CHAPTER IV.

THE BOOK-TRADE IN THE MANUSCRIPT PERIOD.

=Italy.=--It seems probable that the book-trade which had been

introduced into Gaul from Rome still existed during the sixth century.

F. J. Mone finds references to such trade in the chronicles of Cæsarius

of Arles.[308] In the code of laws of the Visigoths, it is provided

that copies of the volume containing the laws shall be sold at not more

than six sols.[309]

Wattenbach is of opinion that not only in Rome but in other Italian

centres some fragments of the classic book-trade survived the fall of

the Empire and the later invasions and changes of rulers, and he finds

references to book-dealers in Italy as late as the sixth century.[310]

He takes the ground that, notwithstanding the destruction of buildings,

library collections, and in fact of whole cities, during the various

contests, first with the Barbarian invaders and later between these

invaders themselves, there still remained scholarly people who

retained their interest in Latin literature; and he points out that,

notwithstanding the many changes in the rulers of Italy between the

year 476 and the beginning of the eleventh century, Latin never ceased

to remain the official language and, as he maintains, the language of

literature.

In the _Tetralogus_ of Wipo are the following lines which have a

bearing upon this belief in the continuation of some literary interests

in Italy:

_Hoc servant Itali post prima crepundia cuncti,

Et sudare scholis mandatur tota juventus.

Solis Teutonicis vacuum vel turpe videtur,

Ut doceant aliquem, nisi clericus accipiatur._[311]

(From their cradle up all Italians pay heed to learning, and their

children are kept at work in the schools. It is only among the Germans

that it is held to be futile and wrong to give instruction to one who

is not to become a cleric.)

Giesebrecht, in his treatise _De Litterarum Studiis apud Italos_,

confirms this view. He refers to a manuscript of Orosius which was

written in the seventh century and which contains an inscription

stating that this copy of the manuscript was prepared by the scribe in

the _Statione Magistri Viliaric Antiquarii_.

This is one of the earlier examples of the use of the term _statio_,

from which is derived the term _stationarii_, indicating scribes whose

work was done in a specific workshop or headquarters, as contrasted

with writers who were called upon to do work at the homes of their

clients. As is specified in the chapter on the universities, this term

came to be used to designate booksellers (that is to say, producers

of books) who had fixed work-shops. In the Acts of the Council of

Constantinople, the scribe who wrote out the record of the fifth

Synod is described as _Theodorus librarius qui habuit stationem ad S.

Johannem Phocam_.[312]

In such work-shops, while the chief undertaking was the production of

books, the scribes were ready to prepare announcements and to write

letters, as is even to-day the practice of similar scribes in not a few

Italian cities and villages.

From the beginning of the seventh century, Rome was for a considerable

period practically the only book market in the world, that is to say,

the only place in which books could be obtained on order and in which

the machinery for their production continued to exist. In 658, S.

Gertrude ordered for the newly founded monastery at Nivelle certain

sacred volumes to be prepared in the city of Rome.[313] Beda reports

that the Abbot Benedict of Wearmouth, in 671, secured from Rome a

number of learned and sacred works, _non paucos vel placito pretio

emtos vel amicorum dono largitos retulit_. (He brought back a number

of books, some of which he had purchased at the prices demanded, while

others he had received as gifts from his friends.) Later, the Abbot

repeated his journeys, and in 678, and again in 685, brought back fresh

collections. The collections secured on his last journey included even

certain examples of the profane writers.[314]

A similar instance is noted in the chronicles of the monastery of St.

Wandrille. The Abbot Wandregisil sent his nephew Godo to Rome in 657,

and Godo brought back with him as a present from the Pope Vitalian,

not only valuable relics, but many volumes of the sacred Scriptures

containing both the New and the Old Testament.[315] During the time

of the Abbot Austrulf (747-753) a chest was thrown up by the sea on

the shore. It contained relics and also a _codicem pulcherrimum_, or

beautiful manuscript, containing the four gospels, _Romana Littera

Optime Scriptum_.

This term _Romana Littera_ has been previously referred to as

indicating a special script which had been adopted in Rome by the

earlier instructors for sacred writings.

Alcuin relates of the Archbishop Ælbert of York (766-780):

_Non semel externas peregrino tramite terras,

Jam peragravit ovans, Sophiæ deductus amore,

Si quid forte novi librorum seu studiorum,_

_Quod secum ferret, terris reperiret in illis.

Hic quoque Romuleam venit devotus ad urbem._[316]

(More than once he has travelled joyfully through remote regions and

by strange roads, led on by his zeal for knowledge, and seeking to

discover in foreign lands novelties in books or in studies which he

could take back with him. And this zealous student journeyed to the

city of Romulus.)

During the Italian expeditions of the German Emperors, books were from

time to time brought back to Germany. Certain volumes referred to by

Pez as having been in the Library at Passau, in 1395, contain the

inscription _isti sunt libri quos Roma detulimus_.

Wattenbach finds record of an organised manuscript business in Verona

as early as 1338,[317] and of a more important trade in manuscripts

being carried on in Milan at the same time. In the fourteenth century,

Richard de Bury speaks of buying books for his library from Rome. The

references to this early manuscript business in Italy are, however, so

fragmentary that it is difficult to determine how far the works secured

were the remnants of old libraries or collections, or how far they were

the productions of scribe work-shops engaged in manifolding copies for

sale.

It seems evident, however, that while a scattered trade in manuscripts

was carried on both by the scribes in the towns and between the

monastery _scriptoria_, the facilities for the production and

manifolding of manuscript copies were hardly adequate to meet the

demand or requirements of readers and students. As early as 250,

Origen, writing in Cappadocia, was complaining that he found difficulty

in getting his teachings distributed. A zealous disciple, named

Ambrosius, secured for the purpose a group of scribes whose transcripts

were afterwards submitted to Origen for revision before being sent

out through the churches. It is further related that Origen became so

absorbed in the work of correcting these manuscripts that he could

not be called from his desk either for exercise or for meals.[318] S.

Jerome, a century later, when he was sojourning in Bethlehem, found

similar difficulty. He had among his monks some zealous scribes, but he

complained that their work was untrustworthy.[319]

Abbot Lupus of Ferrières was obliged (in the ninth century) to apply to

monks in York in order to secure the transcribing work that he required.

In connection with this difficulty in securing books, it became

customary, when copies were loaned from libraries, to secure from

the borrower a pledge or security of equal or greater value. The

correspondence of the time gives frequent instances of the difficulty

in getting back books that had been loaned, notwithstanding the risk

of the forfeiture of the pledges. In 1020, Notker writes from St. Gall

to the Bishop of Sitten that certain books belonging to the Bishop,

for which the Bishop was making demand, had been borrowed by the

Abbot Aregia, and that, notwithstanding many applications, he had not

succeeded in getting even a promise of their return.[320] In Vercelli,

a beautiful mass book which had been loaned by the Abbot Erkenbald of

Fulda (997-1011) to the Bishop Henry of Wurzburg, was to have been

retained for the term of the Bishop’s life. After the death of the

Bishop, reclamation was made from Fulda for the return of the volume,

but without success. During the years 1461-1463, the Legate Marinus de

Fregeno travelled through Sweden and Norway and collected there certain

manuscripts which he claimed were those that had been taken away from

Rome at the time of its plunder by the Goths. He evidently took the

ground that where books were concerned, a term of one thousand years

was not sufficient to constitute a “statute of limitations.”

Louis IX. of France is quoted as having taken the ground that books

should be transcribed rather than borrowed, because in that way the

number would be increased and the community would be benefited. In

many cases, however, there could, of course, be no choice. The King,

for instance, desired to possess the great encyclopedia of Vincenzo

of Beauvais. He sent gold to Vincenzo, in consideration of which a

transcript of the encyclopedia was prepared. The exact cost is not

stated.[321]

In 1375, a sum equivalent to 825 francs of to-day was paid for

transcribing the commentary of Heinrich Bohic on the Decretals of 1375.

In the cost of such work was usually included a price for the loan or

use of the manuscript. A fee or rental was, in fact, always charged

by the manuscript-dealers. Up to the close of the fourteenth century,

the larger proportion of transcripts were prepared for individual

buyers and under special orders, one of the evidences of this being

the fact that upon the titles of the manuscripts were designed or

illuminated the arms or crests of the purchasers. After the beginning

of the fifteenth century, there is to be found a large number of

manuscripts in which a place has been left blank on the title-pages for

the subsequent insertion of the crest or coat-of-arms, indicating that

in these instances the manuscript had been prepared for general use

instead of under special order.[322]

As already mentioned, Charlemagne interested himself, not only in

the training of scribes, but in the collection of books, but he does

not appear to have considered it important that the works secured by

him should be retained for the use of his descendants, as he gave

instructions in his will that after his death the books should be sold.

One of the oldest illuminated Irish manuscripts is that of S. Ceaddæ.

This was purchased, at what date is not specified, by some holy man

in exchange for his best steed, and was then presented by him to the

church at Llandaff. The manuscript finally made its way to Madrid

and thence to Stockholm; according to the record, it had, before

the purchase above mentioned, been saved out of the hands of Norman

pirates.[323] It is certain that very many of the monasteries which

were within reach of the incursions of the Normans were bereft by them

of such books as had been collected, although it is not probable that,

as a rule, the pirates had any personal interest in, or commercial

appreciation for, the manuscripts that fell into their hands.

Gerbert, whose literary interests have been previously referred to, and

who is described as the most zealous book collector of his time, tells

us that he made purchases for his library in Italy, in South Germany,

and in the Low Countries, but he does not mention whether he was

purchasing from dealers or individuals. He was a native of Auvergne,

and in 999 became Pope (under the name of Gregory V.). Abbot Albert of

Gembloux, who died in 1048, states that he brought together, at great

cost, as many as one hundred and fifty manuscripts.[324]

A certain Deopert records that he purchased for the monastery of St.

Emmeran, from Vichelm, the chaplain of Count Regimpert, for a large sum

of money (the price is not specified), the writings of Alcuin.[325]

Notwithstanding the very strict regulations to the contrary, it not

unfrequently happened that monasteries and churches, when in special

stress for money, pledged or sold their books to Jews. As the greater

proportion at least of the sacred writings of the monasteries would

have had no personal interest for their Hebrew purchasers, it is

fair to assume that these were taken for re-sale, and that, in fact,

there came to be a certain trade in books on the part of financiers

acting in the capacity of pawn-brokers. In 1320, the monastery of S.

Ulrich was in need of funds, and the Abbot Marquard, of Hagel, pawned

to the mendicant monks a great collection of valuable books, among

which were certain volumes that had been prepared as early as 1175

under the directions of the Abbot Heinrich. The successor of Marquard,

Conrad Winkler, in 1344, succeeded in getting back a portion of the

books, by the payment of 27 pounds heller, and 15 pfennigs.[326]

Instances like these give evidence that a certain trade in manuscript

books, in Northern Europe at least, preceded by a number of years the

organisation of any systematised book-trade.

Kirchhoff speaks of usurers, dealers in old clothes, and pedlars,

carrying on the trade in the buying and selling of books during the

first half of the fifteenth century. In Milan, a dealer in perfumery,

Paolino Suordo, included in his stock (in 1470) manuscripts for sale,

and later announced himself as a dealer in printed books. Both in

England and France at this time manuscripts were dealt in by grocers

and by the mercers. The monastery of Neuzelle, in 1409, pawned several

hundred manuscripts for 130 gulden, and the monastery at Dobrilugk, in

1420, sold to the Prebendary of Brandenburg 1441 volumes.

In 1455, the Faculty of Arts of the University of Heidelberg bought

valuable books from the estate of the Prior of Worms. In 1402, the

cathedral at Breslau rented a number of books from Burgermeister Johann

Kyner, for which the Chapter was to pay during the lifetime of said

Kyner a yearly rental of eight marks, ten groschens.[327]

The Bishop of Speier rented to the precentor of the cathedral in 1447

some separately written divisions of the Bible, which were to be held

by the precentor during his lifetime only, and were then to be returned

to the Bishop’s heirs. The rental is not mentioned. The Chapter of the

Cathedral of Basel arranged to take over certain books from the owner

or donor, whose name is not given, and to pay as consideration for the

use of the same, each year on the anniversary of the gift, 16 sols.[328]

Richard de Bury makes a reference to the book-trade of Europe, as it

existed in the fourteenth century, as follows:

_Stationariorum ac librariorum notitiam non solum intra natalis soli

provinciam, sed per regnum Franciæ, Teutoniæ et Italiæ comparavimus

dispersorum faciliter pecunia prævolante, nec eos ullatenus impedivit

distantia neque furor maris absterruit, nec eis æs pro expensa defecit,

quin ad nos optatos libros transmitterent vel afferrent._[329]

(By means of advance payments, we have easily come into relations with

the _stationarii_ and _librarii_ who are scattered through our native

province, and also with those who are to be found in the kingdoms

of France, Germany, and Italy; and neither the great distances, nor

the fury of the sea, nor lack of money for their expenses has been

permitted to prevent them from bringing or sending to us the books that

we desired.)

In the same work, De Bury uses the term _bibliator_, which he

afterwards explained as being identical with _bibliopole_,--a seller of

books.

The record of the production of books that was carried on in the

earlier universities, such as Bologna and Padua, is presented in the

chapter on the universities.

In connection with the very special requirements of the earlier Italian

universities, and with the close control exercised by them over the

scribes, it is evident that a book-trade in the larger sense of

the term could not easily come into existence. The first records of

producers and dealers of books of a general character were to be found,

not in the university towns, but in Milan, Florence, and particularly

in Venice. In 1444, a copy of Macrobius was stolen from the scholar

Filelfi, or Philelphus, which copy he recovered, as he tells us, in the

shop of a public scribe in Vincenza.

Blume mentions that in Venice the _Camaldulensers_ of S. Michael in

Murano carried on during the earlier part of the fifteenth century an

important trade in manuscripts, including with the older texts verified

copies which had been prepared under their own direction.[330] The

headquarters, not only for Italy but for Europe, of the trade of Greek

manuscripts, was for a number of years in Venice, the close relations

of Venice with Constantinople and with the East having given it an

early interest in this particular class of Eastern productions.

