size. All that is at present known of this book are two little strips
making part of a leaf, and each containing six lines of verse, three
on each side. I found these fragments a year or two ago amongst a
bundle of uncatalogued leaves in the Bodleian, but was not able at the
time to determine from what book they came. The story is apparently of
someone who having been in purgatory is allowed to revisit the world
in order to warn others of what he had seen there. This was a common
story, and the occurrence of part of a line “But y the goste of guido”
makes it certain that the fragments belong to some version of a work
called _Spiritus Guidonis_.
The two other books in this series are two year-books, for the
first and ninth years of Edward IV. All these early books, with the
exception, of course, of the poetry fragments, contain Pynson’s
first device, which consists of his monogram in white upon a black
background, not at all unlike in style that used by Le Talleur at
Rouen, with whom he had been associated. When the device was used in
November, 1492, a small alteration had been made in it, so that from
the state of the device as well as by the type used we are able to
settle which books belong to this earliest group.
In 1492 Pynson’s first dated book appeared, an edition of the
_Doctrinal_ of Alexander Grammaticus, editions of which had already
been printed abroad in considerable numbers. Pynson’s was not copied
from any of these, having a different commentary, but who this
commentary is by I have not yet been able to ascertain.
This book was only discovered quite lately, and I came upon it by a
fortunate accident. The owner, or rather guardian, of it happened to
have read in some book that the earliest dated book of Pynson’s was
issued in 1493. Knowing that he had an earlier one he wrote to the
British Museum about it, and I heard casually that the book had been
sent to them to examine. I went up to London immediately to see if I
could see the book, but was told it had been returned, nor could I
obtain any information as to where it was to be found. Luckily, the
owner was so far interested as to write a note to one of the papers
mentioning the existence of the book, and also the place where it was
preserved--the Grammar School at Appleby. The following Saturday I set
off to Appleby, and had the pleasure of examining it at my leisure.
It is a beautiful copy, quite perfect, in its original binding, and,
as one would have hoped, with end leaves taken from Machlinia’s
_Chronicle_. It has a perfectly clear Latin imprint which runs: “And
thus ends the commentary of the Doctrinale of Alexander, printed by
me Richard Pynson of the parish of St Clement Danes outside the bar
of the new Temple at London the 13th day of the month of November in
the year of the incarnation of our Lord 1492.” From this colophon it
is clear that if Pynson did commence work in Machlinia’s old office,
which was in Holborn, he had by this time removed to other premises.
The commentary in the book is printed in a very small, neat type which
Pynson had probably had made for him abroad, as it contained no w. I am
sorry that the discovery of this book has thrown out of order the list
of Pynson’s types which I gave in the introduction to my _Facsimiles
of Early English Printing_. In 1903 this volume was sold by the school
trustees, and is now in the British Museum.
In 1493 appeared Henry Parker’s _Dialogue of Dives and Pauper_, which
was always considered, before the discovery of the _Doctrinale_,
Pynson’s first dated book. It is printed in a new and handsome type,
and this is the only dated book in which it is used, though there
are four undated quartos in the same type, which may be put down to
the same year. These are the _Festum nominis Jesu_, one of the _Nova
Festa_ printed as supplements to the Sarum _Breviary_, the _Life of St
Margaret_, Lidgate’s _Churl and Birde_, and an edition apparently of
some statutes or a similar work known from two leaves in the library
at Lambeth. Of the _Festum nominis Jesu_ one copy is known, bound
up in a volume with several other tracts, among them being Caxton’s
_Festum transfigurationis Jesu Christi_. It was for a while in the
Congregational Library in London but was eventually sold to the British
Museum. Three printed leaves from the beginning of the poem amongst
the fragments in the Bodleian are all that remain of the _Life of St
Margaret_. The Lidgate’s _Churl and Birde_ after passing through the
sales of Willett, the Marquis of Blandford, Sir F. Freeling and B. H.
Bright, passed with the Grenville Library into the British Museum.
