A. D. 1861 (JULY-NOVEMBER); 1862 (MARCH-JULY), and after.
POTOSI, The Spanish province of.
Modern Bolivia.
See ARGENTINE REPUBLIC: A. D. 1580-1777.
{2583}
POTTAWATOMIES.
See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY, AND OJIBWAS.
POUNDAGE.
See TUNNAGE AND POUNDAGE.
POWHATANS, The.
See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: POWHATAN CONFEDERACY.
POYNING'S ACTS.
See IRELAND: A. D. 1494.
PRÆFECTS.
PREFECTS.
PRÉFÊTS.
See ROME: B. C. 31-A. D. 14;
and PRÆTORIAN PRÆFECTS.
PRÆMUNIRE, Statute of.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1306-1393.
PRÆNESTE, Sulla's capture of.
Præneste, the ancient city of the Latins, held against Sulla,
in the first civil war, by young Marius, was surrendered after
the battle at the Colline Gate of Rome. Sulla ordered the male
inhabitants to be put to the sword and gave up the town to his
soldiers for pillage.
_W. Ihne,
History of Rome,
book 7, chapter 19._
PRÆNOMEN.
NOMEN.
COGNOMEN.
See GENS.
PRÆTOR.
See ROME: B. C. 366.
----------PRÆTORIANS: Start--------
PRÆTORIAN GUARDS.
PRÆTORIANS.
"The commander–in-chief of a Roman army was attended by a
select detachment, which, under the name of 'Cohors
Praetoria,' remained closely attached to his person in the
field, ready to execute his orders, and to guard him from any
sudden attack. … Augustus, following his usual line of policy,
retained the ancient name of 'Praetoriae Cohortes,' while he
entirely changed their character. He levied in Etruria,
Umbria, ancient Latium, and the old Colonies, nine or ten
Cohorts, consisting of a thousand men each, on whom he
bestowed double pay and superior privileges. These formed a
permanent corps, who acted as the Imperial Life Guards, ready
to overawe the Senate, and to suppress any sudden popular
commotion."
_W. Ramsay,
Manual of Roman Antiquity,
chapter 12._
The Prætorian Guard had been quartered, during the reign of
Augustus, and during the early years of the reign of Tiberius,
in small barracks at various points throughout the city, or in
the neighboring towns. Sejanus, the intriguing favorite of
Tiberius, being commander of the formidable corps, established
it in one great permanent camp, "beyond the north-eastern
angle of the city, and between the roads which sprang from the
Viminal and Colline gates." This was done A. D. 23.
_C. Merivale,
History of the Romans,
chapter 45._
See, also, ROME: A. D. 14-37.
PRÆTORIANS: A. D. 41.
Their elevation of Claudius to the throne.
See ROME: A. D. 41.
PRÆTORIANS: A. D. 193.
Murder of Pertinax and sale of the empire.
See ROME: A. D. 192-284.
PRÆTORIANS: A. D. 193.
Reconstitution by Severus.
Severus, whose first act on reaching Rome had been to disarm
and disband the insolent Guard which murdered Pertinax and
sold the empire to Julianus, had no thought of dispensing with
the institution. There was soon in existence a new
organization of Prætorians, increased to four times the
ancient number and picked from all the legions of the
frontiers.
_E. Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapter 5._
PRÆTORIANS: A. D. 238.
Murder of Balbinus and Pupienus.
See ROME: A. D. 192-284.
PRÆTORIANS: A. D. 312.
Abolition by Constantine.
"By the prudent measures of Diocletian, the numbers of the
Prætorians were insensibly reduced, their privileges
abolished, and their place supplied by two faithful legions of
Illyricum, who, under the new titles of Jovians and
Herculians, were appointed to perform the service of the
imperial guards. … They were old corps stationed at Illyricum;
and, according to the ancient establishment, they each
consisted of 6,000 men. They had acquired much reputation by
the use of the plumbatæ, or darts loaded with lead."
_E. Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapter 13, with foot-note._
Restored and augmented by Maxentius, during his brief reign,
the Prætorians were finally abolished and their fortified camp
destroyed, by Constantine, after his victory in the civil war
of A. D. 312.
_E. Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapter 13._
----------PRÆTORIANS: End--------
PRÆTORIAN PRÆFECTS.
"As the government degenerated into military despotism, the
Prætorian præfect, who in his origin had been a simple captain
of the guards, was placed not only at the head of the army,
but of the finances, and even of the law. In every department
of administration he represented the person, and exercised the
authority, of the emperor. The first præfect who enjoyed and
abused this immense power was Plautianus, the favourite
minister of Severus. … They [the Prætorian præfects) were
deprived by Constantine of all military command as soon as
they had ceased to lead into the field, under their immediate
orders, the flower of the Roman troops; and at length, by a
singular revolution, the captains of the guards were
transformed into the civil magistrates of the provinces.
According to the plan of government instituted by Diocletian,
the four princes had each their Prætorian præfect; and, after
the monarchy was once more united in the person of
Constantine, he still continued to create the same number of
four præfects, and intrusted to their care the same provinces
which they already administered.
1. The Præfect of the East stretched his ample jurisdiction"
from the Nile to the Phasis and from Thrace to Persia.
"2. The important provinces of Pannonia, Dacia, Macedonia, and
Greece, acknowledged the authority of the Præfect of
Illyricum.
3. The power of the Præfect of Italy" extended to the Danube,
and over the islands of the Mediterranean and part of Africa.
"4. The Præfect of the Gauls comprehended under that plural
denomination the kindred provinces of Britain and Spain, and …
to the foot of Mount Atlas.