Joh. Arretinus was busied in Florence between the years 1375 and 1417

in the sale of manuscripts, but he appears to have secured these mainly

not by production in Florence, but by sending scribes to the libraries

in the monasteries and elsewhere to produce the copies required.

A reference in a letter of Leonardo Bruni, written in 1416, gives

indication of an organised book-trade in Florence at that time:

_Priscianum quem postulas omnes tabernas librarias perscrutatus

reperire nondum potui._[331] (I have hunted through all the book-shops,

but have not been able to find the Priscian for which you asked.)

Bruni writes again concerning a certain Italian translation of the

Bible that he had been trying to get hold of:

_Jam Bibliothecas omnes et bibliopolas requisivi ut si qua veniant ad

manus eligam quæque optima mihi significent._ (I have already searched

all the libraries and book-shops in order to select from the material

at hand the manuscripts which are for me the most important.)

Ambrogio Traversari wrote in 1418 in Florence:

_Oro ut convenias bibliopolas civitatis et inquiri facias diligenter,

an inveniamus decretales in parvo volumine._[332] (I beg you to make

search among the booksellers of the city and ascertain whether it is

possible to secure in a small volume a copy of the Decretals.)

The use for book-dealers of the old classic term _bibliopola_ in place

of the more usual _stationarius_ is to be noted.

From these references, we have a right to conclude that there were

during the first quarter of the fifteenth century in Florence a number

of dealers in books who handled various classes of literature.

The great publisher of the fifteenth century, Philippi Vespasianus,

or Vespasiano, who was not only a producer and dealer in manuscripts,

but a man possessed of a wide range of scholarship, called himself

_librarius florentinus_. He held the post for a time of _bidellus_ of

the University of Florence. His work will be referred to more fully in

a later division of this chapter.

Kirchhoff points out that the dealers of this time, among others

Vespasiano himself, were sometimes termed _chartularii_, a term

indicating that dealers in books were interested also in the sale

of paper and probably of other writing materials. The Italian word

_cartolajo_ specifies a paper-dealer or perhaps more nearly a stationer

in the modern signification of the term.

The influx of Greek scholars into Italy began some years before the

fall of Constantinople. Some of these scholars came from towns in Asia

Minor, which had fallen under the rule of the Turks before the capture

of Constantinople. When the Turkish armies crossed the Bosphorus, a

number of the Greeks seem to have lost hope at a comparatively early

date of being able to defend the Byzantine territory, and had betaken

themselves with such property as they could save to various places of

refuge in the south of Europe, and particularly in Italy. As described

in other chapters, many of these exiles brought with them Greek

manuscripts, and in some cases these codices were not only important

as being the first copies of the texts brought to the knowledge of

European scholars, but were of distinctive interest and value as being

the oldest examples of such texts in existence.

The larger number of the exiles who selected Italy as their place of

refuge found homes and in many cases scholarly occupation, not in the

university towns so much as in the great commercial centres, such as

Venice and Florence. Many of these Greeks were accepted as instructors

in the families of nobles or of wealthy merchants, while others made

use of their manuscripts either through direct sale, through making

transcripts for sale, or through the loan of the originals to the

manuscript-dealers.

A little later these manuscripts served as material and as “copy” for

the editions of the Greek classics issued by Aldus and his associates,

the first thoroughly edited and carefully printed Greek books that

the world had known. It was partly as a cause and partly as an effect

of the presence of so many scholarly Greeks, that the study of Greek

language, literature, and philosophy became fashionable among the

so-called higher circles of Italian society during the last half of the

fifteenth century.

The interest in Greek literature had, however, as pointed out, begun

nearly twenty-five years earlier. As there came to be some knowledge

of the extent of the literary treasures of classic Greece which

had been preserved in the Byzantine cities, not a few of the more

enterprising dealers in manuscripts, and many also of the wealthier and

more enterprising of the scholarly noblemen and merchants, themselves

sent emissaries to search the monasteries and cities of the East for

further manuscripts which could be purchased.

One reason, apparently, for the preference given by the Greeks to

Venice and Florence over Bologna and Padua was the fact that the two

great universities were devoted, as we have seen, more particularly

to the subjects of law, theology, and medicine, subjects in which the

learning of the Greeks could be of little direct service.[333] The

philosophy and the poetry which formed the texts of the lectures given

by the Greek scholars attracted many zealous and earnest students,

but these students came, as stated, largely outside of the university

circles. The doctors of law and the doctors of theology were among the

last of the Italian scholars to be interested in Homeric poetry or in

the theories of the Greek metaphysicians.

Towards the middle of the fifteenth century and a few years before the

introduction of printing, a new term came to be used for dealers in

manuscripts. The scribes had in many cases naturally associated their

business interests with those of the makers of paper,--_cartolaji_, and

the latter name came to be applied not only to the paper manufacturers,

but to the purchasers of the paper upon which books were inscribed. In

some cases the paper-makers, or _cartolaji_, appear themselves to have

organised staffs of scribes through whose labour their own raw material

could be utilised, while the name of paper-maker,--_cartolajo_, came to

be used to describe the entire concern.

After the introduction into Italy of printing, the association of the

paper-makers with books became still more important, and not a few of

the original printer-publishers were formerly paper manufacturers,

and continued this branch of trade while adding to it the work of

manufacturing books. Among such paper-making publishers is to be noted

Francesco Cartolajo, who was in business in Florence in 1507, and whose

surname was, of course, derived from the trade in which his family had

for some generations been engaged. Bonaccorsi turned his paper-making

establishment in Florence into a printing-office and book manufactory

as early as 1472, and Montali, in Parma, took the same course in 1482;

Di Sasso who, in 1481, came into association with the Brothers Brushi,

united his printing-office with their paper factory.

Fillippo Giunta, one of the earlier publishers in Florence, calls

himself _librarius et cartolajus_. It is possible that he reversed the

business routine above referred to, and united a paper factory with his

printing-office.

One result of the influx of Greek scholars, many of whom were

themselves skilled scribes while others brought with them scribes,

was the multiplying of the number of writers available for work and a

corresponding reduction in the cost of such work.

The effect of this change in the business conditions was to lessen

the practice of hiring manuscripts for a term of days or weeks, or of

dividing manuscripts into _pecias_, and to increase the actual sale of

works in manuscripts.

The university regulations, however, controlling the loaning of

manuscripts and of the _pecias_ appear to have been continued and

renewed through the latter half of the fifteenth century, that is to

say, not only after the trade in manuscripts, at popular prices, had

largely developed in cities like Florence, Venice, and Milan, but

even after the introduction of printing. It would almost seem as if

in regard to books in manuscript, the system which had been put into

shape by the university authorities had had the effect of delaying for

a quarter of a century or so the introduction into Bologna and Padua

of the methods of book production and book distribution which were

already in vogue in other cities of Italy. I do not overlook the fact

that there was in Florence also a university, but it is evident that

the book-trade in that city had never been under the control of the

university authorities, and that the methods of the dealers took shape

rather from the general, common-sense commercial routine of the great

centre of Italian trade than from the narrow scholastic theories of the

professors of law or of theology.

During the twenty-five years before the art of printing, introduced

into Italy in 1464, had become generally diffused, the years in which

the trade in manuscripts was at its highest development, Florence

succeeded Venice as the centre of this trade, both for Italy and for

Europe.

The activity of the intellectual life of the city, and the fact that

its citizens were cultivated and that its scholars were so largely

themselves men of wealth, the convenient location of the city for trade

communications with the other cities of Italy and with the great marts

in the East, in the West, and in the North, and the accumulation in

such libraries as those of the Medici of collections, nowhere else

to be rivalled, of manuscripts, both ancient and modern, united in

securing for Florence the pre-eminence for literary production and for

literary interests.

Scholars, not only from the other Italian cities, but from France,

Germany, and Hungary, came to Florence to consult manuscripts which in

many cases could be found only in Florence, or to purchase transcripts

of these manuscripts, which could be produced with greater correctness,

greater beauty, and smaller expense by the _librarii_ of Florence than

by producers of books in any other city. After the Greek refugees began

their lecture courses, there was an additional attraction for scholars

from the outer world to visit the Tuscan capital.

The wealthy scholars and merchant princes of Florence, whose

collections of manuscripts were given to the city during their

lifetime, or who left such collections after their death to the

Florentine libraries, made it, as a rule, a condition of such gifts and

such bequests that the books should be placed freely at the disposal

of visitors desiring to make transcripts of the same. Such a condition

appears in the will of Bonaccorsi,[334] while a similar condition was

quoted by Poggio[335] in his funeral oration upon Niccolo d’ Niccoli,

as having been the intention of Niccolo for the books bequeathed by him

to his Florentine fellow-citizens.

Foreign collectors who did not find it convenient themselves to

visit Florence, such as the Duke of Burgundy, and Matthias Corvinus

of Hungary, kept employed in the city for a number of years scribes

engaged in the work of preparing copies of these Florentine literary

treasures for the libraries of Nancy and of Buda-Pesth.

Matthias was, it seems, not content with ordering the transcripts of

the works desired by him, but employed a scholarly editor, resident in

Florence, to supervise the work and to collate the transcripts with the

originals, and who certified to the correctness of the copies forwarded

to Buda.[336] At the death of Matthias, there appear to have been left

in Florence a number of codices ordered by him which had not yet been

paid for, and these were taken over by the Medici.[337]

In a parchment manuscript of the Philippian orations is inscribed a

note by a previous owner, a certain Dominicus Venetus, to the effect

that he had bought the same in Rome from a Florentine bookseller for

five ducats in gold in 1460.[338] Dominicus goes on to say that he had

used this manuscript in connection with the lectures of the learned

Brother Patrus Thomasius.

During the thirteenth century, there was a considerable development

in the art of preparing and of illuminating and illustrating

manuscripts. One author is quoted by Tiraboschi as saying that the

work on a manuscript now required the services not of a scribe, but

of an artist. For the transcribing of a missal and illuminating the

same with original designs, a monk in Bologna is quoted as having

received in 1260 two hundred florins gold, the equivalent of about one

hundred dollars. For copying the text of the Bible, without designs,

another scribe received in the same year eighty lire, about sixteen

dollars.[339]

The work of the manuscript-dealers in Florence was carried on not only

for the citizens and sojourners in the city itself, but for the benefit

of other Italian cities in which there was no adequate machinery for

the manifolding of manuscripts. Bartholomæus Facius, writing from

Naples in 1448, speaks of the serious inadequacy of the scribes in that

city. There were but few men engaged in the business, and these were

poorly educated and badly equipped.[340] Facius was, therefore, asking

a correspondent in Florence to have certain work done for him which

could not be completed in Naples. Poggio writes from Rome about the

same date to Niccolo in Florence to somewhat similar effect. He speaks

with envy of the larger literary facilities possessed by his Florentine

friends.[341]

Next to Florence, the most important centre for the manuscript trade

of North Italy was Milan. As early as the middle of the fourteenth

century, there is record of no less than forty professional scribes

being at work in the city. Such literary work as was required by Genoa

and other Italian towns within reach of the Lombardy capital came to

Milan. At the beginning of the thirteenth century, when the population

of the city was about 200,000, there had been in the city but two

registered copyists. More important, however, than that of either

Florence or Milan, was the manuscript trade of Venice, the position of

which city gave it exceptional advantages as well for the collection of

codices from the East as for securing the services of skilled scribes

from Athens or from Constantinople. One of the more noteworthy of the

Venetian importers of manuscripts was Johannes Galeotti, a Genoese by

birth, who made various journeys to Constantinople, and whose special

trade is referred to in an inscription on a manuscript dating from 1450

and containing the speeches of Demosthenes.[342]

Reference has already been made to Aurispa, who appears to have been

the most important manuscript-dealer of his time, not only in Venice,

but possibly in the world. Aurispa sent various agents to Greece and to

the farther East to collect manuscripts and kept scribes busied in his

work-shop in Venice in preparing authentic copies of these texts. One

of his travellers was Plantinerus, who was sent to the Peloponnesus in

1415, and who succeeded in securing there some valuable codices.[343]

Plantinerus found, in executing his commissions, that he had to come

into competition with a traveller sent out by Cosimo de’ Medici on a

similar errand.

Venice possessed an advantage over the other Italian cities, not only

in the collection of texts, and in its facilities for manifolding

these, but in its position for securing wide sales for the same in

the cities outside of Italy, with which it was, in connection with

its active commerce, in regular relations. The lines of the Oxford

printers, Theo. Rood and Thomas Hunt, printed in their edition of the

_Letters of Phalaris_, give an indication of the relations of the

English university in the early part of the fifteenth century with the

literary marts of Southern Europe.

_Celatos, Veneti, nobis transmittere libros

Cedite, nos aliis vendimus, O Veneti_--[344]

(If you Venetians will send over to us the books which have been hidden

(_i. e._ difficult or rare books, or possibly books unearthed from far

off Eastern regions) we will find sale for the same.)

There is evidence in fact of a very active book-trade between Venice

and England for many years before the introduction into Italy of the

printing-press. The work of Aldus and of those who were associated

with him in carrying on printing and publishing undertakings in Venice

naturally very largely extended these relations with the English

scholars, but the channels for the same had already been opened. The

manuscript-dealers in Venice fixed their place of business in the most

frequented parts of the city--the Bridge of the Rialto, and the Plaza

of S. Mark.

The trade of the Italian dealers in manuscripts was not brought to an

immediate close by the introduction of printing. The older scholars

still preferred the manuscript form for their books, and found it

difficult to divest themselves of the impression that the less costly

printed volumes were suited only for the requirements of the vulgar

herd. There are even, as Kirchhoff points out,[345] instances of

scribes preparing their manuscripts from printed “copy,” and there are

examples of these manuscript copies of printed books being made with

such literalness as to include the imprint of the printer.