Two editions of Mirk’s _Liber Festivalis_, each known from a single
copy, one in the Pepysian Library, the other in the University Library,
belong probably to this time. The various changes in the book are
interesting to trace. In the earliest editions there are no references
to, or additional chapters for, the new feasts which were then coming
into use; then come editions with the extra feasts printed together
at the end as a kind of supplement to the book, and finally we get
the editions with these extra feasts put into their proper places in
the body of the book. The edition in the Pepysian Library is without
these extra feasts, while that in the University Library has them as
a supplement of ten leaves at the end. In the next edition, which was
printed about the end of 1493 by W. de Worde, the feasts have been
incorporated into their proper places.
In 1494 Pynson reverted to his earlier types and issued a translation
by Lidgate from Boccaccio called the _Falle of Princes_, remarkable
for its charming woodcuts. In this book, for the first time, Pynson
used his second device, a large woodcut containing his initials on a
black shield with a helmet above on which is perched a small bird.
This I imagine is meant for a finch, a punning allusion to his name,
since pynson is the Norman name for a finch. Round the whole is a
border of flowering branches, in which are birds and grotesque beasts.
This device supplies us later with a most useful date test, for the
edge split in 1496 and the piece broke off entirely towards the end of
1497. After 1498 the use of this device was discontinued but it was not
destroyed, and it made a solitary reappearance, in a sadly mutilated
state in an edition of a grammar of Whitinton in 1515. Probably in this
year (1494) Pynson issued his edition of the _Speculum vitae Christi_,
of which an almost perfect copy is in King’s library. It is illustrated
with a large number of neat woodcuts, which are copied more or less
from Caxton’s illustrations to the same book, though they are by no
means identical with them, as has been often stated. As a general
rule Pynson’s cuts are of very much better execution and design than
either Caxton’s or De Worde’s, and though not in all cases good, as for
instance in the _Canterbury Tales_, yet they never sink to the very
bad drawing and engraving so often found in the works of the other two
printers.
An edition of the _Hecyra_ of Terence bears the date January 20, 1495,
but no other dated book of this year is known, and 1496 was hardly
better, having only the two grammars, the _Liber Synonymorum_ and
_Liber Equivocorum_, the latter usually wrongly attributed to Joannes
de Garlandia; but many undated books of very considerable interest
appeared about this time. Two of these, the _Epitaph of Jasper_, _Duke
of Bedford_, and the _Foundation of Our Lady’s Chapel at Walsingham_
are to be found in the Pepysian Library. Jasper Tudor, Duke of Bedford,
and half-brother of Henry VI, died on December 21, 1495, and the book
must have been printed early in 1496. It is ostensibly written by one
Smarte, the keeper of the hawks to the Duke, and begins as follows:--
Rydynge al alone with sorrowe sore encombred
In a frosty fornone, faste by Severnes syde
The wordil beholdynge, whereat much I wondred
To se the see and sonne to kepe both tyme and tyde.
The ayre ouer my hede so wonderfully to glyde
And how Saturne by circumference borne is aboute
Whiche thynges to beholde, clerely me notyfyde
One verray god to be, therin to haue no dowte.
The end runs:--
Kynges prynces moste souerayne of renoune
Remembre oure maister that gone is byfore
This worlde is casual, nowe up nowe downe
Wherfore do for your silfe, I can say no more
Honor tibi Deus, gloria et laus
Qd’ Smerte maister de ses ouzeaus.
This poem has been attributed to Skelton, though I do not know for what
reason. On the title-page is a special cut, not used elsewhere, of
Smarte kneeling, with his hawk on his wrist, and presenting with his
other hand a book to a person standing. The _Foundation of Our Lady’s
Chapel at Walsingham_ is a small tract relating to the priory of the
Augustinian canons of St Mary, once one of the most important places of
pilgrimage in England, and which was described by Erasmus. The first
leaf, which would have contained the title, is wanting, but the text
begins on the second:--
Of this chapell se here the fundacyon
Bylded the yere of crystes incarnacyon
A thousande complete, sixty and one
The tyme of Sent Edward kyng of this region.
About this time appeared the first English edition of _Mandeviles
Travels_, the only edition, I think, issued without illustrations, and
a little reprint of Caxton’s _Art and Craft to Know Well to Die_, of
which the only known copy, formerly Ratcliffe’s, is in the Hunterian
Museum at Glasgow.
