books of this kind
in the city once called Ticinum, and who finished this as his
first work on the 30th October, 1473.
Equally precise is Bartolommeo de Cividale in the short colophon he adds
to his edition of Petrarch’s Trionfi, the first book printed at Lucca:
Impressus Lucae liber est hic: primus ubi artem
De Civitali Bartholomeus init.
Anno mcccclxxvii die xii Maii.
This book was printed at Lucca, where Bartolommeo de Cividale
first inaugurated the art, on May 12, 1477.
In the “Manuale” or “Liber de salute siue de Aspiratione Animae ad Deum”
of S. Augustine, printed at Treviso in 1471, we find Gerard de Lisa
boasting, with more poetry, but less precision:
Gloria debetur Girardo maxima lixae,
Quem genuit campis Flandria picta suis.
Hic Tarvisina nam primus coepit in urbe
Artifici raros aere notare libros.
Quoque magis faueant excelsi numina regis
Aurelii sacrum nunc manuale dedit.
Gerard de Lisa may great glory claim—
He who from Flanders’ glowing meadows came—
For in Treviso’s town he foremost was
To print rare books by the skilled use of brass.
And that the heavenly powers may more him bless,
Comes Austin’s holy manual from his press.
Curiously enough, a year before Joannes de Sidriano issued the first
book at Pavia, printing had been inaugurated at Mantua with another
work by the same not very illustrious author—Gambiglioni’s “Tractatus
Maleficiorum.” In this Petrus Adam de Michaelibus writes:
Petrus Adam Mantus opus hoc impressit in urbe.
Illic nullus eo scripserat aere prius.
Petrus Adam printed this work in the town of Mantua. None had
written there on brass before him.
All these claims seem sufficiently well established, but that of Filippo
of Lavagna in the “De medicina” of Avicenna (translated by Master Gerard
of Cremona) is much less tenable. Here he says distinctly at the end of
Book II:
Mediolani die xii februarii 1473 per Magistrum Filippum de
Lauagnia huius artis stampandi in hac urbe primum latorem atque
inventorem.
At Milan, on the 12th day of February, 1473, by Maestro Filippo
of Lavagna, the first bearer and inventor of the art of
stamping in this town.
We know that Antonio Zaroto had printed at Milan a “Festus de Verborum
significationibus” on the 3d August, 1471, while the earliest date
credited to Lavagna is that of his edition of the “Epistolae ad
Familiares” of Cicero, 25th March, 1472. It is true that the pretty
colophon to his “Miraculi de la Vergene Maria” tells another tale:
Dentro de Milano e doue stato impronta
L’opra beata de miraculi tanti
Di quella che nel Ciel monta e dismonta
Accompagnata con gli angeli e sancti.
Philippo da Lauagna qui vi si conta
E state el maestro de si dolce canti.
Impressum anno Domini MCCCCLXVIIII di xviiii Maii.
Within Milan is where has been printed the blessed work of
so great miracles of Her who ascends and descends in Heaven,
accompanied by the angels and saints. Filippo da Lavagna here
is the speaker, and is become the master of so sweet songs.
Printed in the year of the Lord 1469, on May 19.
But this is another instance of the risks of using Roman numerals
(compare the three “1468” colophons cited in Chapter III), since the V
in this date is clearly a misprint for a second X, which in some copies
correctly takes its place.
A possible explanation of Lavagna’s boast in 1473 lies in the fact that
he was by birth a Milanese, while Zaroto came from Parma; so that if we
may take the latter half of the colophon to mean “the first man in this
town who introduced and discovered this art of printing,” it would be
literally correct—that is, if we can be sure that Lavagna was actually
a printer at all, a point on which Mr. Proctor was very doubtful. But
to raise this question is perhaps only a modern refinement, since
without the help of the doctrine _qui facit per alium facit per se_ we
must accuse many worthy fifteenth-century tradesmen of lying in their
colophons.
Another dubious statement, which may perhaps be explained, was
introduced, amid some very vainglorious boasting, in the colophon to the
Oxford edition of the Epistles of Phalaris. This runs:
Hoc opusculum in alma vniuersitate Oxonie a natali christiano
Ducentesima et nonagesima et septima Olimpiade foeliciter
impressum est.
Hoc Teodericus Rood quem Collonia misit
Sanguine Germanus nobile pressit opus:
Atque sibi socius Thomas fuit Anglicus Hunte
Dii dent ut Venetos exsuperare queant.
Quam Ienson Venetos docuit vir Gallicus artem
Ingenio didicit terra britanna suo.