The work of Aldus (continued with scholarly enterprise later by such

men as Froben of Basel and Estienne of Paris) in the printing of Greek

texts, although begun as early as 1495, and although exercising a

very wide influence upon the distribution of Greek literature, was

insufficient to supply the eager demand of the scholars, while not

many other printers were, in the early years of the exercise of the

art, prepared to incur the very considerable risk and expense required

for the production of Greek fonts of type. The risk was, of course, by

no means limited to the cost of the type; the printers of the earlier

Greek books had themselves but slight familiarity with the literature

of Greece, and they were obliged in many cases to confide the selection

and the editing of their texts to editors to whom this literature was

very largely still a novelty. The printers hardly knew what books

to select and they had no adequate data upon which to base business

calculations as to the extent of the demand that could be looked for

for any particular book. The feeling that they were working in the dark

was, therefore, a very natural one.

It was on this ground that, while printing-presses were, during the

century after 1450, multiplying rapidly through Europe, the printing

of Greek books continued to be for a large portion of the period an

exceptional class of undertakings, and work was still found for scribes

who could be trusted to make accurate transcripts of Greek codices.

Kirchhoff gives the names of the following Italian manuscript-dealers

and scribes whose scholarly activity during the latter half of the

fifteenth century was especially important: Antonius Dazilas, Cæsar

Strategus, Constantius Librarius, Andreas Vergetius, and Antonius

Eparchus. The latter made various journeys to the East in search of

manuscripts. The fact that the dealers in manuscripts very rarely

placed their own names on the copies of the texts sent out from their

work-shops has, in a large number of cases, prevented these names from

being preserved for future record. The names that have come into record

are in the main such as have been referred to in the correspondence of

their scholarly friends and clients. I quote a few of these references

from the lists given by Kirchhoff:

In Bologna the oldest _librarius_ whose work is referred to is

Viliaric, who was called an _antiquarius_, and whose shop was open in

the beginning of the thirteenth century. In a manuscript, previously

referred to, containing a treatise of Paul Orosius, originally written

in the seventh century, and from which this copy was transcribed early

in the thirteenth, there is at the end an inscription, as follows:

_Confectus codex in statione magistri Viliaric antiquarii,

Ora pro me scriptore, sic dominum habeas protectorem._[346]

(This codex was completed in the stall of Master Viliaric, bookseller;

pray for (the soul of) me, the scribe, and you shall have the Lord for

your protector.)

This codex seems to have been prepared, according to the usual

university practice, for hire, as on the sixteenth page there is noted

the memorandum, “this quaternio has five sheets.”

In 1247, Nicolaus is recorded as being the _stationarius

universitatis_, and in the same year a certain Johannes Cambii is

recorded as a _stationarius librorum_; and Minghinus as a _stationarius

peciarum_. Here we have in one year record of three classes of scribes

being at work. They were all noted as being doctors of the law, and

they all appear on the list of persons exempt from military service.

Later in the same century, a certain Cervotti, who had inherited from

a deceased brother a collection of books, undertook to use these

for profit by offering them for hire. The list of the books, drawn

up by the notary Noscimpax, has been preserved, and includes twenty

different works. Certain of these are collections of the university

lectures in the Faculty of law, and the others have also, in the main,

to do with the subject of jurisprudence. The first book on the list

is _Diversitates Dominorum_, and the last _Margarita Gallacerti_,

which latter does not appear properly to belong to the subject of

jurisprudence.

In the year 1400, there is reference to a scribe named Moses and

specified as a Jew, which, in view of the university regulations

previously referred to prohibiting the sale of books by Jews or to

Jews, is noteworthy.

The entry appears at the close of a manuscript of Bartholomæus

Brixiensis:

_Emi hunc librum anno domini MCCCC die XXI. Mensis novembris a Moysi

Judeo pro viii. florenes._

Kirchhoff is of opinion that Moses must have been a travelling pedlar,

as it is difficult to believe that a Jew could have at that time

secured the post of a licensed university scribe.[347]

In Verona, there is reference to a certain Bonaventura, who is recorded

as a _scriptor_, and who seems to have occasionally utilised for his

manuscript work the hand of a woman. An inscription on one of the

manuscripts by Bonaventura, quoted by Endlicher, reads as follows:

_Dextra scriptoris careat gravitate doloris.

Detur pro penna scriptori pulchra puella._[348]

In Florence, the earliest _librarius_ of note was probably Johannes

Aretinus, whose work continued during the years between 1375-1417.

Ambrosius Camaldulensis, who had so much to do with books and with

literature, takes pains, in a letter written in 1391, to send a cordial

greeting to the _librarius_ Aretinus.[349] Bandini prints a letter

of Petrarch’s in which the latter refers to Aretinus as a friend for

whom he has a high regard and as a man of exceptional knowledge and

clearness of insight, and specifies, as works that he valued highly,

nine manuscripts which had been written by the hand of Aretinus.

These included Aristotle’s treatise on Ethics, several Essays of

Cicero, the Histories of Livy, Cicero’s Orations, Barbari on Marriage,

etc.

Kirchhoff gives a list of fourteen other Florentine _librarii_, whose

work extended over the years between 1410 and 1480. The latter date is

sixteen years later than the introduction of the printing-press into

Italy.

The most noteworthy by far of these manuscript-dealers of Florence

was Philippi Vespasiano, who has been previously referred to, and

who is to be ranked not only as the most important publisher of the

manuscript period, but as one of the great scholars of his time, and

as a man whose friendship was cherished by not a few of the leaders of

thought during the earlier period of the Renaissance. In one of the

Florentine collections has been preserved a number of letters written

to Vespasiano by his scholarly friends between the years 1446 and

1463, and these letters show how honoured a position he held in the

generation of his time. He was, in fact, in character and in ambition,

as well as in the nature of his work, a worthy predecessor of Aldus,

and he lived long enough himself to have seen some of the productions

of the Aldine Press.

In his earlier years, Vespasiano was for a time secretary to Cardinal

Branda in Rome, and it is during this time that he devoted himself

earnestly to classic studies. It was while he was in Rome that he

began work upon a literary undertaking of his own, which comprised a

series of Memoirs of the noteworthy men of his time with whom he had

come into relations. The Medici, Duke Borso of Ferrara, and other of

the scholarly nobles made large use of Vespasiano’s collections of

manuscripts and facilities for producing authentic transcripts.

He was one of the Italian dealers whose agents were actively at work

in Greece and in Asia Minor in the collecting of manuscripts, and the

clients to whom he supplied such manuscripts included correspondents

in Paris, Basel, Vienna, and Oxford.

In the Bodleian Library in Oxford is a codex containing certain works

of Cyprian, on the first sheet of which is inscribed:

_Vespasianus librarius Florentinus hunc librum Florentiæ transcribendum

curavit._ (Vespasian, a Florentine _librarius_, had this book

transcribed at Florence.)

Another manuscript in the same collection, containing a commentary on

some comedies of Terence, is inscribed as follows:

_Vespasianus librarius Florentinus fecit scribi Florentiæ._ (Vespasian,

a Florentine _librarius_, had this book written in Florence.)

Both codices are beautiful examples of the best manuscript work of the

period.[350]

There are various references of the time showing that manuscripts

which bore the stamp of Vespasiano were not only beautiful in their

form, but possessed probably a higher authority than the work of any

other manuscript-dealer of the age for completeness and for accuracy.

He took contracts for the production of great libraries, and it is

recorded that, in preparing for Cosimo de’ Medici a collection of two

hundred works, he employed forty-five scribes for a term of twenty-two

months.[351] Vespasiano died in 1496, one year later than the

establishment in Venice of the Aldine Press.

Agnolo da Sandro is described as a _bidellus_, a manuscript-dealer,

in Florence as late as 1498, at which time the trade in manuscripts

must already have begun very seriously to diminish. Niccolo di Giunta,

who was active in the manuscript trade in Florence towards the end of

the fifteenth century, is famous as having been the founder of the

family of Giunta or Junta, which later took such an important part in

printing and publishing undertakings in Italy.

In Perugia, the first record of a manuscript-publisher bears date as

late as 1430. The name is Bontempo, and his inscription appears on a

parchment copy of an _Infortiatum_.

While there are various references to manuscript-dealers in Milan of an

early date, the first inscription bears date as late as 1452. The name

is Melchoir, who is described as a “dealer of note.” Filelfo speaks of

Melchoir as having copies of Cicero’s _Letters_ for sale at ten ducats

each.[352]

Paolo Soardo, who was in business between 1470 and 1480, is described

as an apothecary and also as a dealer in _delicatessen_, but he seems

to have added to his employment that of a manifolder and seller of

manuscripts.

Jacobus Antiquarius speaks of having purchased from Paolo in 1480 a

Roman history for the sum of one _aureus_. In Padua, Jacob, a Jew,

succeeded, notwithstanding the university regulations against dealing

in manuscripts by Jews, in carrying on between 1455 and 1460 a business

in the sale of manuscripts. His inscription appears on a number of

classical codices of the time, and in a manuscript of Horace, dating

from the twelfth century, the owner makes reference that he purchased

the same in 1458 from Jacob, the Hebrew _librarius_.[353]

The records of Ferrara give the names of Carnerio, _bibliopola_, and of

several others as doing business in manuscripts between 1440 and 1490.

In Rome the records of 1454 speak of Giovanni and Francisco as

_cartolaji_ and _librarii_, that is to say, dealers in paper and also

in manuscripts. In that year these dealers had for sale among their

things, _Letters of Cicero_ (without which work no well regulated

manuscript-dealer’s collection appears to have been complete) and the

works of Celsus. A copy of the latter was bought for Vespasiano for

the sum of twenty ducats. There is record during the same year of a

certain Spannocchia who also had Cicero’s _Letters_ for sale.

In Genoa there were at this time one or two manuscript-dealers, but, as

before stated, the readers and scholars of Genoa appear for the most

part to have supplied themselves from Florence.

The most important trade in manuscripts during the fourteenth and

fifteenth centuries, as was the case during the fifteenth century with

the trade in printed books, was carried on in Venice and Florence. As

early as 1390 the inscription of Gabriel Ravenna, _librarius_, appears

in a copy of Seneca’s _Tragedies_.[354] Kirchhoff is of opinion that

Gabriel conducted, during the last fifteen years of the fourteenth

century, an important work-shop for the production of manuscripts.

A year or two later, occurs the name of Michael, a German _librarius_,

but it is possible that Michael’s work was more nearly that of a

secretary than of a manuscript-dealer. As Kirchhoff points out,

it is not always easy at this stage of the trade in manuscripts,

to distinguish between the inscriptions of the manuscript-dealers

certifying to the correctness of the copy sent out from their shops,

and the inscriptions of the scribes or secretaries who, having

completed for this or that employer specific copies of the works

required, added their names as a record on the final sheet.

Reference has already been made to Johannes Aurispa, by far the most

important of the manuscript-dealers of his time and possibly of the

entire Middle Ages. Aurispa was born in 1369 in Sicily. The earlier

years of his life were passed in Constantinople, where he appears to

have held a position of some importance in connection with the Court.

While in Constantinople, he began to make collections of manuscripts,

and he organised there a staff of skilled scribes. In 1423, at the

invitation of his friends, Ambrosius Camaldulensis and Niccolo

de’ Niccoli, he came to Florence, bringing with him an invaluable

collection of 238 manuscripts.

To this store he afterwards added, while in Florence, a further lot of

codices which he had had sent from Constantinople to Messina. At this

time, his interest in the collection of manuscripts appears to have

been a matter of scholarship merely and of sympathy with the efforts

of certain Florentine scholars whom he came to know, to secure the

material for their classical studies.

Later, however, in connection, doubtless, with the many applications

that came to him for transcripts of his codices, he decided to organise

a business as a bookseller and publisher. Before taking this course, he

had, it appears, sought a position as instructor, first in Florence and

afterwards in Bologna and in Ferrara, but had not succeeded in finding

the kind of a post that suited him.

Part of the evidence of his change of mind comes to us through letters

from Filelfo, whose keen scholarly interest brought him into close

relations with men having to do with literary production. Filelfo

writes to Aurispa, in 1440:

_Totus es in librorum mercatura, sed in lectura mallem. Quid enim

prodest libros quotidie, nunc emere, nunc vendere, legere vere

nunquam!_ (You are completely absorbed in the occupation of trading

books, but I should choose that of reading them. For what does it

profit you to buy and sell books every day if you never have time for

their perusal.)

And again in 1441:

_Sed ex tua ista taberna libraria nullus unquam prodit codex, nisi cum

quæstu._[355] (No book ever leaves your book-shop, except at a profit

to you.)

The publishing undertakings of Aurispa were devoted almost entirely to

works of classical literature. Among the authors whose names appear

either in the lists of books offered by him or in the correspondence of

his friends and clients, are as follows:

Philo Judæus, Strabo, Theophrastus, Demosthenes, Xenophon, Proculus,

Homer, Aristarchus, Athenæus, Sophocles, Æschylus, Pindar, Oppian,

Proclus, Eusebius, Gregory, Aristotle, Plutarch, Plotinus, Lucian, Dio

Cassio, Diodorus, and other Greek authors. The Latin writers included

Cicero (of necessity), Virgil, Pliny, Quintilian, Macrobius, Apicius,

and Antonius.

Aurispa seems to have enjoyed the confidence and friendship of all

the noted Italian scholars of his time, and the letters of his

correspondents speak with very cordial appreciation as well of the

importance of his services to literature, as of the extent of the

accuracy of his own scholarship. The only correspondent with whom

he appears to have had any trouble was Filelfi, but if Filelfi had

not managed to have friction with Aurispa, the bookseller would have

been an exception among the contemporaries of this irritable and

self-sufficient scholar.

In 1450, being then well advanced in years, Aurispa gave up his

business undertakings, took priestly orders, and lived thereafter as a

_scriba apostolicus_, dividing his time between Ferrara and Rome. He

declined tempting offers, made through his friend Panormita, to join

the literary circle of King Alphonso which had been brought together

about the Court in Naples.