… Rome and Constantinople were alone excepted from the
jurisdiction of the Prætorian præfects. … A perfect equality
was established between the dignity of the two municipal, and
that of the four Prætorian præfects."
_E. Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapters 5 and 17._
See, also, ROME: B. C. 31-A. D. 14.
PRÆTORIUM, The.
"In the very early days of Rome, before even Consuls had a
being, the two chief magistrates of the republic bore the
title of Praetors. Some remembrance of this fact lingering in
the speech of the people gave always to the term Prætorium
(the Praetor's house) a peculiar majesty, and caused it to be
used as the equivalent of palace. So in the well-known
passages of the New Testament, the palace of Pilate the
Governor at Jerusalem, of Herod the King at Caesarea, of Nero
the Emperor at Rome, are all called the Praetorium. From the
palace the troops who surrounded the person of the Emperor
took their well-known name, 'the Praetorian Guard.'"
_T. Hodgkin,
Italy and Her Invaders,
book 1, chapter 3 (volume 1)._
{2584}
PRAGA, Battle of (1831).
See POLAND: A. D. 1830-1832.
----------PRAGMATIC SANCTION: Start--------
PRAGMATIC SANCTION.
"No two words convey less distinct meaning to English ears
than those which form this title: nor are we at all prepared
to furnish an equivalent. Perhaps 'a well considered
Ordinance' may in some degree represent them: i. e. an
Ordinance which has been fully discussed by men practised in
State Affairs. But we are very far from either recommending or
being satisfied with such a substitute. The title was used in
the Lower [the Byzantine] Empire, and Ducange ad v. describes
'Pragmaticum Rescriptum seu Pragmatica Sanctio' to be that
which 'ad hibitâ diligente causæ cognitione, ex omnium
Procerum consensu in modum sententiæ lecto, a Principe
conceditur.'"
_E. Smedley,
History of France,
part 1, chapter 15, footnote._
"Pragmatic Sanction being, in the Imperial Chancery and some
others, the received title for Ordinances of a very
irrevocable nature, which a sovereign makes, in affairs that
belong wholly to himself, or what he reckons his own rights."
_T. Carlyle,
History of Frederick II.,
book 5, chapter 2._
"This word [pragmatic] is derived from the Greek 'pragma,'
which means 'a rule.'"
_E. de Bonnechose,
History of France,
volume 1, epoch 2, book 1, chapter 5, foot-note._
The following are the more noted ordinances which have borne
this name.
PRAGMATIC SANCTION: A. D. 1220 and 1232.
Of the Emperor Frederick II.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1250-1272.
PRAGMATIC SANCTION:A. D. 1268 (?).
Of St. Louis.
See FRANCE: A. D. 1268.
PRAGMATIC SANCTION: A. D. 1438.
Of Charles VII. of France, and its abrogation.
See FRANCE: A. D. 1438; and 1515-1518.
PRAGMATIC SANCTION:A. D. 1547.
Of the Emperor Charles V. for the Netherlands.
See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1547.
PRAGMATIC SANCTION: A. D. 1718.
Of the Emperor Charles VI.
See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1718-1738; and 1740 (OCTOBER).
----------PRAGMATIC SANCTION: End--------
----------PRAGUE: Start--------
PRAGUE: A. D. 1348-1409.
The University and the German secession.
See EDUCATION, MEDIÆVAL: GERMANY;
and BOHEMIA: A. D. 1405-1415.
PRAGUE: A. D. 1620.
Battle of the White Mountain.
Abandonment of crown and capital by Frederick.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1620.
PRAGUE: A. D. 1631.
Occupied and plundered by the Saxons.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1631-1632.
PRAGUE: A. D. 1648.
Surprise and capture of the Kleinsite by the Swedes.
Siege of the older part of the city.
The end of the Thirty Years War.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1646-1648.
PRAGUE: A. D. 1741.
Taken by the French, Saxons and Bavarians.
See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1741 (AUGUST-NOVEMBER).
PRAGUE: A. D. 1742.
The French blockaded in the city.
Retreat of Belleisle.
See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1742 (JUNE-DECEMBER).
PRAGUE: A. D. 1744.
Won and lost by Frederick the Great.
See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1743-1744; and 1744-1745.
PRAGUE: A. D. 1757.
Battle.
Prussian victory
Siege.
Relief by Count Daun.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1757 (APRIL-JUNE).
PRAGUE: A. D. 1848.
Bombardment by the Austrians.
See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1848-1849.
----------PRAGUE: End--------
PRAGUE, Congress of.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1813 (MAY-AUGUST).
PRAGUE,
Treaty of (1634).
See GERMANY: A. D. 1634-1639.
Treaty of (1866).
See GERMANY: A. D. 1866.
PRAGUERIE.
The commotions produced by John Huss, at Prague, in the
beginning of the 15th century, gave the name Praguerie, at
that period, to all sorts of popular disturbances.
PRAIRIAL, The month.
See FRANCE: A. D. 1793 (OCTOBER)
THE NEW REPUBLICAN CALENDAR.
PRAIRIAL FIRST, The insurrection of.
See FRANCE: A. D. 1795 (APRIL).
PRAIRIAL TWENTY-SECOND, Law of the.
See FRANCE: A. D. 1794 (JUNE-JULY).
PRAIRIE GROVE, Battle of.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A. D. 1862 (SEPTEMBER-DECEMBER: MISSOURI-ARKANSAS).
PRAKRITA.
See SANSKRIT
PRATO, The horrible sack of (1512).
See FLORENCE: A. D. 1502-1569.
PRECIANI, The.
See AQUITAINE: THE ANCIENT TRIBES.
