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_.