After Aurispa’s death, Filelfo gave to his son-in-law, Sabbatinus, a

very cordial word of appreciation of the services and of the character

of the publisher. A portion of the manuscripts belonging to Aurispa’s

collection was purchased in 1461 by Duke Borso of Ferrara for two

hundred ducats.

A large collection of manuscripts was, however, in Aurispa’s

possession at the time of his death, and these were taken charge of by

Bartholomæus Facius, and, after various vicissitudes, many of them have

since found place in existing collections of Florence, Venice, Vienna,

Paris, and London. A selection of the letters between Aurispa and his

near friend Camaldulensis has also been preserved.

=Books in Spain.=--At the time when the great manuscript-dealers

of Venice and Florence were carrying on business with the literary

centres of France, Germany, and England, they had some dealings

also with Spain; but their correspondence was practically limited

to the University of Salamanca, which had been founded about 1220.

The literary activities of Spain during the fifteenth century were

certainly much less important than those of either Italy or France.

They were of necessity seriously hampered by the long series of wars

with the Moors, while the final overthrow in 1492 of the Moorish

kingdom of Granada doubtless had, as one of many results, a decidedly

unfavourable influence upon the intellectual development and the

literary possibilities of the Peninsula. For two centuries or more

the scholars of the Moorish kingdom had busied themselves in making

collections of Arabic literature, while of not a few of the more

noteworthy works they caused to be prepared versions in Latin, by means

of which the books were made available for the use of instructors and

students in Salerno, Bologna, Padua, and Paris. It was the case also

that the first knowledge of certain Greek authors came to the scholars

of Europe through the Latin translations which were produced in Cordova

from the Arabic versions. The Moorish scholars thus became a connecting

link for the transmission to the Western world of the philosophy and

learning of the East. Until its conquest and practical destruction by

the Spaniards in 1236, Cordova had been not only the political capital

but the centre of the intellectual life of the Moorish kingdom, so that

it was spoken of as the Athens of the West. At the close of the tenth

century it is said to have contained nearly one million inhabitants. In

connection with the work of its university and of the great library,

a large body of skilled scribes were busied with the manifolding of

manuscripts, and there appears to have been a regular exchange of

manuscripts between Cordova and Baghdad.

In the year 995, Thafar Al-baghdádé, the chief of the scribes of his

time, came from Baghdad and settled in Cordova. The Khalif Al-hakem

took him into his service and employed him in transcribing books.

The Khalif surpassed every one of his predecessors in the love of

literature and of the sciences, which he himself cultivated with

success and fostered in his dominions. Through his influence, Andalusia

became a great market to which the literary productions of every clime

were immediately brought for sale. He employed merchants and agents to

collect books for him in distant countries, remitting for the purpose

large sums of money from the treasury, until, says the chronicler, “the

number of books in Andalusia exceeded all calculation.” The Khalif

sent presents of money to celebrated authors in the East with a view

to encourage the publication of works or to secure the first copies of

these. Hearing, for instance, that Abú-l-faraj of Ispahán had written

a book entitled _Kitábu-l-aghani_ (_The Book of Songs_), he sent him

a thousand dinars of pure gold, in consideration of which he received

a copy of the work before it had been published in Persia. He did the

same thing with Abú Bekr Al-abhari, who had published a commentary on

the _Mokhtassar_.

Al-hakem also collected and employed in his own palace the most skilful

men of his time in the arts of transcribing, binding and illuminating

books. The great library that he brought together remained in the

palace of Cordova, until, during a siege of the city by the Berbers,

Hájib Wadheh, a freedman of Al-mansúr, ordered portions of the books

to be sold, the remainder being shortly afterwards plundered and

destroyed on the taking of the city. The extent of the collection

is indicated by the description of the catalogue. In the Tekmílah,

Ibun-l-abbáns is quoted by Al-Makkari as saying that the catalogue

comprised forty-four volumes, each volume containing twenty sheets.

Makkari estimates that the library contained no less that four hundred

thousand volumes. It is possible that this number was over-estimated,

at least, if we are to believe the statement of Ibun-l-abbar that the

Khalif Al-hakem had himself read every book in the collection, writing

on the fly-leaf the dates of his perusal and details concerning the

author.

Makkari gives a long list of famous authors who flourished in Andalusia

during the reign of Al-hakem, their productions including works in

law, medicine, history, topography, language, and poetry. One of the

historians, Al-tári-khí, was a paper merchant, and was accordingly

known by the name of Al-Warrak. I do not find record of the names of

any dealers in books or any account of the means employed for their

distribution.[356]

=The Manuscript Trade in France.=--While, in Italy, the more important

part of the trade in manuscripts was carried on outside of the

university circles, in France the university retained in the hands

of its own authorities the control and supervision of the work of

the manuscript-dealers; and the book-trade of the country, not only

during the manuscript period, but for many years after the introduction

of printing, was very directly associated with the university

organisation. The record of the production and of the trade in books

carried on by the _stationarii_, _librarii_, and the printer-publishers

of the university is presented in the chapter on the Making of Books

in the Universities.

During its earlier years, the trade in manuscripts was limited

practically to the city of Paris. The work of the official university

scribes in Paris was very similar to that which has already been

referred to for Bologna. It appears, however, that, in accordance with

the Parisian methods, there was less insistence upon the practice of

hiring manuscripts, either complete or in divisions, and there was an

earlier development of the practice of making an absolute sale of the

texts required.

Kirchhoff traces the beginning of the manuscript-trade back to the

second half of the eleventh century. He says that it is not clear

whether the earlier dealers were able to devote themselves exclusively

to the business of selling books, or whether, as he thinks it more

probable, they associated this business with some other occupation.

Jean de Garland, who compiled a kind of technological directory or list

of industries carried on in Paris in 1060, says: _Paravisus est locus

ubi libri scholarium vendentur_.[357] He is apparently referring to

the Place near the Cathedral Church, which later became the centre of

the Parisian book-trade. Peter of Blois, writing, in the middle of the

twelfth century, to an instructor in jurisprudence in Paris, makes a

more definite reference to the Parisian manuscript-dealers. He speaks

of the great collections of valuable books which the Parisian dealers

have for sale, and laments the narrowness of his purse which prevents

him from purchasing many things which have tempted him.[358]

Bulæus, in his _History of the University of Paris_, published in 1665,

maintains that as early as 1174, the manuscript-dealers of Paris formed

a part of the organisation of the university, and that their work had

been brought fully under the regulation of the university authorities.

The university statistics, before the thirteenth century, do not,

however, appear fully to bear out this contention. The first statutes

which give detailed regulations concerning the book-trade bear date

as late as 1275. These statutes specify what texts and what number of

copies of each text the licensed booksellers should keep in stock, and

give a schedule, as was done in Bologna and Padua, of the prices at

which the loans and sales should be made.

Kirchhoff is of opinion that, prior to the middle of the thirteenth

century, the book-trade connected with the university, while it

had already assumed considerable proportions, had not been brought

thoroughly under university control. With this control came also as an

effect, the privileges which attached to the dealers as members of the

university body, and there is no evidence that the booksellers enjoyed

these privileges before 1250. Depping takes the ground, that during

the fifteenth century the sale of books in Paris was not sufficient to

constitute a business in itself, and that all dealers in books had some

other occupation or means of support, and interested themselves in the

sale of manuscripts only as an additional occupation.[359]

It appears hardly likely, however, that manuscript-dealers should be

able to secure immunity from the general tax, which fell upon nearly

all other classes of dealers, on the ground of the importance of

their trade for education, unless they were able to show that they

were actively engaged in such trade. The regulation quoted by Depping

specifies among the free citizens of the city of Paris who were not

liable to the King’s tax,--_libraires parcheminiers_, _enlumineurs_,

_escriipveins_. It was evidently the intention of the framers of the

law to include under the exemption all dealers upon whose trade the

preparation and sale of manuscripts was directly dependent. Under this

heading were included, of necessity, the scribes, the illuminators (who

added to the text of the scribes the artistic decorations and initial

letters), and (most important of the three) the dealers in parchment.

The fact that the booksellers are named in this schedule separately

from the scribes is an indication of the existence of a bookselling

trade of sufficient importance to call for the work of capitalists

employing in the preparation of their manuscripts the services of

the scribes and of the other workmen required. Work of this kind can

properly be classified as publishing.

The dealer was himself prohibited from making purchase of a manuscript

left in his hands until this had been offered for sale during the term

of not less than one month. Record was to be kept of the name of the

purchaser and of the price received.

The requirement that the price obtained for a manuscript should be

recorded, has secured the preservation, on a number of manuscripts of

the time, of a convenient record of their market value.

In a collection of sermons dating from the latter part of the fifteenth

century, for instance, is the record, “This book was sold for 20

Parisian sols.” In a text of _Ovid_ of about the same time is noted

simply the price,--6 sols, Parisian.[360]

Newly prepared transcripts could not be licensed for renting until

they had been examined and passed as correct by the officials, and

until their renting prices had been placed on record. No new work

could be included in the lists of the _stationarii_ until license for

the same had been secured. At this date, the usual term of rental of

a manuscript was one week, and an additional charge could be made if

the manuscript was held in excess of that time. In case a member of

the university had transcribed an incorrect or incomplete manuscript,

the _stationarius_ was liable to him for damages to cover his wasted

labour. According to the general practice, the hirer of a manuscript

was obliged to deposit a pledge for the same, which pledge could be

disposed of by the _stationarius_ after the term of one year.

In the schedule presented by Chevillier of manuscripts licensed in

the early part of the thirteenth century, the prices specified cover

only the rates for renting. Chevillier points out that there is in

this schedule no indication of the division of the manuscripts into

_pecias_, the practice which was, as we have seen, the usual routine in

the Italian universities.[361]

An appraisal of the books contained in the library of the Sorbonne in

the year 1292 gives a value of 3812 livres, 10 sous, 8 deniers.[362]

The regulations concerning the sale of works on commission were

renewed in 1300, with provisions which must have rendered this class

of business not only unremunerative but peculiarly troublesome. Such

a sale could be made only in the presence of two witnesses. No other

bookseller was at liberty to purchase the book, excepting with the

permission and in the presence of the original owner. Before a sale was

made to a bookseller, the manuscript must be allowed to remain exposed

for sale not less than four days in the library of the Dominican

monastery.

Exceptions to the above regulations were permitted under the express

authority of the Rector of the university in case the original

possessor of the manuscript might be in immediate need of money, a

condition which probably obtained in a large number of cases.

The general purpose of these regulations appears to have been the

prevention of any undue increase in the market price or selling value

of manuscripts, or the “cornering of the market” on the part of the

manuscript-dealers in connection with texts which might be in demand.

Existing regulations of this kind tended, however, naturally to fall

into desuetude.

In 1411, an ordinance of Charles VI. made fresh reference to the

necessity of such supervision, mainly on the ground of the convenience

of tracing stolen manuscripts or unlicensed manuscripts.

In 1342, the _librarii_ were permitted to increase their selling

commission from four deniers to six deniers in the case of manuscripts

sold by them for clients who were not themselves members of the

university. Kirchhoff points out, however, that this commission could

by no means have represented the actual charges made. The University

of Paris claimed the authority to license its _librarii_, and to carry

on business not only in Paris but throughout France. _Librarii_ from

without were, however, strictly prohibited from carrying on business in

Paris.

There were in Paris, in addition to the _stationarii_ and _librarii_,

a certain number of unlicensed dealers who were not members of the

university, and who might be classed as book pedlars. While these book

pedlars enjoyed no university privileges, their business was subjected

to the supervision of the university authorities. It was the purpose

of the regulations to prevent dealers of this kind from taking part in

any higher grade book business. They were, for instance, forbidden to

sell any volume for a higher price than ten sous, which, of necessity,

limited their trade practically to chap-books, broadsides, etc. They

were also forbidden to trade in any covered shops, their business being

carried on in open booths. In case they were at any time found to be

trenching upon the business of the licensed or certified book-dealers

(_libraires jurés_), they forfeited promptly their permits as book

pedlars.

In 1323, the Paris School was the most important in Europe for

theological studies, as that of Bologna was the authority on

jurisprudence, and that of Padua for medicine; and the trade of the

Paris booksellers was, therefore, largely devoted to theological

writings. It is partly on this ground that the records of the

monasteries in which there was scholarly and literary activity make

more frequent reference during this century to Paris as a book centre

than to any one of the Italian cities. When, for instance, King Wenzell

II. of Bohemia, at the time of the founding of the Cistercian abbey of

Königsaal, presented two hundred marks of silver for the organisation

of its library, the Abbot Conrad had, he reports, no other course to

take than to travel to Paris in order to purchase the books. This was

in the year 1327.[363] Johann Gerson, writing in 1395 to Petrus de

Alliaco, speaks of the wealth of the literary stores available at this

time in Paris. The list that he gives as an example of these treasures

is devoted exclusively to theological works.

While it is difficult to understand from the evidence available

what machinery may have been in existence during the thirteenth and

fourteenth centuries for the distribution of the books, there are

various references to indicate that such distribution took place

promptly over a very considerable territory. The anonymous author of

a polemical tract, written in order to point out the errors of some

heretical production, says:

_Is autem erroneus liber positus fuit publice ad exemplandum Parisius

anno domini 1254. Unde certum est, quod jam publice predicaretur, nisi

boni prelati et predicatores impedirent._[364]

(In Paris in the year of our Lord 1254, this heretical book was openly

given to the scribes to be copied. Whence it is evident what manner of

doctrine would now be set forth to the public had not good priests and

preachers interfered.)