Another poetical tract is the _Life of Petronylla_, beginning:--
The parfite lyfe to put in remembraunce
Of a virgyn moost gracious and entere
Which in all vertu had souereyn suffysaunce
Called Petronylla petyrs doughter dere.
This little tract consists of four leaves, and though only three copies
are known at present it is probable that more are in existence, for
the book seems to occur in all the sales of large libraries which have
occurred within the last hundred years.
About 1496 Henry Quentell, a Cologne printer, had issued the first
edition of the _Expositio Hymnorum et Sequentiarum_, according to the
use of Sarum, but it was found that several hymns and sequences were
omitted, so Pynson issued two supplements, one of sixteen leaves to the
hymns, another of six to the sequences.
Another rather quaint book issued about this time is a kind of
vocabulary or phrase book in English and French. “Here is a good book
to lerne to speak french, Vecy ung bon liure a apprendre a parler
fraunchoys.” The book contains also specimens of letters in French
relating to trade, in fact it was evidently intended as a manual for
people who had business relations with France.
Two more editions of the _Nova Festa_, the _Festum transfigurationis_
and the _Festum nominis Jesu_ were issued about this time. The only
copies known of these two books are in a private library in Somerset,
and I have not yet had an opportunity of examining them.
In 1497, or perhaps slightly earlier, Pynson began to use his third
device, made probably to take the place of the second which had split,
and taking warning from it he had the new one cut in metal. The device
consists of the shield and monogram supported by a man and a woman,
with the helmet and bird above. The border, which is cut on a separate
piece, contains birds and foliage, with the Virgin and Child and a
saint in the bottom corners. In the lowest part of the frame a piece
in the form of a ribbon has been cut out for the insertion of type. In
consequence of the weakness of that particular place the small piece
of border below the ribbon began to be pushed inwards, and by 1499
there was a distinct indentation in the border. This got deeper and
deeper year by year, until the piece broke off entirely in 1513. The
first dated book in which it occurs is the 1497 edition of Alcock’s
_Mons perfectionis_, but it occurs in several of the undated books that
can be placed about 1496.
Between 1495 and the end of 1497 Pynson issued the plays of Terence,
the first classic (with the exception of an Oxford edition of the _Pro
Milone_, which is known from a few leaves) that had been printed in
England. The six plays were evidently issued separately and not as a
volume, for they differ considerably typographically. There is some
difficulty, too, in determining in what order they were issued.
In 1498 there are seven dated books, one of them being the sermon of
Bishop Alcock called _Gallicantus_, and he is so pleased with jesting
on his name that he prefaces the text of his sermon with a little black
picture of a cockerel, which he also used as a device. Another edition
of the _Doctrinale_ of Alexander the Grammarian was issued this year,
but I have not yet seen the book, as the only copy known belongs to
Lord Beauchamp.
In 1499 a very interesting book was printed by Pynson. This was the
_Promptorius Puerorum_, a Latin-English dictionary ascribed to a monk
of Lynn. The imprint tells us that the book was printed for Frederick
Egmondt and Peter post pascha. Frederick Egmondt was an important
stationer, and no doubt Peter post pascha was a stationer also, though
what name in the vernacular can be represented by post pascha remains
an unsolved riddle. Mr Albert Way, in his edition of the _Promptorium
parvulorum_, applies a curious amount of misplaced ingenuity to the
question of the identity of these two stationers. “We find about
the time in question,” he says, speaking of the name Egmondt, “a
distinguished person of that family, possibly the patron of Pynson,
Frederic, son of William IV, Count of Egmond. In 1472 he received from
his uncle, the Duke of Gueldres, the lordship of Buren; he was named
governor of Utrecht by the Archduke Maximilian in 1492; two years
later Buren was raised to a count in reward of his services. There was
a Peter, an illegitimate brother of his father, who might have been
living at that time; what was his surname does not appear.” Another
book printed about this year was the _Elegantiarum viginti praecepta_,
a book which I am fond of for a peculiar reason. I found once a leaf
of it in the Signet Library, Edinburgh, and, not knowing that any copy
was in existence, set to work to reconstruct the book from the leaf.