Celatos Veneti nobis transmittere libros
Cedite: nos aliis, vendimus, O Veneti.
Que fuerat uobis ars prima nota latini
Est eadem nobis ipsa reperta patres.
Quamuis semotos toto canit orbe Britannos
Virgilius, placet his lingua latina tamen.
This little work was happily printed in the bounteous
University of Oxford in the two hundred and ninety-seventh
Olympiad from the birth of Christ.
This noble work was printed by Theodoric Rood, a German by
blood, sent from Cologne, and an Englishman, Thomas Hunte,
was his partner. The gods grant that they may surpass the
Venetians. The art which the Frenchman Jenson taught the
Venetians, the British land has learnt by its mother-wit.
Cease, Venetians, from sending us the books you engrave: we
are now, O Venetians, selling to others. The art which was
first known to you, O Latin Fathers, has been discovered by us.
Although Virgil sings of the Britons as all a world away, yet
the Latin tongue delights them.
This is certainly not a truthful colophon, for we cannot believe that
any foreign students would have sent to Oxford to buy the letters of the
pseudo-Phalaris or any other books there printed, while the assertion
that Britons learnt printing by their mother-wit accords ill with the
fact that Theodoric Rood came from Cologne to practise the art on their
behalf. Mr. Horatio Brown, however, perhaps presses the fifth line a
little too hard when he asserts that “these verses prove that public
opinion abroad assigned the priority of printing in Venice to Jenson.”
John of Speier had died so early in his career, and the work of Jenson is
to this day so universally recognized as the finest which was produced
at Venice, that the Frenchman may fairly be said to have taught the
Venetians printing, without claiming for him priority in order of time.
It should, perhaps, also be noted that while Hain and Mr. Brown print the
important word as _docuit_, Mr. Madan gives it as _decuit_, from which
it might be possible to extract the assertion, not that he _taught_ the
Venetians the art, but that he _graced_ them with it. It would need,
however, a fifteenth-century Orbilius to do justice upon the perpetrator
of such vile Latin, while _e_ for _o_ is an easy misprint, and _docuit_
is confirmed by the obvious antithesis of _didicit_ in the next line.
More important, because more detailed than any of the boasts we have
yet quoted, are the claims and pleas put forward in the colophons to
the edition of the commentary of Servius on Virgil, printed by Bernardo
Cennini and his son Domenico, at Florence, in 1471-72. The first of these
occurs at the end of the Bucolics, and is repeated, with the substitution
of “Georgica” for “volumen hoc primum,” after the Georgics. The second
comes at the end of the book.
(1) Ad Lectorem. Florentiae. vii Idus Nouembres. MccccLxxi.
Bernardus Cennius [_sic_], aurifex omnium iudicio
prestantissimus, et Dominicus eius F[ilius] egregiae indolis
adolescens, expressis ante calibe caracteribus, ac deinde fusis
literis, volumen hoc primum impresserunt. Petrus Cenninus,
Bernardi eiusdem F[ilius], quanta potuit cura et diligentia
emendauit ut cernis. Florentinis ingeniis nil ardui est.
(2) Ad Lectorem. Bernardinus Cenninus, aurifex omnium iudicio
praestantissimus, et Dominicus eius F[ilius], optimae indolis
adolescens, impresserunt. Petrus eiusdem Bernardi F[ilius]
emendauit, cum antiquissimis autem multis exemplaribus
contulit. In primisque illi cura fuit, ne quid alienum Seruio
adscriberetur, ne quid recideretur aut deesset, quod Honorati
esse peruetusta exemplaria demonstrarent. Quoniam uero
plerosque iuuat manu propria suoque more Graeca interponere,
eaque in antiquis codicibus perpauca sunt, et accentus quidem
difficillimi imprimendo notari sunt, relinquendum ad id spatia
duxit. Sed cum apud homines perfectum nihil sit, satis uideri
cuique debebit, si hi libri (quod vehementer optamus) prae
aliis emendati reperientur. Absolutum opus Nonis Octobribus. M.
cccc Lxxii. Florentiae.
(1) To the Reader. At Florence, on November 7, 1471, Bernardo
Cennini, by universal allowance a most excellent goldsmith, and
Domenico his son, a youth of remarkable ability, having first
modelled the stamps with compasses, and afterward moulded the
letters, printed this first volume. Pietro Cennini, son of the
aforesaid Bernardo, has corrected it, as you see, with all the
care and diligence he could. To Florentine wits nothing is
difficult.