Kirchhoff is of the opinion that there began to be at this time

in connection with the work of the contemporary authors a kind of

publishing arrangement under which the author handed over to the

_stationarii_ or to the _librarii_ his literary production for

multiplication and for publication, either through renting, through

sale, or in both methods. He finds in the manuscript of a tract by

Gerson, which was given to the public in the year 1417, a notice to the

effect that this was published in Paris under the instructions of the

author and under the license of Magister Johannus, Cancellarius.[365]

The work of the manuscript-dealers was carried on in booths or shops in

various open places, but as a rule in the immediate neighbourhood of

the churches. Certain booths were to be found, however, on the bridges

and by the courts of justice; and a neighbourhood particularly resorted

to by the booksellers was the Rue Neuve Notre Dame, where, in the year

1292, out of eight licensed book-sellers, no less than three had their

work-shops. On the bridge Neuf Notre Dame, there were at the time

of its falling, in 1499, a number of booksellers, three of whom are

recorded as having lost their stock through the accident. The places

selected by the earlier dealers in manuscripts became later the centre

of the Parisian trade in printed books.

As a result of their membership in the university, the dealers in

manuscripts shared in the exemption from the taxation enjoyed by the

university body. The royal tax collectors persisted, however, from

time to time in ignoring this right of exemption, and it was therefore

necessary at different periods to secure fresh enactments from the

royal ordinances in order to confirm the privilege. An example of

such an ordinance is that issued by Philip the Fair, in 1307. In the

cases in which the university placed an impost upon its members for

any special purpose, the manuscript dealers were, of course, obliged

to assume their share of such impost. At the time of their acceptance

as official or licensed dealers, they had to pay a fee, in the first

place of four sous, but after 1467 of eight sous. For the privilege

of keeping an open shop, the fee was twenty-four sous. A further fee

of eight sous was payable for each apprentice, and a weekly payment

of twelve deniers payable for each workman. These fees went into the

treasury of the booksellers’ corporation.

After 1456, under the enactment of the congregation of the university,

each manuscript dealer and paper dealer was called upon to pay to the

Rector of the university at the time of his acceptance and license a

_scutum_ of gold.

The four _taxatores_, the officials charged with the supervision of

the fees for the booksellers’ guild (usually the four senior or most

important members of the guild), were also charged with the selection

or approval of new members and with the supervision of the proper

carrying out of the various regulations controlling the organisations

of the guild. In the earlier period of the work, such censorship as

was found necessary concerning the books to be published was exercised

through these four taxators. They were also the official representative

body of the university guild.

In case any member of the guild suffered injury from unauthorised

competition, the guild had the power to suspend the business operation

with the person charged with committing the injury, until the complaint

could be passed upon. In case the rules of the corporation had been

broken, the corporation appears to have had the power, at least up

to the beginning of the fifteenth century, of withdrawing the trade

privilege or license.

The taxators or _principales jurati_, as they were sometimes called,

had power to proceed not only to supervise the business undertaking of

the members of the guild, but were also authorised to take measures

against the outside or unlicensed booksellers and to proceed, if

necessary, even to the point of seizure and confiscation of their

goods. In carrying out such measures, they were empowered to call upon

the university bedels for co-operation.

These unlicensed dealers or book pedlars, as they increased in numbers,

naturally attempted to withdraw themselves from the jurisdiction and

supervision of the university authorities. An ordinance of Charles VI.,

dated June 20, 1411, confirms specifically the right of control over

the entire book-trade, and prohibits pedlars, dealers, hucksters, etc.,

from taking part in the selling of manuscripts, “of which business

they could have no understanding.” The edict went on to specify that

the carrying on of the book business by ignorant and irresponsible

dealers not only caused injury to the licensed book-dealers, but was

a wrong upon the public, in that it furthered the circulation of

incorrect, incomplete, and fraudulent manuscripts. This ordinance was

doubtless issued at the instance of the book-dealers’ guild, but it

is evident that it was not strictly carried out, as from year to year

there are renewed complaints of the competition of these ignorant and

irresponsible book pedlars.

It was considered important, in order to insure the proper control by

the university over the book-trade and the interests of the scholars

who depended upon the book-dealers for their text-books, that the

trade in the materials used in the manifolding of books should also be

strictly supervised. The special purpose of the university authorities

was to prevent any “cornering of the market” in parchment, and to

insure that the supply of this should be regular and uniform in price.

Under the ordinance of 1291, the dealers in parchment were forbidden

to keep any secret stores of the same, but were obliged to keep on file

with the managers of the book guild the record of the stock carried by

them from month to month. The parchment-dealers licensed to do business

in Paris were forbidden to sell parchment to dealers from outside of

Paris. On the first day of the Trade Fair, when foreign dealers brought

parchment to Paris for sale, the Parisian dealers were forbidden

themselves to make purchases, this day being reserved for such

purchases as the university officials might desire to make. In case,

after the first day of the Fair, a foreign dealer in parchment had

before him more applications for his stock than could be supplied, and

among the applicants there should be one representing the university,

the latter was to be served first. Outside of the time of the official

Fair, the Paris dealers in parchment were allowed to make purchases of

their material only in the monastery of S. Mathurin.

In case between the times of the Fair a foreign dealer or manufacturer

of parchment came to Paris, he was obliged to place his stock in

this same monastery and to give information concerning this deposit

to the Rector of the university. The Rector sent a representative to

examine and to schedule the parchment, and the stock was priced by

four of the licensed parchment-dealers associated with the university.

The university authorities had then for twenty-four hours the first

privilege of purchase. This regulation was applied also to the

parchment-trade carried on at the Fair of St. Germain.

It is evident from the many renewed edicts and ordinances referring

to this trade that it was not easy to carry out such regulations

effectively, and that much friction and dissatisfaction was produced by

them. It seems probable also that, with the trade in parchment as in

other trades, the attempt to secure uniformity of price, irrespective

of the conditions of manufacture or of the market, had the effect not

infrequently of lessening the supply and of causing sales to be made

surreptitiously at increased prices.

After the use of parchment had in large part been replaced by paper

made of linen, the supplies of Paris came principally from Lombardy.

Later, however, paper-mills were erected in France, the first being

at Troyes and Esson. These earlier paper manufacturers were, like the

book-dealers in Paris, made free from tax. This exemption was contested

from time to time by the farmers of the taxes and had to be renewed

by successive ordinances. Later, the university associated with its

body, in the same manner as had been done with the parchment-dealers,

the manufacturers and dealers in paper, and confirmed them in the

possession of the privileges previously enjoyed by the _librarii_ and

_stationarii_. The privileges of the paper manufacturers extended,

however, outside of Paris, which was, of course, not the case with the

_librarii_.

While, in connection with the requirements of the university and

the special privileges secured through university membership, the

book-trade of Paris and the trades associated with it secured a larger

measure of importance as compared with the trade of the provinces than

was the case in either Italy or Germany, there came into existence as

early as the middle of the fourteenth century a considerable trade in

manuscripts in various provincial centres.

In Montpellier, the university was, as in Paris, a centre for

publishing undertakings, but in Angers, Rouen, Orleans, and Toulouse,

in which there are various references to book-dealers as early as

the beginning of the fourteenth century, the trade must have been

supported by a public largely outside of the university organisation.

The statutes of Orleans and of Toulouse, dating from 1341, regulate the

supervision of the trade in manuscripts.

In Montpellier, there appears to have been, during the beginning of

the fourteenth century, a business in the loaning of the manuscripts

and of manuscript _hefts_--_pecias_, similar to that already described

in Bologna. The university authorities, usually the bedels, supervised

the correctness of the _pecias_ and prescribed the prices at which they

should be rented. The _stationarii_ who carried on this business and

also the _venditores librorum_ were members of the university body.

The sale of books on commission was also supervised under regulations

similar to those obtaining in Bologna.

No _stationarius_ was at liberty to dispose of a work placed in his

hands for sale (unless it belonged to a foreigner) until it had been

exposed in his shop for at least six days, and had at least been three

times offered for sale publicly in the auditorium. This offering for

sale was cared for by the _banquerii_, who were the assistants or

tenants of the rectors. These _banquerii_ were also authorised to carry

on the business of the loaning of _pecias_ under the same conditions

as those that controlled the _stationarii_. They were also at liberty,

after the close of the term lectures, to sell their own supplies of

manuscripts (usually of course the copies of the official texts) at

public auction in the auditorium.

It is difficult to understand how, with a trade, of necessity, limited

in extent, and the possible profits of which were so closely restricted

by regulations, there could have been a living profit sufficient to

tempt educated dealers to take up the work of the _stationarii_ or

_librarii_.

It is probably the case, as Kirchhoff, Savigny, and others point

out, that the actual results of the trade cannot be ascertained with

certainty from the texts of the regulations, and that there were

various ways in which, in spite of these regulations, larger returns

could be secured for the work of the scholarly and enterprising

_librarii_.

An ordinance issued in 1411 makes reference to booksellers buying

and selling books both in French or in Latin and gives privilege

to licensed booksellers to do such buying and selling at their

pleasure. This seems to have been an attempt to widen the range of the

book-trade, while reference to books in the vernacular indicates an

increasing demand for literature outside of the circles of instructors

and students.

In the beginning of the fifteenth century, there was, among a number of

the nobles of families in France, a certain increase in the interest of

literature and in the taste for collecting elaborate, ornamented, and

costly manuscripts.

The princely Houses of Burgundy and of Orleans are to be noted in this

connection, and particularly in Burgundy, the influence of the ducal

family was of wide importance in furthering the development of the

trade in manuscripts and the production of literature.

A large number of the manuscripts placed in these ducal family

libraries were evidently originally prepared by scribes having

knowledge only of plain script, and the addition of the initial

letters and of the illuminated head and tail pieces was made later

by illuminators and designers attached to the ducal families. It

was to these latter that fell the responsibility of placing upon

the manuscripts the arms of the owners of the libraries. In case

manuscripts which had been inscribed with family arms came to change

hands, it became necessary to replace these arms with those of the

later purchaser, and many of the illuminated manuscripts of the period

give evidence of such changing of the decorations, decorations which

took the place of the book-plate of to-day.

The taste for these elaborate illuminated manuscripts, each one of

which, through the insertion of individual designs and of the family

arms, became identified with the personality and taste of its owner,

could not easily be set aside, after the middle of the fifteenth

century, by the new art of printing. As a matter of fact, therefore, it

not infrequently happened, towards the latter part of the fifteenth

century, that these noble collectors caused elaborate transcripts to

be made, by hand, of works which were already in print, rather than

to place in their own collection books in the form in which ordinary

buyers could secure them.

By the year 1448, the number of certified _librarii_ in Paris had

increased to twenty-four.[366] Kirchhoff is of opinion that a certain

portion at least of these _librarii_ carried on also other trades, but

it is evident that there had come to be in these years, immediately

preceding the introduction of the printing-press, a very considerable

development in the demand for literature and in the book-trade of the

capital.

In 1489, the list of book-dealers and of those connected with the

manufacture of books who were exempt from taxation included twenty-four

_librarii_, four dealers in parchment, four dealers in paper, seven

paper manufacturers (having mills outside of Paris), two illuminators,

two binders, and two licensed scribes.

In the following year, the list of _librarii_ free from taxation was

reduced to seventeen. It is probable that those _librarii_ whose

names had been taken off the exemption list undertook a general book

business carried on outside of the university regulations, and were

probably able to secure returns more than sufficient to offset the loss

caused by the curtailing of their freedom from taxation and of their

university privileges.

This reduction in the number of manuscript-dealers who remained members

of the corporation was, however, very promptly made up by including in

the corporation the newly introduced printers. As early as 1476, one of

the four officials of the guild was the printer Pasquier Bonhomme.

The cessation of the work of the scribes and the transfer of the

book-trade from their hands to those of the printers took place

gradually after the year 1470, the printers being, as said, promptly

included in the organisation of the guild. There must, however, have

been, during the earlier years at least, not a little rivalry and

bitterness between the two groups of dealers.

An instance of this rivalry is given in 1474, in which year a

_librarius juratus_, named Herman von Stathoen (by birth a German),

died. According to the university regulation, his estate, valued at

800 crowns of gold, (there being no heirs in the country) should have

fallen to the university treasury. In addition to this property in

Paris, Stathoen was part owner of a book establishment in Mayence,

carried on by Schöffer & Henckis, and was unpopular with the Paris

dealers generally on the ground of his foreign trade connections.

Contention was made on behalf of the Crown that the property in Paris

should be confiscated to the royal treasury, and as Schöffer & Henckis

were subjects of the Duke of Burgundy, whose relations with Louis XI.

might be called strained, the influence of the Court was decidedly in

favour of the appropriation of any business interest that they might

have in their partner’s property in Paris. In the contention between

the university and the Crown, the latter proved the stronger, and the

bookseller’s 800 crowns were confiscated for the royal treasury, and at

least got so far towards the treasury as the hands of the chancellor.

As a further result of the issue which had been raised, it was ordered

on the part of the Crown that thereafter no foreigner should have a

post as an official of the university or should be in a position to lay

claim to the exemption and the privileges attaching to such post.

While in Paris the manuscript-dealers had been promptly driven from

the field through the competition of the printers, in Rouen they held

their own for a considerable term of years. The space which had been

assigned to the _librarii_ for their shops at the chief doorway of the

cathedral, continued to be reserved for them as late as 1483, and the

booksellers keeping on sale the printed books, were forbidden to have

any shops at this end of the cathedral, but were permitted to put up,

at their own cost, stalls at the north doorway.

The oldest Paris bookseller whose name has been placed on record is

described as Herneis le Romanceur. He had his shop at the entrance

to Notre Dame. His inscription appeared in a beautiful manuscript

presenting a French translation of the Code of Justinian, a manuscript

dating from the early part of the thirteenth century. It is possible

that Guillaume Herneis, whose name appeared in the tax list of 1292

with a rate of ten livres, was the scribe and the publisher of the

above manuscript, but if this were the case he must have been at the

time of this tax rating well advanced in years.[367] In 1274, the name

of Hugichio le Lombard appears recorded on several manuscripts which

have been preserved in existing collections. In the taxes of 1292,

appears the name of Agnien, _Libraire_, in the Rue de la Boucherie,

assessed for thirty-six sous. The tax is too large to make it probable

that Agnien was a mere pedlar or did business from an open stall, and

it is Géraud’s opinion that he was charged probably as a university

bookseller to whom the tax collector had refused the exemption

belonging to university members.[368]

In the year 1303, the stock of books of a certain Antoine Zeno,

_libraire juré_, was scheduled for taxation. Among the titles included

in this schedule are the commentaries or lectures of Bruno on S.