I counted the lines, and comparing with foreign editions, conjectured
the size and structure of the book, and knowing how Pynson would make
a title-page with a woodcut, and the woodcut he would probably use,
I made up a description of the book, taking the title from an early
bibliography. At last I heard of a perfect copy in a private library
which the owner was kind enough to allow me to examine. When the book
arrived I found I had not only got the collation right, but by a lucky
inspiration had selected the correct woodcut for the title-page. As it
happens I might have spared myself the trouble, for I found afterwards
a fairly accurate collation of the book in an authority I had not
consulted.
A curious prognostication for 1499 is in the Bodleian. It is addressed
to Henry VII, and was drawn out by a William Parron, who lived at
Piacenza and called himself doctor of medicine and professor of
astrology. Another prognostication for 1502, by the same author, was
printed by Pynson, and some fragments are in the library of Westminster
Abbey. He also wrote an astrological work on Henry, Duke of York,
afterwards Henry VIII, in 1502, of which there are manuscripts in the
British Museum and Bibliothèque Nationale, but it does not seem ever to
have been printed.
The _Missal_ which Pynson printed in 1500 is perhaps the finest book
printed in the fifteenth century in England. It was produced at the
expense of Cardinal Morton, whose arms appear at the beginning, and
Pynson has introduced into the borders and initials a rebus on the
name consisting of the letters Mor surmounting a barrel or tun. Five
copies of this book are known, three being on vellum. One of the latter
copies, slightly imperfect, is in the library of Trinity College,
Cambridge. In the copy at Manchester all the references to St Thomas
and his service, which had been scraped out and erased according to
the command of Henry VIII, have been entirely filled in by some pious
seventeenth century owner in gold.
In the imprint, after setting forth that the book was printed at the
command of Cardinal Morton, Pynson adds the date, January 10, 1500.
Now, as Cardinal Morton died on September 15, 1500, I think we have
here a strong piece of evidence that Pynson, like De Worde, began his
year on January 1. For if he had begun it on March 25, then January 10,
1500, would be after the Cardinal was dead, and Pynson would surely
have spoken of him as lately dead, or in some way alluded to the loss
of his patron.
The _Book of Cookery_, belonging to the Marquis of Bath, was also
printed this year. It begins: “Here beginneth a noble boke of
festes royalle and cokery, a boke for a pryncis housholde or any
other estates, and the makynge therof accordynge as ye shall fynde
more playnly within this boke.” Then follows an account of certain
great banquets, the feast at the coronation of Henry V; “the earle
of Warwick’s feast to the king, the feast of my lorde chancellor
archbishop of York at his stallacion in York,” and so on. After the
account of the feasts comes the more practical Calendar of Cookery.
Two editions of the _Informatio Puerorum_, a small grammatical work
founded upon the _Donatus_, were issued about this time. In the
colophon of one it is stated that the book was printed for George
Chasteleyn and John Bars. I have found no reference anywhere to John
Bars, but George Chasteleyn was an Oxford bookseller, carrying on
business at the Sign of St John the evangelist in that city. It was for
him also that in 1506 Pynson printed an edition of the _Principia_ of
Peregrinus de Lugo. About this time there was no press in Oxford, so
that books for use in the schools had to be printed in London.
In a scrap-book in the British Museum are some leaves of an edition
of the romance of _Guy of Warwick_ which may be ascribed to Pynson,
and they are printed in a curious mixture of his early types. These
leaves were discovered in 1860 in the binding of a copy of Maydeston’s
_Directorium Sacerdotum_, printed by Pynson in 1501, and an account
of them was sent by their discoverer, who signs himself E. F. B.,
to _Notes and Queries_. Now, of this edition of the _Directorium_,
only two copies are known, one in the British Museum and one in Ripon
Cathedral, and I should very much like to know from which copy these
leaves were obtained.
During all the period from 1490 to 1500 Pynson was busy issuing
editions of law-books, more than a quarter of his productions being
of this class, and it is probable that a considerable number more
printed in the fifteenth century may yet be discovered. They are not
of a nature to attract much interest, and are generally very badly
catalogued, or catalogued in collections and not separately, and in one
great English library at least they have no more detailed press mark
than Law Room, so it is needless to say I have not yet examined such
books as they may have in that library.