(2) To the Reader. Bernardino Cennini, by universal allowance
a most excellent goldsmith, and Domenico his son, a youth of
very good ability, have been the printers. Pietro, son of the
aforesaid Bernardo, has acted as corrector and has made a
collation with many very ancient copies. His first anxiety was
that nothing by another hand should be ascribed to Servius,
that nothing which very old copies showed to be the work of
Honoratus should be cut down or omitted. Since it pleases many
readers to insert Greek words with their own hand and in their
own fashion, and these in ancient codices are very few, and the
accents are very difficult to mark in printing, he determined
that spaces should be left for the purpose. But since nothing
of man’s making is perfect, it must needs be accounted enough
if these books (as we earnestly hope) are found exceptionally
correct. The work was finished at Florence on October 5, 1472.
The references to the leaving of blank spaces for the Greek quotations
(a common practice of the earliest printers in Italy) and to the trouble
caused by the accents are particularly interesting, and by ill luck were
not noticed by Mr. Proctor, who would have been delighted to quote them
in his admirable monograph on “The Printing of Greek.”
Difficulties were natural in the early days of the art, and must often
have beset the path of the wandering printers who passed from town to
town, or from monastery to monastery, printing one or two books at each.
As late as 1493 one such printer, not yet identified, who started his
press at Acqui, though he was engaged on only a humble school-book, the
“Doctrinale” of Alexander Gallus, found himself in sore straits owing to
the plague raging in the neighboring towns.
Alexandri de villa Dei Doctrinale (Deo laudes) feliciter
explicit. Impressum sat incommode, cum aliquarum rerum, quae
ad hanc artem pertinent, impressori copia fieri non potuerit
in huius artis initio: peste Genuae, Ast, alibique militante.
Emendauit autem hoc ipsum opus Venturinus prior, Grammaticus
eximius, ita diligenter, ut cum antea Doctrinale parum
emendatum in plerisque locis librariorum vitio esse videretur,
nunc illius cura et diligentia adhibita in manus hominum quam
emendatissimum veniat. Imprimentur autem posthac libri alterius
generis litteris, et eleganter arbitror. Nam et fabri et
aliarum rerum, quarum hactenus promptor indigus fuit, illi nunc
Dei munere copia est, qui cuncta disponit pro sue voluntatis
arbitrio. Amen.
The Doctrinale of Alexander of Villedieu (God be praised!)
comes to a happy end. It has been printed amid enough
inconveniences, since of several things which belong to this
art the printer, in making a beginning with it, could obtain no
proper supply, owing to the plague raging at Genoa, Asti, and
elsewhere. Now this same work has been corrected by the prior
Venturinus, a distinguished grammarian, and that so diligently
that whereas previously the Doctrinale in many places seemed
by the fault of booksellers too little corrected, now by the
application of his care and diligence it will reach men’s hands
in the most correct form possible. After this date books will
be printed in type of another kind, and elegantly, I think;
for both artificers and a sufficiency of other things of which
hitherto the putter forth has been in need he now possesses
by the gift of God, who disposes all things according to the
judgment of his will. Amen.
All these promises may have been carried out, but we know of no other
book from this press, and it is more than likely that no other was
issued. Nor was this the only press which was inconvenienced by the
plague, since two years later the disease interrupted Conrad Kachelofen
in the pious task of printing a missal at Leipzig, and caused him to
become the first exponent of the art at Freiberg, as we duly learn from
the colophon:
[Illustration: Meissen Missal. Freiberg: Conrad Kachelofen,
1495. (Reduced.)]
Quanquam alias codices librorum missalium iuxta rubricam
ecclesie Misnensis per Reuerendissimum in christo patrem
et dominum dominum Iohannem f[elicis] r[ecordationis] olim
episcopum Misnensem imprimi satis exacta diligentia procurati
sunt: tamen quia predicti codices multa necessaria que
presentes in lucem dedere omiserunt et eorum numerus Misnensis
diocesis latitudini ac personarum inibi deo famulantium & pro
libris huiusmodi sepenumero auide inquirentium multitudini non
satisfacit Ideo Reuerendissimus in cristo pater et dominus
dominus Iohannes de Salhusen modernus misnensis ecclesie
episcopus, his aliisque penuriis et defectibus succurrere
uolens, presens missalium opus iuxta rubricam iam dicte sue
Misnensis diocesis diligenti opera castigatum atque distinctum
per industrium Conradum Kachelofen huius impressorie artis
magistrum oppidique lipsensis conciuem in oppido eodem
inchoari: atque grassante pestifero morbo in oppido Freiberg
perfici et foeliciter finiri procurauit. Quod quidem opus
ad nouarum etiam festiuitatum, pro diuini cultus augmento,
institutiones aptissimum erit: quarum historie in prioribus
codicibus minime habentur et in presentibus cum multis aliis
specialibus uotiuis missis suo ordine annotantur ita ut hec
noua uolumina cum precedentibus conferentes necessaria potius
quam superuacanea fuisse animaduertant. Anno salutis quinto et
nonagesimo supra quadringentesimum et millesimum, Die uero lune
mensis nouembris nona.