Matthew (57 pages, price one sol), the same on Mark, Luke, and John,

the commentaries of Alexander on Matthew, the _Opera Fratris Richardi_,

the _Legenda Sanctorum_, various texts of the Decretals, commentaries

of S. Bernard on the Decretals, a treatise of a certain Thomas on

metaphysics, on physics, on the heavens and the earth, and on the soul,

and a series of lectures on ethics, and on politics. The scheduled

price ranged from one sol to eight sols, the latter being the price of

a manuscript of 136 pages. The books were probably confined exclusively

to texts used in the university work.[369]

In 1313, appears in the tax list, assessed for twelve sous, the name of

Nicholas L’Anglois, bookseller and tavern-keeper in Rue St. Jacques.

It is to be noted that the booksellers, and for that matter the traders

generally of the time, are frequently distinguished by the names of

their native countries. It is probable that Nicholas failed to escape

taxation as a bookseller because he was also carrying on business (and

doubtless a more profitable business) in his tavern. The list of 1313

includes in fact but three booksellers, and each of these is described

as having an additional trade.[370]

A document of the year 1332 describes a sale made by a certain Geoffroy

de Saint Léger, a _clerc libraire_, to Gérard de Montagu, _avocat

du roy au parlement_. Geoffroy acknowledges to have sold, ceded,

assigned, and delivered to the said Gérard a book entitled _Speculum

Historiale in Consuetudines Parisienses_, comprised in four volumes,

and bound in red leather. He guarantees the validity of this sale with

his own body, _de son corps mesme_. Gérard pays for the book the sum

of forty Parisian livres, with which sum Geoffroy declares himself

to be content, and paid in full.[371] It appears that the sale of a

book in the fourteenth century was a solemn transaction, calling for

documentary evidence as specific as in the case of the transfer of real

estate.

In the year 1376, Jean de Beauvais, a _librarius juratus_, is recorded

as having sold various works, including the Decretals of Gregory

IX., illustrated with miniatures, a copy of _Summa Hostiensis_, 423

parchment leaves, illustrated with miniatures, and a codex of Magister

Thomas de Maalaa.[372]

In the year 1337, Guidomarus de Senis, master of arts and _librarius

juratus_, renews his oath as a taxator. He seems to have put into his

business as bookseller a certain amount of literary gaiety, if one may

judge from the lines added at the end of a parchment codex sold by him,

which codex contains the poems of Guillaume de Marchaut.

The lines are as follows:

_Explicit au mois d’avril,

Qui est gai, cointe et gentil,

L’an mil trois cent soixante et onze.

D’Avril la semaine seconde,

Acheva à un vendredi,

Guiot de Sens c’est livre si,

Et le comansa de sa main,

Et ne fina ne soir ne matin,

Tant qu’il eut l’euvre accomplie,

Louée soit la vierge Marie._[373]

Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, was one of the more important book

collectors of his time. In 1386, the Duke paid to Martin L’Huillier,

dealer in manuscripts and bookbinder, sixteen francs for binding

eight books, six of which were bound in grain leather.[374] The Duke

of Orleans also appears as a buyer of books, and in 1394, he paid to

Jehan de Marsan, master of arts and dealer in manuscripts, twenty

francs in gold for the _Letters of S. Pol_, bound in figured silk, and

illuminated with the arms of the Duke.

Four years later, the Duke makes another purchase, paying to Jehan one

hundred _livres tournois_ for a Concordance to the Bible in Latin, an

illuminated manuscript bound in red leather, stamped.

The same Duke, in 1394, paid forty gold crowns to Olivier, one of the

four principal _librarii_, for a Latin text of the Bible, bound in

red leather, and in 1396, this persistent ducal collector pays sixty

livres to a certain Jacques Jehan, who is recorded as a grocer, but who

apparently included books in his stock, for the _Book of the Treasury_,

a book of Julius Cæsar, a book of the King, _The Secret of Secrets_,

and a book of Estrille Fauveau, bound in one volume, illuminated, and

bearing the arms of the Duke of Lancaster. Another volume included

in this purchase was the _Romance of the Rose_, and the _Livres des

Eschez_, “moralised,” and bound together in one volume, illuminated in

gold and azure.[375]

In 1399, appears on the records the name of Dyne, or Digne Rapond,

a Lombard. Kirchhoff speaks of Rapond’s book business as being with

him a side issue. Like Atticus, the publisher of Cicero, Rapond’s

principal business interest was that of banking, in which the Lombards

were at that time pre-eminent throughout Europe. In connection with

his banking, however, he accepted orders from noble clients and

particularly from the Duke of Burgundy, for all classes of articles of

luxury, among which were included books.

In 1399, Rapond delivered to Philip of Burgundy, for the price of five

hundred livres, a _Livy_ illuminated with letters of gold and with

images, and for six thousand francs a work entitled _La Propriété de

Choses_. A document, bearing date 1397, states that Charles, King of

France, is bound to Dyne Rapond, merchant of Paris, for the sum of 190

francs of gold, for certain pieces of tapestry, for certain shirts,

and for four great volumes containing the chronicles of France. He is

further bound in the sum of ninety-two francs for some more shirts,

for a manuscript of Seneca, for the Chronicles of Charlemagne, for

the Chronicles of Pepin, for the Chronicles of Godefroy de Bouillon,

the latter for his dear elder son Charles, Dauphin. The King further

purchases certain hats, handkerchiefs, and some more books, for which

he instructs his treasurer in Paris to pay over to said Rapond the

sum of ninety francs in full settlement of his account; the document

is signed on behalf of the King by his secretary at his château of

Vincennes.[376]

Jacques Rapond, merchant and citizen of Paris, probably a brother of

Dyne, also seems to have done a profitable business with Philip of

Burgundy, as he received from Philip, for a Bible in French, 9000

francs, and in the same year (1400), for a copy of _The Golden Legend_,

7500 francs.

Nicholas Flamel, scribe and _librarius juratus_, flourished at the

beginning of the thirteenth century. He was shrewd enough, having made

some little money at work as a bookseller and as a school manager, to

carry on some successful speculations in house building, from which

speculations he made money so rapidly that he was accused of dealings

with the Evil One. One of the houses built by him in Rue Montmorency

was still standing in 1853, an evidence of what a clever publisher

might accomplish even in the infancy of the book business.

The list of booksellers between the years 1486-1490 includes the name

of Jean Bonhomme, the name which has for many years been accepted

as typical of the French bourgeois. This particular Bonhomme seems,

however, to have been rather a distinctive man of his class. He calls

himself “bookseller to the university,” and was a dealer both in

manuscripts and in printed books. On a codex of a French translation

of _The City of God_, by S. Augustine, is inscribed the record

of the sale of the manuscript by Jean Bonhomme, bookseller to the

University of Paris, who acknowledges having sold to the honoured

and wise citizen, Jehan Cueillette, treasurer of M. de Beaujeu, this

book containing _The City of God_, in two volumes, and Bonhomme

guarantees to Cueillette the possession of said work against all. His

imprint as a bookseller appears upon various printed books, including

the _Constitutiones Clementinæ_, the _Decreta Basiliensia_, and the

_Manuale Confessorum_ of Joh. Nider.

Among the cities of France outside of Paris in which there is record

of early manuscript-dealers, are Tours, Angers, Lille, Troyes, Rouen,

Toulouse, and Montpellier. In Lille, in 1435, the principal bookseller

was Jaquemart Puls, who was also a goldsmith, the latter being probably

his principal business. In Toulouse, a bookseller of the name of

S. Julien was in business as early as 1340. In Troyes, in the year

1500, Macé Panthoul was carrying on business as a bookseller and as a

manufacturer of paper. In connection with his paper-trade, he came into

relations with the book-dealers of Paris.

=Manuscript Dealers in Germany.=--The information concerning the

early book-dealers in Germany is more scanty, and on the whole

less interesting, than that which is available for the history of

bookselling in Italy or in France. There was less wealth among the

German nobles during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and fewer

among the nobles who had means were interested in literary luxuries

than was the case in either France, Burgundy, or Italy.

As has been noted in the preceding division of this chapter, the

references to the more noteworthy of the manuscript-dealers in France

occur almost entirely in connection with sales made by them to the

members of the Royal Family, to the Dukes of Burgundy, or to other of

the great nobles. The beautifully illuminated manuscript which carried

the coat-of-arms or the crest of the noble for whom it was made,

included also, as a rule, the inscription of the manuscript-dealer by

whom the work of its preparation had been carried on or supervised,

and through whom it had been sold to the noble purchaser. Of the

manuscripts of this class, the record in Germany is very much smaller.

Germany also did not share the advantages possessed by Italy, of close

relations with the literature and the manuscript stores of the East,

relations which proved such an important and continued source of

inspiration for the intellectual life of the Italian scholars.

The influence of the revival of the knowledge of Greek literature

came to Germany slowly through its relations with Italy, but in the

knowledge of Greek learning and literature the German scholars were

many years behind their Italian contemporaries, while the possession of

Greek manuscripts in Germany was, before the middle of the fifteenth

century, very exceptional indeed. The scholarship of the earlier German

universities appears also to have been narrower in its range and more

restricted in its cultivation than that which had been developed in

Paris, in Bologna, or in Padua. The membership of the Universities of

Prague and of Vienna, the two oldest in the German list, was evidently

restricted almost entirely to Germans, Bohemians, Hungarians, etc.,

that is to say, to the races immediately controlled by the German

Empire.

If a scholar of England were seeking, during the fourteenth and

fifteenth centuries, special instruction or special literary and

scholarly advantages, his steps were naturally directed towards Paris

for theology, Bologna for jurisprudence, and Padua for medicine, and

but few of these travelling English scholars appear to have taken

themselves to Prague, Vienna, or Heidelberg.

In like manner, if English book collectors were seeking manuscripts,

they betook themselves to the dealers in Paris, in Florence, or in

Venice, and it was not until after the manuscript-trade had been

replaced by the trade in the productions of the printing-press that the

German cities can be said to have become centres for the distribution

of literature.

Such literary interests as obtained in Germany during the fourteenth

century, outside of those of the monasteries already referred to,

centred nevertheless about the universities. The oldest of these

universities was that of Prague, which was founded in 1347, more

than a century later than the foundations of Paris and Bologna. The

regulations of the University recognised the existence of scribes,

illuminators, correctors, binders, dealers in parchment, etc., all of

which trades were placed under the direct control of the university

authorities.

Hauslik speaks of the book-trade in the fourteenth century as being

associated with the work of the library of the university, and refers

to licensed scribes and illuminators, who were authorised to make

transcripts, for the use of the members of the university, of the texts

contained in the library.[377]

If we may understand from this reference that the university

authorities had had prepared for the library authenticated copies of

the texts of the works required in the university courses, and that the

transcribing of these texts was carried on under the direct supervision

of the librarians, Prague appears to have possessed a better system for

the preparation of its official texts than we have record of in either

Bologna or Paris. Hauslik goes on to say that the entire book-trade of

the city was placed under the supervision of the library authorities,

which authorities undertook to guarantee the completeness and the

correctness of all transcripts made from the texts in the library.

Kirchhoff presents in support of this theory examples of one or two

manuscripts, which contain, in addition to the inscription of the name

of the scribe or dealer by whom it had been prepared, the record of the

corrector appointed by the library to certify to the correctness of the

text.[378]

The second German university in point of date was that of Vienna,

founded in 1365, and, in connection with the work of this university

the manuscript-trade in Germany took its most important development.

There is record in Vienna of the existence of _stationarii_ who carried

on, under the usual university supervision, the trade of hiring out

_pecias_, but this was evidently a much less important function than in

Bologna.

The buying and selling of books in Vienna was kept under very close

university supervision, and without the authority of the rector or of

the bedels appointed by him for the purpose, no book could be purchased

from either a _magister_ or a student, or could be accepted on pledge.

The books which had been left by deceased members of the university

were considered to be the property of the university authorities, and

could be sold only under their express directions. The commission

allowed by the authorities for the sale of books was limited to 2½ per

cent., and before any books could be transferred at private sale, they

must be offered at public sale in the auditorium. The purpose of this

regulation was apparently here as in Paris not only to insure securing

for the books sold the highest market prices, but also to give some

protection against the possibility of books being sold by those to whom

they did not belong.

The regulation of the details of the book business appears to have

fallen gradually into the hands of the bedels of the Faculty, and

the details of the supervision exercised approach more nearly to the

Italian than to the Parisian model.

The third German university was that of Heidelberg, founded in 1386.

Here the regulations concerning the book-trade were substantially

modelled upon those of Paris. The scribes and the dealers in

manuscripts belonged to the privileged members of the university.

The provisions in the foundation or charter of the university, which

provided for the manuscript-trade, make express reference to the

precedents of the University of Paris.

By the middle of the fifteenth century, there appears to have been a

considerable trade in manuscripts in Heidelberg and in places dependent

upon Heidelberg. In the library of the University of Erlangen, there

exists to-day a considerable collection of manuscripts formerly

belonging to the monastery of Heilsbronn, which manuscripts were

prepared in Heidelberg between 1450 and 1460. The series includes

a long list of classics, indicating a larger classical interest in

Heidelberg than was to be noted at the time in either Prague or

Vienna.[379]

The University of Cologne, founded a few years later, became the centre

of theological scholarship in Germany, and the German manuscripts

of the early part of the fifteenth century which have remained in

existence and which have to do with theological subjects were very

largely produced in Cologne. A number of examples of these have been

preserved in the library of Erfurt.