PRECIEUSES.
See RAMBOUILLET, HÔTEL DE.
PRECIOUS METALS, Production of.
See MONEY AND BANKING: 16-17TH CENTURIES, and 1848-1893.
PREFECTS.
PRÉFÊTS.
PRÆFECTS.
See ROME: B. C. 31-A. D. 14;
and PRÆTORIAN PRÆFECTS.
PREMIER.
PRIME MINISTER.
See CABINET, THE ENGLISH.
PREMISLAUS, King of Poland, A. D. 1289-1296.
PREMONSTRATENSIAN ORDER.
This was the most important branch of the Regular Canons of
St. Augustine, founded by St. Norbert, a German nobleman, who
died in 1134. It took its name from Pre-montre, in Picardy,
where the first house was established.
_E. L. Cutts,
Scenes and Characters of the Middle Ages,
chapter 3._
ALSO IN:
_J. Alzog,
Manual of Universal Church History,
section 243 (volume 2)._
See AUSTIN CANONS.
PRESBURG, OR PRESSBURG, Peace of (1805).
See GERMANY: A. D. 1805-1806.
----------PRESBYTERIANS: Start--------
PRESBYTERIANS, English,
in the Civil War.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1643 (JULY),
and (JULY-SEPTEMBER); 1646 (MARCH);
1647 (APRIL-AUGUST); (AUGUST-DECEMBER); 1648.
PRESBYTERIANS:
At the Restoration.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1658-1660; 1661; and 1662-1665.
PRESBYTERIANS:
In Colonial Massachusetts.
See MASSACHUSETTS: A. D. 1646-1651.
PRESBYTERIANS:
Scotch-Irish.
See SCOTCH-IRISH.
PRESBYTERIANS:
Scottish.
See CHURCH OF SCOTLAND.
----------PRESBYTERIANS: End--------
PRESCOTT, Colonel William, and the battle of Bunker Hill.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1775 (JUNE).
{2585}
PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
"The executive power shall be vested in a President of the
United States of America. He shall hold his office during the
term of four years, and, together with the Vice-President,
chosen for the same term, be elected as follows: Each State
shall appoint, in such manner as the legislature thereof may
direct, a number of electors, equal to the whole number of
Senators and Representatives to which the State may be
entitled in the Congress [and these electors, meeting in their
respective States, shall vote for President and
Vice-President, transmitting certified lists of their votes to
the President of the Senate of the United States, who shall
count them in the presence of the two Houses of Congress; and
if no person is elected President by a majority of all the
votes cast, then the House of Representatives shall elect a
President from the three persons who received the highest
numbers of the votes cast by the electors, the representation
from each State having one vote in such election]. … No person
except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United
States at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall
be eligible to the office of President; neither shall any
person be eligible to that office who shall not have attained
to the age of thirty-five years, and been fourteen years a
resident within the United States. … The President shall be
Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States,
and of the militia of the several States, when called into the
actual service of the United States; he may require the
opinion, in writing, of the principal officer in each of the
executive departments, upon any subject relating to the duties
of their respective offices, and he shall have power to grant
reprieves and pardons for offences against the United States,
except in cases of impeachment. He shall have power, by and
with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties,
provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he
shall nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the
Senate, shall appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and
consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and all other officers
of the United States whose appointments are not herein
otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by law;
but the Congress may by law vest the appointment of such
inferior officers as they think proper in the President alone,
in the courts of law, or in the heads of departments. The
President shall have power to fill up all vacancies that may
happen during the recess of the Senate, by granting
commissions which shall expire at the end of their next
session. He shall from time to time give to the Congress
information of the state of the Union, and recommend to their
consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary and
expedient; he may, on extraordinary occasions, convene both
houses, or either of them, and in case of disagreement between
them, with respect to the time of adjournment, he may adjourn
them to such time as he shall think proper; he shall receive
ambassadors and other public ministers; he shall take care
that the laws be faithfully executed, and shall commission all
the officers of the United States. The President,
Vice-President, and all civil officers of the United States,
shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and
conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and
misdemeanors."
_Constitution of the United States,
article 2, and article 12 of amendments._
The provisions of the Constitution regarding the Presidential
succession, in case of the death or resignation of both
President and Vice-President, are: 'In case of the removal of
the President from office, or of his death, resignation, or
inability to discharge the powers and duties of the said
office, the same shall devolve on the Vice-President, and the
Congress may by law provide for the case of removal, death,
resignation, or inability both of the President and
Vice-President, declaring what officer shall then act as
President, and such officer shall act accordingly until the
disability be removed or a President shall be elected.'
_(Article II, Section 6.)_
In pursuance of the power thus granted to it in the last half
of this section, Congress in 1792 passed an act declaring that
in case of the death, resignation, etc., of both the President
and Vice-President, the succession should be first to the
President of the Senate and then to the Speaker of the House.
This order was changed by the act of 1886, which provided that
the succession to the presidency should be as follows:
1. President.
2. Vice-President.
3. Secretary of State.
4. Secretary of the Treasury.
5. Secretary of War.
6. Attorney General.
7. Postmaster General.
8. Secretary of the Navy.
9. Secretary of the Interior.
In all cases the remainder of the four-years' term shall be
served out. This act also regulated the counting of the votes
of the electors by Congress, and the determination of who were
legally chosen electors.
_Statutes of the United States passed at 1st Session
of 49th Congress, page 1._
ALSO IN:
_E. Stanwood,
History of Presidential Elections,
chapter 27._
_J. Story,
Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States,
book 3, chapters 36-37 (volume 3)._
_The Federalist,
numbers 66-76._
_J. Bryce,
The American Commonwealth,
chapters 5-8 (volume 1)._
PRESIDIO.