IOANNIS CUBITENSIS EPIGRAMMA
Gallicus hoc nostro Conradus muneris euo
Attulit: ingenio dedalicaque manu.
Antistes Misne, plenus bonitate fideque,
Dux erat. Auctorem lector opusque tenes.
Although copies of the missal-books according to the rubric of
the diocese of Meissen have been caused by the most reverend
Father in Christ and lord, the lord John of happy memory,
formerly Bishop of Meissen, to be printed elsewhere with
sufficiently exact diligence, yet inasmuch as the aforesaid
copies omitted many necessary things which the present ones
have published, and the number of them does not suffice for
so wide a diocese as Meissen and for the multitude of persons
of the household of God in it who ofttimes eagerly seek for
books of this kind, Therefore, the most reverend Father in
Christ and lord, the lord Johann von Salhusen, the Bishop,
that now is, of the Church of Meissen, wishing to come to the
aid of these and other wants and defects, caused the present
missal-book, according to the rubric of his aforesaid diocese
of Meissen, diligently corrected and arranged, to be begun
by the industrious Conrad Kachelofen, a master of this art
of printing and citizen of the town of Leipzig, in that same
town, and on the approach of the plague to be accomplished and
happily finished in the town of Freiberg. The which missal-book
will be found most suitable for the institutions also of new
festivals for the increase of the divine worship, the lessons
for these being very defective in the former copies, while in
the present ones they are noted with many other special votive
masses in their proper order, so that those who compare these
volumes with the preceding ones will count them as necessary
rather than superfluous. In the year of salvation 1495, on
Monday, November 9th.
EPIGRAM OF JOHANNES CUBITENSIS
This gift French Conrad brought unto our age;
His wit and skilful hand achieved the task.
Meissen’s good, faithful bishop blessed the page:
Of book or author need none further ask.
From Hain 10425 we learn that a Machasor, or Compendium of Prayers, for
the use of the Italian synagogues was begun at Soncino in September,
1485, and finished at Casal Maggiore in August, 1486; but to what this
change of scene was due the colophon does not say. One would have thought
that in the fifteenth century war as well as pestilence must often have
interrupted the printer at his work; and indeed the sack of Mainz in
1462 was a very notable event in the history of printing. Yet the only
two references to war I can remember in contemporary colophons hardly
view it as an interruption—the first Paris printers (Gering, Krantz,
and Friburger), indeed, tried to use it as an advertisement for their
Sallust, where the verses at the end run:
Nunc parat arma uirosque simul rex maximus orbis,
Hostibus antiquis exitium minitans.
Nunc igitur bello studeas gens Pariseorum,
Cui Martis quondam gloria magna fuit.
Exemplo tibi sint nunc fortia facta uirorum,
Quae digne memorat Crispus in hoc opere.
Armigerisque tuis alemannos adnumeres, qui
Hos pressere libros, arma futura tibi.
The King of France his armaments and men is mustering,
Upon his ancient enemies destruction threatening.
Now therefore, men of Paris, show your ardor for the wars,
Who erst won mighty glory in the service of great Mars.
Set before you as examples each brave, heroic deed
Of which in Sallust’s pages due record you may read;
And count us German printers as adding to your store
Of fighters, since this history will stir up many more.
The other allusion takes the form of sympathy with the sufferers from
Turkish oppression and invasion, and comes at the end of an edition of
the story of Attila, in a colophon which leads up to the statement that
the book was printed at Venice by showing how it was the fear caused by
Attila which brought about the foundation of the island city.
Atila persecutore de la Christiana fede. Primamente vene verso
aquilegia nel tempo de papa Leone e de odopio imperatore de li
christiani. Laqual cita insembre con molte altre cita castelli
e forteze nela fertile e bella Italia destrusse. Li habitatori
de li dicti luoghi fugiendo la sua canina rabia ad modo che nel
presente tempo, cioe del summo pontifice papa Innocentio, e di
Federico imperatore e del Inclyto duce Augustino Barbadico in
Venetia imperante neli anni del signore del M.cccc lxxxxi se
fuge la crudele ed abhominabile persecutione del perfido cane
turcho il qual come e ditto de sopra abandonando le lor dolce
patrie perueneno a le prenominate isole: nelequale fu edificata
la potentissima famosa e nobile cita de Venetia laqual Idio per
la sua pieta mantenga felice e prospera e victoriosa per mare e
per terra longo tempo.