One reason for the smaller importance in Germany of the _stationarius_

was the practice that obtained on the part of the instructors of

lecturing or of reading from texts for dictation, the transcripts being

made by the students themselves. The authority or permission to read

for dictation was made a matter of special university regulation. The

regulation provided what works could be so utilised, and the guarantee

as to the correctness of the texts to be used could either be given

by a member of the faculty of the university itself or was accepted

with the certified signature of an instructor of a well known foreign

university, such as Paris, Bologna, or Oxford.

By means of this system of dictation, the production of manuscripts

was made much less costly than through the work of the _stationarii_,

and the dictation system was probably an important reason why the

manuscript-trade in the German university cities never became so

important as in Paris or London.

It is contended by the German writers that, notwithstanding the

inconsiderable trade in manuscripts, there was a general knowledge of

the subject-matter of the literature pursued in the university, no

less well founded or extended among the German cities than among those

of France or Italy. This familiarity with the university literature

is explained by the fact that the students had, through writing at

dictation, so largely possessed themselves of the substance of the

university lectures.

In the Faculty of Arts at Ingolstadt, it was ordered, in 1420, that

there should be not less than one text-book (that is to say, one copy

of the text-book) for every three scholars in baccalaureate. This

regulation is an indication of the scarcity of text-books.

The fact that the industry in loaning manuscripts to students was

not well developed in the German universities delayed somewhat the

organisation of the book-trade in the university towns. Nevertheless,

Richard de Bury names Germany among the countries where books could be

purchased, and Gerhard Groote speaks of purchasing books in Frankfort.

This city became, in fact, important in the trade of manuscripts for

nearly a century before the beginning of German printing.[380]

Æneas Silvius says in the preface of his _Europa_, written in 1458,

that a _librarius teutonicus_ had written to him shortly before, asking

him to prepare a continuation of the book “_Augustalis_.”[381] This

publishing suggestion was made eight years after the perfection of

Gutenberg’s printing-press, but probably without any knowledge on the

part of the _librarius_ of the new method for the production of books.

In Germany there was, during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries,

outside of the ecclesiastics, very little demand for reading matter.

The women had their psalters, which had, as a rule, been written out

in the monasteries. As there came to be a wider demand for books

of worship, this was provided for, at least in the regions of the

lower Rhine, by the scribes among the Brothers of Common Life. The

Brothers took care also of the production of a large proportion of the

school-books required.

During the fourteenth century and the first half of the fifteenth,

the Brothers took an active part in the production and distribution

of manuscripts. Their work was distinct in various respects from

that which was carried on in monastery or in university towns, but

particularly in this that their books were, for the most part, produced

in the tongue of the common folk, and their service as instructors

and booksellers was probably one of the most important influences in

helping to educate the lower classes of North Germany to read and to

think for themselves. They thus prepared the way for the work of Luther

and Melanchthon.

As has been noted in another chapter, the activity of the Brothers in

the distribution of literature did not cease when books in manuscripts

were replaced by the productions of the printing-press. They made

immediate use of the invention of Gutenberg, and in many parts of

Germany, the first printed books that were brought before the people

came from the printing-presses of the Brothers.

Some general system of public schools seems to have taken shape in

the larger cities at least of North Germany as early as the first half

of the thirteenth century. The teachers in these schools themselves

added to their work and to their earnings by transcribing text-books

and sometimes works of worship. Later, there came to be some extended

interest in certain classes of literature among a few of the princes

and noblemen, but this appears to have been much less the case in

Germany than in Italy or even than in France. In the castles or palaces

where there was a chaplain, the chaplain took upon himself the work of

a scribe, caring not only for the correspondence of his patron, but

occasionally also preparing manuscripts for the library, so called, of

the castle. There is also record of certain _stadtschreiber_, or public

scribes, licensed as such in the cities of North Germany, and in some

cases the post was held by the instructors of the schools.

Ulrich Friese, a citizen of Augsburg, writing in the latter half of

the fourteenth century, speaks of attending the Nordlingen Fair with

parchment and books. Nordlingen Church was, it appears, used for the

purpose of this fair, and in Lübeck, in the Church of S. Mary, booths

were opened in which, together with devotional books, school-books and

writing materials were offered for sale.

In Hamburg also, the courts in the immediate neighbourhood of the

churches were the places selected by the earlier booksellers and

manuscript-dealers for their trade. In Metz, a book-shop stood

immediately in front of the cathedral, and in Vienna, the first

book-shop was placed in the court adjoining the cathedral of S.

Stephen. Nicolaus, who was possibly the earliest bookseller in Erfurt,

had his shop, in 1460, in the court of the Church of the Blessed Virgin.

From a school regulation of Bautzen, written in 1418, it appears

that the children were instructed to purchase their school-books

from the master at the prices fixed in the official schedule.[382]

A certain schoolmaster in Hagenau, whose work was carried on between

1443 and 1450, has placed his signature upon a considerable series of

manuscripts, which he claims to have prepared with his own hands, and

which were described in Wilken’s History of the library in Heidelberg.

His name was Diebold Läber, or, as he sometimes wrote it, Lauber,

and he describes himself as a writer, _schreiber_, in the town of

Hagenau. This inscription appears in so many manuscripts that have been

preserved, that some doubt has been raised as to whether they could

be all the work of one hand, or whether Lauber’s name (imprint, so to

speak) may not have been utilised by other scribes possibly working in

association with him.[383]

Lauber speaks of having received from Duke Ruprecht an order for

seven books, and as having arranged to have the manuscripts painted

(decorated or illuminated) by some other hand. Lauber is recorded as

having been first a school-teacher and an instructor in writing, later

a scribe, producing for sale copies of standard texts, and finally a

publisher, employing scribes, simply certifying with his own signature

to the correctness of the work of his subordinates. There is every

indication that he had actually succeeded in organising in Hagenau, as

early as 1443, an active business in the production and distribution of

manuscripts. The books produced by him were addressed more generally

to the popular taste than was the case with the productions of the

monastery scribes.

In part, possibly, as a result of this early activity in the production

of books, one of the first printing-presses in Germany, outside of

that of Gutenberg in Mayence, was instituted in Hagenau, and its work

appears to have been in direct succession to that of the public writer

Lauber.

The relations between Hagenau and Heidelberg were intimate, and the

scholarly service of the members of the university was utilised by the

Hagenau publishers. The book-trade of Hagenau also appears to have been

increased in connection with the development of intellectual activity

given by the Councils of Constance and Basel. In regard to the latter

Council, Kirchhoff quotes Denis as having said:

_Quod concilium, qui scholam librariorum dixerit haud errabit._[384]

Either as a cause or as an effect of the activity of the book

production in Hagenau, the Hagenau schools for scribes during the

first half of the fifteenth century became famous.[385] The work of

producing manuscripts appears to have been divided, according to the

manufacturing system; one scribe prepared the text, a second collated

the same with the original, a third painted in the rubricated initials,

and a fourth designed the painted head-pieces to the pages, while

a fifth prepared the ornamented covers. It occasionally happened,

however, that one scribe was himself able to carry on each division of

the work of the production of an illuminated manuscript.

Hagen quotes some lines of a Hagenau manuscript, as follows:

_Dis buch vollenbracht vas,

In der zit, also man schreip vnd las,

Tusent vnd vyer hundert jar.

Nach Christus gebort daz ist war,

Dar nach jn dem eyn vnd siebentzigsten jar,

Vff sant Pauly bekarung, daz ist ware,

Von Hans Dirmsteyn, wist vor war,

Der hait es geschreben vnd gemacht,

Gemalt, gebunden, vnd gantz follenbracht._[386]

Hagenau was one of the few places of book production (excepting

the workshops of the Brothers of Common Life) in which, during the

manuscript period, books were prepared to meet the requirements of the

common folk. The literature proceeding from Hagenau included not only

“good Latin books,” that is to say, copies of the accepted classics as

used in Heidelberg and elsewhere, but also copies of the famous Epics

of the Middle Ages, the Sagas, Folk Songs, Chap-Books, copies of the

Golden Bull, Bible stories, books of worship, books of popular music,

books of prophecy, and books for the telling of fortunes, etc.[387]

Throughout both Germany and the Low Countries, it was the case that,

during the manuscript period, the work of the school teachers was

closely connected with the work of the producers and sellers of

manuscripts, and the teachers not infrequently themselves built up

a manuscript business. The school ordinance of the town of Bautzen,

dating from the year 1418, prescribed, for example, the prices which

the scholars were to pay to the _locatus_ (who was the fifth teacher in

rank in the institution) for the school-books, the responsibility for

preparing which rested upon him.

A history of the Printers’ Society of Dresden, printed in 1740, gives

examples of some of these prices:

For one _A. B. C._ and a paternoster, each one groschen.

For a _Corde Benedicite_, one groschen.

For a good _Donat_, ten groschens.

For a _Regulam Moralem et Catonem_, eight groschens.

For a complete _Doctrinal_, a half mark.

For a _Primam Partem_, eight groschens.

In case no books are purchased from the _locatus_, there shall be paid

to him by each scholar, if the scholar be rich, two groschens, if he be

in moderate circumstances, one groschen, and if the scholar be poor, he

shall be exempt from payment.[388]

A certain Hugo from Trimberg, who died about 1309, is referred to by

Jaeck as having been a teacher for forty years, at the end of which

term he gave up the work of teaching with the expectation of being

able to make a living out of his collection of books. The collection

comprised two hundred volumes, of which twelve are specified as being

original works, presumably the production of Trimberg himself. Jaeck

does not tell us whether or not the good schoolmaster was able to earn

enough from the manifolding or from the sale of his books to secure a

living in his last years.[389]

Kirchhoff refers to the importance of the fairs and annual markets

for the manuscript trade. It is evident that, in the absence of any

bookselling machinery, it was of first importance for the producers

of copies of such texts as might be within their reach, to come into

relations with each other in order to bring about the exchange of their

surplus copies.

There is record of the sale and exchange of manuscripts, during the

first half of the fifteenth century, at the Fairs of Salzburg, Ulm,

Nordlingen, and Frankfort. It was in fact from its trade in manuscripts

that Frankfort, by natural development, became and for many years

remained the centre of the trade in printed books.[390] Ruland speaks

of one of the most important items of the manuscript-trade at the

Frankfort Fair between 1445 and 1450, being that of fortune-telling

books and illustrated chap-books.

It appears also from the Fair records that in Germany, as in Italy,

the dealers in parchment and paper were among the first to associate

with their goods the sale of manuscripts. In 1470, occurs the earliest

record of sales being made at the fair in Nordlingen of printed

books.[391] The earliest date at which the sale of printed books at

the fair at Frankfort was chronicled was 1480. In 1485, the printer

Peter Schöffer was admitted as a citizen in Frankfort.

While Kirchhoff maintains that the distribution of books in manuscript

was more extensive in Germany than in either France or Italy, and

emphasises particularly the fact that there was among circles

throughout Germany a keener interest in literature than obtained

with either the French or the Italians, he admits that the record of

noteworthy booksellers in Germany, during the manuscript period, is,

as compared with that of France and Italy, inconsiderable. In Cologne,

he finds, as early as 1389, through an inscription in a manuscript

that has been preserved, the name of Horstan de Ledderdam, who called

himself not a _librarius_, but a _libemarius_. The manuscript that

bears this record is a treatise by Porphyry on Aristotle.

In Nordlingen, the tax list of 1407 gives the name of Joh. Minner,

recorded as a _scriptor_. There is an entry of a sale made by Minner to

the Burgermeister Protzen of a German translation of the _Decretals_.

The tax list of 1415 gives the name of Conrad Horn, described as a

_stadtschreiber_. Horn seems to have carried on an extensive business

in the production and the exchange of manuscripts. Kirchhoff quotes a

contract entered into by him in 1427 with a certain Prochsil of Eystet

for the purchase of a _buch_, the title of which is not given, for the

sum of forty-three Rhenish gulden.

The name of Diebold Lauber has already been mentioned. His inscription

appears on a number of manuscripts that have been preserved principally

through the Heidelberg University. On the first sheet of a _Legend

of the Three Holy Kings_ from this library, is written the following

notice, which can be considered as a general advertisement:

_Item welche hande bücher man gerne hat, gross oder clein,

geistlich oder weltlich, hübsch gemolt, die findet man alle by

Diepold Lauber, schreiber in der burge zu hagenow._

Freely translated, this notice would read: “Any books that are desired,

whether great or small, religious or profane, beautifully painted

(adorned), all of these will one find by Diepold Lauber, scribe in

the town of Hagenau.” Among the manuscripts of Lauber, which have

been preserved, is a beautiful copy of _Gesta Romanorum, mit den

viguren gemolt_, a Bible in rhyme (_eine gerymete bibel, ein salter

Latin und Tüstch_). Also a number of _gemolte losbücher_ (illustrated

fortune-telling books), etc.

In Heidelberg, the name of Wolff von Prunow, _bibliopola_, is recorded

early in the fifteenth century, as associated with the university. In

Bruges, in 1425, the list of manuscript-dealers is a more important

one. It begins with Joorquin de Vüc, who is described as a cleric. He

was bookseller to Duke Philip, and is spoken of by Labord as having

had an extensive manuscript factory.[392] Colart Mansion has already

been referred to. He is recorded in 1450 as an _escripvain_, but a

few years later appears in the list of printers and is known as the

friend and associate of Caxton. The books of Duke Philip of Burgundy

include also the name of the bookseller Hocberque, in 1427, and that of

Neste in 1423. In 1456, Morisses de Haat is recorded as an _escripvain

de livres_, who rented out books. In order to do this, he must, as

Kirchhoff points out, have carried some general stock. A certain Herr

van Gruthuyse, a rich collector, of Bruges, bought a number of finely

illuminated manuscripts from Jean Paradis, who was in 1470 made a

member of the _librariers gild_.

Kirchhoff quotes a document dated 1346, the wording of which is in the

form of a contract between Wouters Vos and Jan Standard, described

as manuscript-dealers, “parties of the first part,” and a group of

citizens, “parties of the second part.” The contract has to do with

the transfer of certain books as security for a loan. The list of the

books includes copies of the Codex of Justinian, some essays on taxes,

polities, and rhetoric, a work by Albertus, a treatise by Ægidius, the

Physics of Aristotle, a commentary of Averrhoes, etc. These two dealers

of Bruges seem to have had an important collection of literature for so

early a period.