See TEXAS: A. D. 1819-1835
PRESS, The.
See PRINTING.
PRESSBURG, or
PRESBURG, Treaty of (1805).
See GERMANY: A. D. 1805-1800.
PRESS-GANG.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1812.
PRESTER JOHN, The Kingdom of.
"About the middle of the eleventh century stories began to be
circulated in Europe as to a Christian nation of north-eastern
Asia, whose sovereign was at the same time king and priest,
and was known by the name of Prester John. Amid the mass of
fables with which the subject is encumbered, it would seem to
be certain that, in the very beginning of the century, the
Khan of the Keraït, a tribe whose chief seat was at Karakorum,
between Lake Baikal and the northern frontier of China, was
converted to Nestorian Christianity—it is said, through the
appearance of a saint to him when he had lost his way in
hunting. By means of conversation with Christian merchants, he
acquired some elementary knowledge of the faith, and, on the
application of Ebed-Jesu, metropolitan of Maru, to the
Nestorian patriarch Gregory, clergy were sent, who baptized
the king and his subjects, to the number of 200,000. Ebed-Jesu
consulted the patriarch how the fasts were to be kept, since
the country did not afford any corn, or anything but flesh and
milk; and the answer was, that, if no other Lenten provisions
were to be had, milk should be the only diet for seasons of
abstinence. The earliest western notice of this nation is
given by Otho of Freising, from the relation of an Armenian
bishop who visited the court of pope Eugenius III. This report
is largely tinctured with fable, and deduces the Tartar
chief's descent from the Magi who visited the Saviour in His
cradle.
{2586}
It would seem that the Nestorians of Syria, for the sake of
vying with the boasts of the Latins, delighted in inventing
tales as to the wealth, the splendour, and the happiness of
their convert's kingdom; and to them is probably to be
ascribed an extravagantly absurd letter, in which Prester John
is made to dilate on the greatness and the riches of his
dominions, the magnificence of his state and the beauty of his
wives, and to offer the Byzantine emperor, Manuel, if he be of
the true faith, the office of lord chamberlain in the court of
Karakorum. In 1177 Alexander III. was induced by reports which
a physician named Philip had brought back from Tartary, as to
Prester John's desire to be received into communion with the
pope, to address a letter to the king, recommending Philip as
a religions instructor. But nothing is known as to the result
of this; and in 1202 the Keraït kingdom was overthrown by the
Tartar conqueror Genghis Khan. In explanation of the story as
to the union of priesthood with royalty in Prester John, many
theories have been proposed, of which two may be mentioned
here: that it arose out of the fact of a Nestorian priest's
having got possession of the kingdom on the death of a khan;
or that, the Tartar prince's title being compounded of the
Chinese 'wang' (king) and the Mongol 'khan,' the first of
these words was confounded by the Nestorians of Syria with the
name John, and the second with 'cohen' (a priest). … The
identification of Prester John's kingdom with Abyssinia was a
mistake of Portuguese explorers some centuries later."
_J. C. Robertson,
History of the Christian Church,
book 6, chapter 11, with foot-note (volume 5)._
ALSO IN:
_Colonel H. Yule,
Note to 'The Book of Marco Polo,'
volume 1, pages 204-209._
PRESTON,
Battle of (1648).
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1648 (APRIL-AUGUST).
Battle of (1715).
See SCOTLAND: A. D. 1715.
PRESTON PANS, Battle of (1745).
See SCOTLAND: A. D. 1745-1746.
PRESTONBURG, Battle of.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A. D. 1862 (JANUARY-FEBRUARY: KENTUCKY-TENNESSEE).
PRETAXATION.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1125-1152.
PRETENDERS, The Stuart.
See JACOBITES.
PRICE'S RAID.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A. D. 1864 (MARCH-OCTOBER: ARKANSAS-MISSOURI).
PRIDE'S PURGE.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1648 (NOVEMBER-DECEMBER).
PRIEST'S LANE, The.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1631-1632.
PRIM, General, Assassination of.
See SPAIN: A. D. 1866-1873.
PRIMATES.
METROPOLITANS.
PATRIARCHS.
In the early organization of the Christian Church, the bishops
of every province found it necessary "to make one of
themselves superior to all the rest, and invest him with
certain powers and privileges for the good of the whole, whom
they therefore named their primate, or metropolitan, that is,
the principal bishop of the province. … Next in order to the
metropolitans or primates were the patriarchs; or, as they
were at first called, archbishops and exarchs of the diocese.
For though now an archbishop and a metropolitan be generally
taken for the same, to wit, the primate of a single province;
yet anciently the name archbishop was a more extensive title,
and scarce given to any but those whose jurisdiction extended
over a whole imperial diocese, as the bishop of Rome,
Alexandria, Antioch, &c."
_T. Bingham,
Antiquities of the Christian Church,
book 2, chapters 16-17 (volume 1)._
See, also, CHRISTIANITY; A. D. 312-337.
PRIME MINISTER, The English.
See CABINET, THE ENGLISH.
PRINCE, Origin of the title.
See PRINCEPS SENATUS.
PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND.
"Prince Edward's Island, the smallest province of the Dominion
[of Canada], originally called St. John's Island, until 1770
formed part of Nova Scotia. The first Governor was Walter
Patterson. … The first assembly met in 1773." In 1873 Prince
Edward Island consented to be received into the Confederation
of the Dominion of Canada—the latest of the provinces to
accede to the Union, except Newfoundland, which still (1894)
remains outside.