Though he did not print so many books as De Worde in the fifteenth
century, nevertheless Pynson was evidently a more enterprising and
careful printer. He had seven distinct founts of type, all of which
were made for him and not inherited from other printers, and the
works he produced were of a much more scholarly nature, though this
becomes more apparent in his work during the sixteenth century. His
patrons were often learned and distinguished men, for whom he produced
such splendid work as the _Morton Missal_, and he became later the
recognised king’s printer. In the fifteenth century he printed
altogether eighty-eight books known to us.
Pynson, like De Worde, very considerately moved to a new address at the
end of the century; previous to 1501 he was in St Clement’s parish,
outside Temple Bar, which was the limit, I think, of the parish, but
afterwards moved inside Temple Bar, where he carried on business at
the Sign of the George. The colophon to the _Book of Cookery_, printed
in 1500, says, “Imprinted without Temple Bar”; the colophon to the
_Directorium Sacerdotum_ of 1501 says, “intra barram novi templi,” so
that the date is pretty accurately fixed.
LECTURE III.
THE STATIONERS.
In speaking of the history of the printed book in the fifteenth century
I have so far dealt only with the printers of London and Westminster;
to-day I propose to touch on the books printed abroad for the English
market and the stationers who sold them. In the early days the
different businesses of a publisher, a bookseller, and a bookbinder
were often carried on by one man, who was called a stationer. He bought
books wholesale, sometimes having whole editions specially printed for
him, he bound them, and then sold them like an ordinary bookseller. He
also probably in England, as was certainly done on the Continent, sent
round vans full of books to the various provincial towns, timing his
arrival as far as possible to coincide with the local fairs.
A considerable number of the books printed abroad for sale in England
have no connexion with any particular stationer, but were probably
brought over by an agent of the printer and sold in lots to different
stationers.
The earliest book printed abroad definitely for sale in England is the
edition of the Sarum _Breviary_ printed at Cologne about 1475. Of this
book nothing is left but a few leaves, and the imprint, if it possessed
one, is not known. Only one other book is known printed in the same
type, an edition of the _Homilies_, but it, unfortunately, has no
imprint, so that we have no clue as to who may have been the printer.
I cannot help thinking that perhaps Caxton may have had something
to do with having this book printed, commissioning it either on his
own account or for some friend in England, for it is unlikely that a
printer in so distant a town would have issued such a book on his own
account, and the probable date of its printing coincides more or less
with Caxton’s departure for England.
In 1483 a book was printed at Venice for sale in England, curiously
enough another edition of the Sarum _Breviary_. The copy in the
Bibliothèque Nationale, the only one known, is a very beautiful book,
printed on vellum and quite perfect. There is a rather painful history
attached to it. In 1715 this unique book came to the University
Library, Cambridge, as part of the library of Bishop Moore which was
presented to the University by George I. In the latter half of the
eighteenth century it appears to have been purloined along with a
great many other rarities by a certain Dr Combe. It then found its way
into the collection of Count Justin MacCarthy, who formed the largest
library of books printed on vellum ever brought together by a private
collector (he had over 600 of such books), and at his sale in 1815 it
was purchased for the Paris Library for fifty-one francs. The printer
of the book, Reginaldus de Novimagio, does not appear to have had
any connexion with England, nor does the imprint mention for whom the
book was produced. It is curious that he should have been chosen as
the printer of this _Breviary_, for it seems to have been the only
liturgical work he issued, and nothing among his other productions has
any connexion with England. Of course English people passed through
Venice in large quantities as it was the starting-point for pilgrims
to the Holy Land, and many ecclesiastics of high position went on this
journey, so that perhaps one of these travellers, seeing the beautiful
work done at Venice, and knowing that no printer at home was equal to
the task of producing such a book in a fitting manner, commissioned
the printing of the _Breviary_. It is sad to think that so beautiful a
book has been lost to England through the dishonesty of a reader in the
Library. We can only regret that the negotiations between the Duke of
Devonshire and the representatives of Count MacCarthy for the purchase
of the library _en bloc_ fell through, and that the Duke and Lord
Spencer, who both bought considerably at the sale, did not secure it,
for then at any rate it might have been in England, though not in its
proper place.
[Illustration]