The manuscript-trade in the Netherlands was more important both in

character and in extent than that carried on in Germany, and it had

also a larger influence upon the general education of the people than

the book-trade of the time in either France or Italy. In France and

in Italy, the earlier book-trade was, as we have noted, connected

principally with the work of the universities. In the Low Countries,

on the other hand, particularly in such centres as Ghent, Antwerp,

and Bruges, there came into existence, during the first half of the

fifteenth century, an active and intelligently conducted business in

the production of books both of a scholarly and of a popular character,

the sale of which was made very largely among the citizens, outside

of the university circles. One reason why the trade in books found a

larger development in Belgium than in Germany, was the greater wealth

of the trading class in the Low Countries. With the wealth, came

cultivation and a taste for luxuries, and among luxuries soon came to

be included art and literature.

As early as 1424, there was instituted a guild of publishers,

_librariers gild_, in Ghent, and a year or two later one in Brussels.

These guilds came into relations in 1450 with the St. Lucas Guild in

Antwerp.

According to Kapp, the first evidences of an organised German trade

in manuscripts are to be found at the beginning of the fifteenth

century. He is, however, convinced that a very considerable exchange

of literary material in manuscripts must have found place at a much

earlier date. There came to be in the German towns and among the

citizen class an earlier interest in literature than there is evidence

of at this time in the same class of any other country of Europe. This

demand for reading matter on the part of the citizen class brought into

existence in Germany (at a time when in Italy, France, and England

there were practically no books in other than the Latin language) a

considerable mass of popular literature written in the vernacular,

and copied out on cheap material in such way as to make possible a

general circulation. This popular circulation of books written for the

common folk was very much facilitated by the introduction into Germany,

as early as the fourteenth century, of paper, which for the cheaper

manuscripts took the place of the old-time parchment.

The Order of Brothers of Common Life carried on their literary work,

so to speak, between the monasteries and the writers of the general

lay community. They had for their first purpose the dissemination of

sound doctrine, but as they were trying to give instruction direct

to the common folk, they put their teachings into the dialect of the

place, and they wrote out in their own monasteries the chap-books and

instruction books which, at times distributed freely from the monastery

centres, came to be very largely sold.

Their work lay between that of the monastery monks and that of the

city scribes in another respect. As before indicated, the work of

the scribes in the _scriptorium_ was performed for no individual

remuneration. If the manuscripts were sold or were exchanged for

property of one kind or another, the benefit of the sale or exchange

accrued to the monastery. On the other hand, the scribes of the cities,

as they came to organise themselves into an accepted trade, arrived at

a system of fixed charges for their work. The Brothers of Common Life,

while living together in monkish centres, did not withdraw themselves

from the life of the world, but made it their first duty, using their

monastery homes simply as a starting-place or place of consultation

or as centres of education, to go out into the highways and by-ways,

teaching what they had to teach direct to the people whom they met; and

as an important means of this instruction they used their facilities

as scribes for manifolding the tracts and the scriptural classics

with which they provided themselves. It was their recognition of the

enormous service that could be secured in influencing a community

through the distribution of books, that made them so prompt in their

appreciation of the value of the printing-press and that caused them to

take place among the first printers of Germany.

The term commonly given to the earlier German scribes was _clericus_,

or _pfaffe_, and nearly every well-to-do nobleman or citizen had a

_clericus_, or _pfaffe_, to take charge of his correspondence and his

accounts.

While the general use of this term indicates the ecclesiastical origin

of the scribes and confirms the previous records to the effect that

the first scribes undoubtedly were monks trained in the monasteries,

it is of course by no means to be accepted as evidence that the art of

writing continued, at least after the fourteenth century, to be limited

to ecclesiastics. As has before been indicated, the monastery schools

accepted very many pupils who had no intention of entering the Church,

but who secured from their monkish teachers a knowledge of reading and

writing.

As early as 1403, mention is made of a certain Heilmannus, formerly

a cleric of the diocese of Trier, licensed as a public scribe (_eyn

offenbar schreiber_). At about the same time, Dr. Conrad Humery, of

Mayence, is referred to in the chronicles as _pfaffe_, _jurist_,

and _chancellor_ of the city. Ulrich Zell, who later became the

first printer in Cologne, was accustomed to add to the imprint of

his works the designation _clericus_ from Hanau in the diocese of

Mayence. Notwithstanding the term _clericus_ and the reference to his

diocese, Ulrich had never been an ecclesiastic.[393] The ecclesiastical

divisions, parishes or dioceses, were utilised in those times, as

political divisions are to-day, as the territorial designations that

would be most readily understood.

The trade in books in manuscript was developed from two great sources.

For a certain special and restricted class of work, the trade came into

existence and continued, as we have seen, for some centuries, in the

Italian universities, in the University of Paris, and in two or three

of the older German universities. Some little time later, the scribes

found place among the hand-workers and dealers of the larger cities.

Their work was at first carried on most actively in connection with

cathedrals and churches, and, later, associated itself with the annual

markets and fairs.

In the trade centres, where the goldsmiths, designers, and illuminators

found profitable occupation, the skilled writers (that is to say, those

who were competent to prepare the elaborately ornamented manuscripts)

soon found occupation, while the writers of common text came to be

employed particularly, as mentioned, in the markets and fairs in

connection with the records and correspondence required for business

transactions.

Throughout the first half of the fifteenth century the production of

manuscripts, which, from the beauty of their script and the artistic

finish of their illustrations and ornamentations, could be classed as

works of art, became an important industry, an industry of which the

centres in Germany and the Low Countries were Bruges, Ghent, Antwerp,

Aix-la-Chapelle, Cologne, Strasburg, Augsburg, Ulm, and Vienna.

As before indicated, the manuscripts produced in the Netherlands and

in Burgundy far surpassed those of Germany and, for that matter, those

of the rest of the world, in beauty and in the elaboration of their

artistic finish and ornamentation. The Dukes of Burgundy took a large

personal interest in this special industry of their dominions, and

their patronage did much to make the art fashionable and to further its

development.

When, after the introduction of printing, the printers and book-makers

instituted their trade-unions or guilds in Ghent and in Bruges, they

absorbed into their organisations the existing associations of fine

writers, scribes, illuminators, etc.

In the library of S. Mark’s, in Venice, there is a beautiful breviary

known as that of Grimani, which was produced in 1478 by certain artists

of Bruges, among whom is mentioned John Memmling, and which was

purchased in 1489, for five hundred ducats, by the Cardinal Grimani.

About the same time, that is to say, between 1468 and 1469, was

produced the copy of Froissart’s Chronicles which had been prepared in

Bruges for the son of Duke Philip of Burgundy, and which is at present

in the possession of the library of the University of Breslau.

The labour of the scribes of the fifteenth century was, however, by no

means exclusively devoted to works of magnificence (_prachtwerke_).

From the shops of the ordinary writers, were produced considerable

masses of text-books, books of worship, cookery books, astrological

treatises, almanacs, and even political tracts. Before the middle

of the century, there are records of licensed scribes carrying on

a general business for the public in Cologne, Frankfort, Augsburg,

Vienna, and even in smaller towns, such as Nordlingen.

The scribes of the universities, who were included among the

university officials, and who, in securing certain university

privileges, subjected themselves also to a rather elaborate series

of restrictions, were naturally not in a position to leave their

university towns to do work in other centres. In fact, it was for

a long time not permitted for them to take up any work outside of

providing the copies required of the authorised university texts.

The scribes who were not associated with any official bodies were,

however, free to carry their work from place to place according as the

varying demand of the seasons of the year, a demand dependent upon the

markets, the fairs, and other special business conditions, might give

opportunity for a profitable use of their labours. The shops of these

town scribes were, as a rule, in the open places, more particularly in

the market, in the neighbourhood of the town hall, or under the shadow

of the cathedral or principal church. Frequently, where the business

was not quite important enough to warrant a shop, it was carried on

under the steps or in the porches of the church or the cathedral, and

sometimes even within the church building, in one of the chapels.

It seems probable that the old-time ecclesiastical associations of

the art (which was still known as “clerical”) may have caused the

authorities having charge of the church buildings to look with special

favour upon these later scribes, so that they were able to secure for

their trade facilities and accommodations which would not have been

afforded to workers or dealers in other occupations.

There is a reference, in 1408, in one of the Strasburg chronicles to

a scribe named Peter von Haselo, who sells books on the steps of the

cathedral of Our Lady.[394] In Cologne the manuscript-dealers took

possession of various corners or angles of the cathedral for their

shops or booths. In Münster the space immediately in front of the

cathedral was allotted to them. In a number of the larger cities the

scribes dealt not only in the productions of their own pens, but in

such ancient manuscripts as they had been able to collect, these

coming for the most part from Italy. It was from this branch of their

business that the booksellers came to be known quite frequently as

_antiquarii_.

While there gradually grew up throughout Germany an active trade in

manuscripts, the record shows an earlier development of this trade in

Italy and France, and even in England. Reference has already been made

to the activity as a book collector of Richard de Bury, who in the

first half of the fourteenth century secured through travelling dealers

manuscripts which had been brought from France and from Italy. De Bury

speaks of these dealers as taking commissions for the delivery of the

manuscripts at such interval of months as would be required for the

long journeys from Oxford to Paris and back, or from Oxford to Florence

or Venice.

It appears, however, that towards the middle of the fifteenth century,

when the work of town scribes in Germany had once begun and the

character of their productions came to be known to the common people,

the circulation of books among the people was more extensive in amount

and more wide-reaching in the territory and the classes of buyers

concerned than was the case in any other state of Europe.

In 1439, some dealers from the Siebengebirge brought from Basel to

Hermannstadt certain political controversies and tracts. Some of

the latter treated of the work of the Council of Basel, and came,

therefore, under the censorship of the Church, and their circulation in

Hermannstadt was forbidden.[395]

Between 1440 and 1450, the records of the annual fairs of Nordlingen

include repeated references to dealings in manuscripts.

After 1460, it is not always easy to determine whether the

specifications of the prices paid for books refer to manuscripts or

to printed copies. On the 27th of March, 1485, Rudolph Agricola, the

librarian of the Elector of the Palatinate, writes to his friend Adolph

Rusch, a bookseller from Strasburg who was at that time in Frankfort,

ordering for his library copies of the following books: Columella, _De

Re Rustica_; Celsus, _De Medicina_; _Macrobii Saturnalia_, _Statii_,

_Opera_, and Silius Italicus. It is certain, says Kirchhoff, that these

books had not yet been printed in Germany, and he is, therefore, of

opinion that Agricola was expecting to secure manuscripts. Kapp points

out, however, that certain of them had already been printed in Italy;

_Columella_, for instance, had been published in a volume with _Cato_

and _Varro_, in Venice in 1472, and in Reggio in 1482.

_Celsus_ appeared in Florence in 1478, and in Milan in 1481;

_Macrobius_, in Venice in 1472 and 1483; _Statius_ in Rome in 1476,

in Milan in 1483; _Silius_ in Rome, in 1471, in Milan in 1480, and in

Parma in 1481.

It seems probable that, in connection with the correspondence between

the scholars of Italy and the instructors in the University of

Heidelberg, news might very easily have come to the librarian of the

Elector of these important classical undertakings, and that he had

naturally desired to secure copies of the books for the Elector’s

library. As far as I can understand from the reference made by

Kapp, there is no record of the result of this order or inquiry,

or of the prices at which Agricola secured or hoped to secure the

books in question. It was undoubtedly the case that, as the work

of the printers, both German and Italian, came to be known to the

book collectors, there was a steady decrease in the prices paid for

manuscripts, until the business of the manuscript-dealers came to be

limited to the sale as curiosities of old codices, and the work of the

scribes in the reproduction of copies ceased altogether.

Reference has already been made to the prices paid during the Middle

Ages for more or less famous manuscripts. The difficulty with the

prices of which we have record is that they vary so considerably for

goods of apparently about the same description, a variation doubtless

depending upon the special conditions of the sale, the wealth or

eagerness of the purchaser, etc. In 1054, for instance, a _Book of the

Mass_ was sold by the monk named Ulrich (the sale being made with the

consent of the Abbot) in exchange for a great vineyard covering the

slope of a large hill, the exact dimensions of which are not given.

In 1057, a nun named Diemude, of the convent of Wessobrunn, exchanged

a Bible, which she had written with her own hand, for a farm on

Peissenburg. Without, however, the exact description of any particular

manuscript, a description which should specify the nature of the work

put into it, the illuminations, the designs, the covers, etc., it is,

of course, very difficult to compare one transaction with another.

Kapp speaks of a good copy of the _Corpus Juris_ as being valued in

1350 at 1000 gold gulden.[396] He quotes a purchase made by a certain

Prahel, in 1427, of a copy of _Livy_ for 120 gold gulden, and the

sale of a _Plutarch_ in 1470 (twenty years after Gutenberg’s press

began to work) for no less than 800 gold gulden. Jan Van Enkhuisen,

of Zwolle, received in 1460 for an illuminated Bible 500 gold gulden,

and for a Bible with a plain text (_einfach geschrieben_) 100 crowns.

In 1345, Etienne de Conty paid for a handsomely adorned copy of the

_Commentaries_ of Henry Bohic, 62 livres and 11 sous, a sum which Kapp

calculates to be the equivalent of 825 francs in the money of the

present day. For the production of this work, there were paid to the

scribes 31 livres and 5 sous, for the parchment 18 livres and 18 sous,

for six initials in gold, 1 livre and 10 sous, for other illuminations

3 livres and 6 sous, for the hire of the manuscript (paid to the

university _bidellus_), 4 livres, and for binding the volume, 1 livre

12 sous.

The Countess of Anjou paid, in 1460, for a copy of the _Homilies_ of

Haimon, Bishop of Halberstadt, two hundred sheep, five measures of

wheat, and five measures of barley.