_J. E. C. Munro,
The Constitution of Canada,
chapter 2._
See, also,
CANADA: A. D. 1867; and 1869-1873.
PRINCE OF THE CAPTIVITY.
See JEWS: A. D. 200-400.
PRINCE OF WALES.
See WALES, PRINCE OF.
PRINCEPS SENATUS.
"As the title of imperator conferred the highest military rank
upon Augustus and his successors, so did that of princeps
senatus, or princeps (as it came to be expressed by an easy
but material abridgment), convey the idea of the highest civil
preeminence consistent with the forms of the old constitution.
In ancient times this title had been appropriated to the first
in succession of living censorii, men who had served the
office of censor; and such were necessarily patricians and
senators. The sole privilege it conferred was that of speaking
first in the debates of the senate; a privilege however to
which considerable importance might attach from the exceeding
deference habitually paid to authority and example by the
Roman assemblies. … The title of princeps was modest and
constitutional; it was associated with the recollection of the
best ages of the free state and the purest models of public
virtue; it could not be considered beyond the deserts of one
who was undoubtedly the foremost man of the nation. … The
popularity which the assumption of this republican title
conferred upon the early emperors may be inferred from the
care with which it is noted, and its constitutional functions
referred to by the writers of the Augustan age and that which
succeeded it. But it was an easy and natural step in the
progress of political ideas to drop the application of the
title, and contract it from prince of the senate, to prince
merely. The original character of the appellation was soon
forgotten, and the proper limits of its privileges confounded
in the more vague and general prerogative which the bare
designation of first or premier seemed to imply."
_C. Merivale,
History of the Romans,
chapter 31._
ALSO IN:
_E. Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapter 3, note by Dr. W. Smith._
PRINCETON, Battle of (1777).
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A. D. 1776-1777 WASHINGTON'S RETREAT.
PRINCIPES.
See LEGION, THE ROMAN.
{2587}
----------PRINTING AND THE PRESS: Start--------
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1430-1456.
The invention of movable type.
Rival claims for Coster and Gutenberg.
The first Printed Book.
"Before arriving at the movable type placed side by side, and
forming phrases, which appears to us to-day so simple and so
ordinary, many years passed. It is certain that long before
Gutenberg a means was found of cutting wood and metal in
relief and reproducing by application the image traced. …
Remembering that the numerous guilds of 'tailleurs d' images,'
or sculptors in relief, had in the Middle Ages the specialty
of carving ivories and of placing effigies on tombs, it can be
admitted without much difficulty that these people one day
found a means of multiplying the sketches of a figure often
asked for, by modelling its contour in relief on ivory or
wood, and afterwards taking a reproduction on paper or
parchment by means of pressure. When and where was this
discovery produced? We cannot possibly say; but it is certain
that playing cards were produced by this means, and that from
the year 1423 popular figures were cut in wood, as we know
from the St. Christopher of that date belonging to Lord
Spencer. … It is a recognised fact that the single sheet with
a printed figure preceded the xylographic book, in which text
and illustration were cut in the same block. This process did
not appear much before the second quarter of the 15th century,
and it was employed principally for popular works which were
then the universal taste. The engraving also was nothing more
than a kind of imposition palmed off as a manuscript; the
vignettes were often covered with brilliant colours and gold,
and the whole sold as of the best quality. … An attempt had
been made to put some text at the foot of the St. Christopher
of 1423, and the idea of giving more importance to the text
was to the advantage of the booksellers. … At the epoch of the
St. Christopher, in 1423, several works were in vogue in the
universities, the schools, and with the public. … To find a
means of multiplying these treatises at little cost was a
fortune to the inventor. It is to be supposed that many
artisans of the time attempted it; and without doubt it was
the booksellers themselves, mostly mere dealers, who were
tempted to the adventure by the sculptors and wood-cutters.
But none had yet been so bold as to cut in relief a series of
blocks with engravings and text to compose a complete work.
That point was reached very quickly when some legend was
engraved at the foot of a vignette, and it may be thought that
the 'Donatus' [i. e. the Latin Syntax of Ælius Donatus] was
the most ancient of books so obtained among the 'Incunabuli,'
as we now call them, a word that signifies origin or cradle.
The first books then were formed of sheets of paper or
parchment, laboriously printed from xylographic blocks, that
is to say wooden blocks on which a 'tailleur d' images' had
left in relief the designs and the letters of the text. He had
thus to trace his characters in reverse, so that they could be
reproduced as written; he had to avoid faults, because a
phrase once done, well or ill, lasted. It was doubtless this
difficulty of correction that gave the idea of movable types.