FINIS. Impressum Venetiis.
Attila, the persecutor of the Christian faith, first came to
Aquilegia in the time of Pope Leo and of Odopius, Emperor
of the Christians. The which city, together with many other
cities, castles, and strong places in fertile and beautiful
Italy, he destroyed. The inhabitants of the said places fled
from his dog-like rage just as in the present time (that
is, the time of the most high pontiff Pope Innocent, and of
the Emperor Frederick, and of the renowned doge Agostino
Barbadico, holding rule in Venice, in the year of our Lord
1491) people are flying the cruel and abominable persecution
of the treacherous dog of a Turk. Abandoning their sweet
fatherlands, as was said above, they came to the afore-named
islands, in the which was built the most potent, famous, and
noble city of Venice, the which for its piety may God long
preserve in happiness and prosperity, victorious by sea and
land. Finis. Printed at Venice.
Printers—though Pynson’s head was broken in a street riot, and Pierre
le Dru took part in a Paris brawl during his prentice days—have usually
been men of peace; but despite this and any care they may have taken in
avoiding the plague, they died like other men, and several colophons
record the death of the master craftsman while engaged on the work. We
have already seen the rather businesslike lamentation of Wendelin of
Speier for his brother John. In the edition of Boccaccio’s “Genealogiae
Deorum gentilium” printed at Reggio in 1481, Bartholomeus Bruschus (or
Bottonus) mourns rather more effusively for Laurentius:
Dum tua, Boccacci, propriis Laurentius auget
Sumptibus et reddit nomina clara magis,
Hoc opus aere notans, tunc stirps bottona uirentem
Et quem flet Regium mors inopina rapit.
Post lachrymas tandem frater uirtutis amore
Tam pulchrum exegit Bartholomeus opus.
Impressum Regii anno salutis M.cccc.Lxxxi. pridie Nonas
Octobris.
Boccaccio, while at his proper cost
Lorenzo toiled your honor to increase,
Printing this book, the Bruschian clan him lost;
And Reggio, in his prime, mourns his decease.
Tears dried, Bartolommeo undertook,
With emulous love, to end his brother’s book.
Printed at Reggio in the year of salvation 1481. October 4th.
But neither do these verses come anywhere near the simple pathos of the
colophon to the “Cronycles of the londe of England,” printed at Antwerp
in 1493, which records the death of the famous printer Gerard Leeu.
Here ben endyd the Cronycles of the Reame of Englond, with
their apperteignaunces. Enprentyd In the Duchye of Braband in
the towne of Andewarpe In the yere of our Lord M.cccc.xciij. By
maistir Gerard de leew a man of grete wysedom in all maner of
kunnyng: whych nowe is come from lyfe unto the deth, which is
grete harme for many of poure man. On whos sowle God almyghty
for hys hygh grace haue mercy. Amen.
A man whose death is great harm for many a poor man must needs have been
a good master, and a king need want no finer epitaph, though the phrase
is full of the one thought which makes the prospect of death terrible.[5]
One rather wonders what the workmen of Plato de Benedictis had to say
about _him_ when he died; for, if the colophon to his edition of “Bononia
illustrata” (Bologna, 1494) was worded with his consent, he had a nasty
readiness to take all the credit to himself and leave all the blame for
his workmen.
[Illustration: Bononia illustrata. Bologna: Plato de
Benedictis, 1494.]
Ad lectorem.
Bononiae: anno salutis .M.cccc.lxxxx.iiii. Ex officina Platonis
de Benedictis huiusce artis exactoris probatissimi Libellus
quam pulcherrimis caractheribus impressus. In quo Origo,
situsque Bononiae. Hinc uiri illustres: qui ingenio claruerint
tam domestici quam externi. Templa quoque ac corpora sanctorum
ibidem consepulta. Postmodum oppida, uicus, factiones: quae
quondam hic uiguere. Gestaque Bononiensium sub breuitate
contenta: una cum illustri Bentiuolorum genologia [_sic_]
connumerantur. Si quid tamen in eo mendae et erroris insertum
fuerit: non impressoris negligentia sed potius famulorum
incuria pretermissum putes. Nam ille ingenio litteraturaque
non mediocri dotatus: et tali exercitio inter caeteros
excultissimus est.