… This at least explains the legend of Laurent Coster, of
Haarlem, who, according to Hadrian Junius, his compatriot,
discovered by accident the secret of separate types while
playing with his children. And if the legend of which we speak
contains the least truth, it must be found in the sense above
indicated, that is in the correction of faults, rather than in
the innocent game of a merchant of Haarlem. … Movable type,
the capital point of printing, the pivot of the art of the
Book, developed itself little by little, according to needs,
when there was occasion to correct an erroneous inscription;
but, in any case, its origin is unknown. Doubtless to vary the
text, means were found to replace entire phrases by other
phrases, preserving the original figures; and thus the light
dawned upon these craftsmen, occupied in the manufacture and
sale of their books. According to Hadrian Junius, Laurent
Janszoon Coster (the latter name signifying 'the discoverer')
published one of the celebrated series of works under the
general title of 'Speculum' which was then so popular, … the
'Speculum Humanæ Salvationis.' … Junius, as we see, attributes
to Laurent Coster the first impression of the 'Speculum,' no
longer the purely xylographic impression of the 'Donatus' from
an engraved block, but that of the more advanced manner in
movable types [probably between 1430 and 1440]. In point of
fact, this book had at least four editions, similar in
engravings and body of letters, but of different text. It must
then be admitted that the fount was dispersed, and typography
discovered. … All the xylographic works of the 15th century
may be classed in two categories: the xylographs, rightly so
called, or the block books, such as the 'Donatus,' and the
books with movable types, like the 'Speculum,' of which we
speak. … The movable types used, cut separately in wood, were
not constituted to give an ideal impression. We can understand
the cost that the execution of these characters must have
occasioned, made as they were one by one, without the
possibility of ever making them perfectly uniform. Progress
was to substitute for this irregular process types that were
similar, identical, easily produced, and used for a long time
without breaking. Following on the essays of Laurent Coster,
continuous researches bore on this point. … Here history is
somewhat confused. Hadrian Junius positively accuses one of
Laurent Coster's workmen of having stolen the secrets of his
master and taken flight to Mayence, where he afterwards
founded a printing office. According to Junius, the metal type
was the discovery of the Dutchman, and the name of the thief
was John. Who was this John? Was it John Gænsefleisch, called
Gutenberg, or possibly John Fust? But it is not at all
apparent that Gutenberg, a gentleman of Mayence, exiled from
his country, was ever in the service of the Dutch inventor. As
to Fust, we believe his only intervention in the association
of printers of Mayence was as a money-lender, from which may
be comprehended the unlikelihood of his having been with
Coster, the more so as we find Gutenberg retired to
Strasbourg, where he pursued his researches. There he was, as
it were, out of his sphere, a ruined noble whose great
knowledge was bent entirely on invention. Doubtless, like many
others, he may have had in his hands one of the printed works
of Laurent Coster, and conceived the idea of appropriating the
infant process.
{2588}
In 1439 he was associated with two artisans of the city of
Strasbourg, ostensibly in the fabrication of mirrors, which
may be otherwise understood as printing of 'Speculums,' the
Latin word signifying the same thing. … Three problems
presented themselves to him. He wanted types less fragile than
wooden types and less costly than engraving. He wanted a press
by the aid of which he could obtain a clear impression on
parchment or paper. He desired also that the leaves of his
books should not be anopistograph, or printed only on one
side. … Until then, and even long after, the xylographs were
printed 'au frotton,' or with a brush, rubbing the paper upon
the forme coated with ink, thicker than ordinary ink. He
dreamed of something better. In the course of his work John
Gutenberg returned to Mayence. The idea of publishing a Bible,
the Book of books, had taken possession of his heart. … The
cutting of his types had ruined him. … In this unhappy
situation, Gutenberg made the acquaintance of a financier of
Mayence, named Fust, … who put a sum of 1,100 florins at his
disposal to continue his experiments. Unfortunately this money
disappeared, it melted away, and the results obtained were
absolutely ludicrous. … About this time a third actor enters
on the scene. Peter Schoeffer, of Gernsheim, a writer,
introduced into the workshop of Gutenberg to design letters,
benefited by the abortive experiments, and taking up the
invention at its dead-lock, conducted it to success. John of
Tritenheim, called Trithemius, the learned abbot of Spanheim,
is the person who relates these facts; but as he got his
information from Schoeffer himself, too much credence must not
be given to his statements. Besides, Schoeffer was not at all
an ordinary artisan. If we credit a Strasbourg manuscript
written by his hand in 1449, he was a student of the 'most
glorious university of Paris.'" How much Schoeffer contributed
to the working out of the invention is a matter of conjecture;
but in 1454 it was advanced to a state in which the first
known application of it in practical use was made. This was in
the printing of copies of the famous letters of indulgence
which Pope Nicholas V. was then selling throughout Europe.
Having the so far perfected invention in hand, Fust and
Schoeffer (the latter now having married the former's
granddaughter) wished to rid themselves of Gutenberg. "Fust
had a most easy pretext, which was to demand purely and simply
from his associate the sums advanced by him, and which had
produced so little. Gutenberg had probably commenced his
Bible, but, in face of the claims of Fust, he had to abandon
it altogether, types, formes, and press. In November, 1455, he
had retired to a little house outside the city, where he tried
his best, by the aid of foreign help, to establish a workshop,
and to preserve the most perfect secrecy. Relieved of his
company, Fust and Schoeffer were able to take up the
impression of the Bible and to complete it without him. … One
thing is certain: that the Bible of Schoeffer, commenced by
Gutenberg or not, put on sale by Fust and Schoeffer alone
about the end of 1455 or beginning of 1456, proves to be the
first completed book. … It is now called the Mazarine Bible,
from the fact that the copy in the Mazarin Library was the
first to give evidence concerning it. The book was put on sale
at the end of 1455 or beginning of 1456, for a manuscript note
of a vicar of St. Stephen at Mayence records that he finished
the binding and illuminating of the first volume on St.
Bartholomew's Day [June 13], 1456, and the second on the 15th
of August. … All these remarks show that the printers did not
proclaim themselves, and were making pseudo-manuscripts. …
Many of the copies are illuminated with as much care and
beauty as if they were the finest manuscripts. … Copies are by
no means uncommon, most of the great libraries having one, and
many are in private collections."
_H. Bouchot,
The Printed Book,
chapter 1._
"The general consent of all nations in ascribing the honour of
the invention of printing to Gutenberg seems at first sight a
very strong argument in his favour; but if Gutenberg were not
the first to invent and use movable types, but the clever man
who brought to perfection what already existed in a crude
state, we can quite imagine his fame to have spread everywhere
as the real inventor. As a master in the art of printing,
Gutenberg's name was known in Paris so early as 1472. … Mr.
Hessels … believes that the Coster mentioned in the archives
as living in Haarlem, 1436-83, was the inventor of types, and
that, taken as a whole, the story as told by Junius is
substantially correct. Personally I should like to wait for
more evidence. There is no doubt that the back-bone of the
Dutch claim lies in the pieces and fragments of old books
discovered for the most part in the last few decades, and
which give support to, at the same time that they receive
support from, the Cologne Chronicler. … These now amount to
forty-seven different works. Their number is being added to
continually now that the attention of librarians has been
strongly called to the importance of noting and preserving
them. They have been catalogued with profound insight by Mr.
Hessels, and for the first time classified by internal
evidence into their various types and classes. But, it may
well be asked, what evidence is there that all these books
were not printed long after Gutenberg's press was at work? …
The earliest book of Dutch printing bears date 1473, and not a
single edition out of all the so-called Costeriana has any
printer's name or place or date. To this the reply is, that
these small pieces were school-books or absies and such-like
works, in the production of which there was nothing to boast
of, as there would be in a Bible. Such things were at all
times 'sine ulla nota,' and certain to be destroyed when done
with, so that the wonder would be to find them so dated, and
the very fact of their bearing a date would go far to prove
them not genuine. These fragments have been nearly all
discovered in 15th-century books, printed mostly' in various
towns of Holland. … Mr. Hessels quotes forty-seven different
books as 'Costeriana,' which include four editions of the
Speculum, nineteen of Donatus, and seven of Doctrinale. The
Donatuses are in five different types, probably from five
different Dutch presses. Compared with the earliest dated
books of 1473 and onwards, printed in Holland, they have
nothing in common, while their brotherhood to the Dutch MSS.
and block-books of about thirty years earlier is apparent.
Just as astronomers have been unable to explain certain
aberrations of the planets without surmising a missing link in
the chain of their knowledge, so is it with early typography.
That such finished works as the first editions of the Bible
and Psalter could be the legitimate predecessors of the
Costeriana, the Bruges, the Westminster press, and others, I
cannot reconcile with the internal evidence of their
workmanship. But admit the existence of an earlier and much
ruder school of typography, and all is plain and harmonious."
_W. Blades,
Books in Chains, and other Bibliographical Papers,
pages 149-158._
ALSO IN:
_J. H. Hessels,
Gutenberg: was he the Inventor of Printing?_
_C. H. Timperley,
Encyclopœdia of Literature and Typographical Anecdote,
pages 101-120._
_H. N. Humphreys,
History of the Art of Printing,
chapters 3-4._
{2589}
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1457-1489.
Progress and diffusion of the art.
After the Mazarine Bible, "then follows the Kalendar for the
year 1457, most probably printed at the end of 1456. Then
again the printed dates, August 14, 1457 and 1459, with place
(Mentz) in the colophons of the Psalter issued by Fust and
Schoeffer; the printed year 1460 (with Mentz added) in the
Catholicon [a Latin Grammar and Dictionary]. &c. &c. So that,
with the exception of 1458, there is no interruption in Mentz
printing from the moment that we see it begin there. As
regards the printed psalter, its printers are mentioned
distinctly in the book itself; but the other books just
mentioned are assumed to have been issued by the same two
Mentz printing-offices which are supposed to be already at
work there in 1454, though the 1460 Catholicon and some of the
other works are ascribed by some to other printers. By the
side of these dates, we find already a Bible completed in 1460
by Mentelin at Strassburg, according to a MS. note in the copy
preserved at Freiburg. … Assuming then, for a moment, that
Mentz is the starting-point, we see printing spread to
Strassburg in 1460; to Bamberg in 1461; to Subiaco in 1465; in
1466 (perhaps already in 1463) it is established at Cologne;
in 1467 at Eltville, Rome; in 1468 at Augsburg, Basle,
Marienthal; in 1469 at Venice; 1470 at Nuremberg, Verona,
Foligno, Trevi, Savigliano, Paris; 1471 at Spire, Bologna,
Ferrara, Florence, Milan, Naples, Pavia, Treviso; 1472 at
Esslingen, Cremona, Mantua, Padua, Parma, Monreale, Fivizano,
Verona; 1473 at Laugingen, Ulm (perhaps here earlier),
Merseburg, Alost, Utrecht, Lyons, Brescia, Messina; 1474 at
Louvain, Genoa, Como, Savona, Turin, Vicenza; 1475 at Lubeck,
Breslau, Blaubeuren, Burgdorf, Modena, Reggio, Cagli, Caselle
or Casale, Saragossa; 1476 at Rostock, Bruges (here earlier?),
Brussels; 1477 at Reichenstein, Deventer, Gouda, Delft,
Westminster; 1478 at Oxford, St. Maartensdyk, Colle,
Schussenried, Eichstadt; 1479 at Erfurt, Würzburg, Nymegen,
Zwolle, Poitiers; 1480 at London [?], Oudenaarde, Hasselt,
Reggio; 1481 at Passau, Leipzig, Magdeburg, Treves, Urach;
1482 at Reutlingen, Memmingen, Metz, Antwerp; 1483 at Leiden,
Kuilenburg, Ghent, Haarlem; 1484 at Bois-le–Duc, Siena; 1485
at Heidelberg, Regensburg; 1486 at Munster, Stuttgart; 1487 at
Ingolstadt; 1488 at Stendal; 1489 at Hagenau, &c."
_J. H. Hessels,
Haarlem the Birth-place of Printing, not Mentz,
chapter 4._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1469-1515.
The early Venetian printers.
The Aldine Press.
"One of the famous first race of German printers, John of
Spires, arrived at Venice in the year 1469, and immediately
brought his art into full play; producing within the first
three months his fine edition of the 'Letters of Cicero.' a
masterpiece of early printing. … The success of John of Spires
as a printer was at once recognized by the Venetian Republic;
and Pasquale Malipiero, the reigning Doge, granted a patent
conferring upon him the sole right of printing books within
the territory of Venice. … But the enterprising printer did
not live to enjoy the privilege," and it was not continued to
any of his family, "On the withdrawal of the monopoly several
new printers set up their Presses in the city, among whom was
the celebrated Jenson, the ingenious Frenchman who was sent by
Charles VII. to acquire the art at Mayence. … John Emeric, of
Udenheim, was another of the German printers who immediately
succeeded John and Vindelin of Spires; and still more
successful, though somewhat later, in the field, was Erard
Ratdolt. … He [Ratdolt] is said to have been the first to
adopt a regular form of Title at all approaching our modern
conception of a Book-Title; and he also took the lead in the
production of those beautifully-engraved initials for which
the books printed in Italy towards the close of the 15th
century are famous. His most splendid work is undoubtedly the
'Elements of Euclid, with the Commentaries of Campanus.' …
Nicholas Jenson was the most renowned of those who followed
the earliest German printers in Venice, until his works were
partially eclipsed by those of the Aldi. … In 1470 he [Jenson]
had … completed his preparations, and the first four works
which issued from his Venetian press appeared in that year. …
These works were printed with Roman characters of his own
engraving, more perfect in form than those of any previous
printer. His types are in fact the direct parents of the
letters now in general use, which only differ from them in
certain small details dependent solely on fashion. … This
celebrated printer died in September of the year 1481. …
Andrea Torresani and others continued Jenson's Association,
making use of the same types. Torresani was eventually
succeeded in the same establishment by the celebrated Aldo
Manuccio, who, having married his daughter, adopted the
important vocation of printer, and became the first of those
famous 'Aldi,' as they are commonly termed, whose fame has not
only absorbed that of all the earlier Venetian printers, but
that of the early printers of every other Italian seat of the
art. … It was Manuccio who, among many other advances in this
art, first invented the semi-cursive style of character now
known as 'Italic'; and it is said that it was founded upon a
close imitation of the careful handwriting of Petrarch, which,
in fact, it closely resembles. This new type was used for a
small octavo edition of 'Virgil,' issued in 1501, on the
appearance of which he obtained from Pope Leo X. a letter of
privilege, entitling him to the sole use of the new type which
he had invented." The list of the productions of the elder
Aldus and his son Paul "comprises nearly all the great works
of antiquity, and of the best Italian authors of their own
time. From their learning and general accomplishments, the
Aldi might have occupied a brilliant position as scholars and
authors, but preferred the useful labour of giving correctly
to the world the valuable works of others. The Greek editions
of the elder Aldus form the basis of his true glory,
especially the 'Aristotle,' printed in 1405, a work of almost
inconceivable labour and perseverance."
_H. N. Humphreys,
History of the Art of Printing,
chapter 8._
{2590}
"Aldus and his studio and all his precious manuscripts
disappeared during the troubled years of the great Continental
war in which all the world was against Venice [see VENICE: A.
D. 1508-1500]. In 1510, 1511, and 1512, scarcely any book
proceeded from his press. … After the war Aldus returned to
his work with renewed fervour. 'It is difficult,' says
Renouard, 'to form an idea of the passion with which he
devoted himself to the reproduction of the great works of
ancient literature. If he heard of the existence anywhere of a
manuscript unpublished, or which could throw a light upon an
existing text, he never rested till he had it in his
possession. He did not shrink from long journeys, great
expenditure, applications of all kinds.' … It is not in this
way however that the publisher, that much questioned and
severely criticised middleman, makes a fortune. And Aldus died
poor. His privileges did not stand him in much stead,
copyright, especially when not in books but in new forms of
type, being non-existent in his day. In France and Germany,
and still nearer home, his beautiful Italic was robbed from
him, copied on all sides, notwithstanding the protection
granted by the Pope and other princes as well as by the
Venetian Signoria. His fine editions were printed from, and
made the foundation of foreign issues which replaced his own.
How far his princely patrons stood by him to repair his losses
there seems no information. His father-in-law, Andrea of
Asola, a printer who was not so fine a scholar, but perhaps
more able to cope with the world, did come to his aid, and his
son Paolo Manutio, and his grandson Aldo il Giovane, as he is
called, succeeded him in turn."
_Mrs. Oliphant,
The Makers of Venice,
part 4, chapter 3._
Aldus died in 1515. His son Paul left Venice for Rome in 1562.
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1476-1491.
Introduction in England.
The Caxton Press.
"It was probably at the press of Colard Mansion, in a little
room over the porch of St. Donat's at Bruges, that William
Caxton learned the art which he was the first to introduce
into England. A Kentish boy by birth, but apprenticed to a
London mercer, Caxton had already spent thirty years of his
manhood in Flanders as Governor of the English gild of
Merchant Adventurers there, when we find him engaged as
copyist in the service of Edward's sister, Duchess Margaret of
Burgundy. But the tedious process of copying was soon thrown
aside for the new art which Colard Mansion had introduced into
Bruges. … The printing-press was the precious freight he
brought back to England in 1476 after an absence of
five-and-thirty years. Through the next fifteen, at an age
when other men look for ease and retirement, we see him
plunging with characteristic energy into his new occupation.
His 'red pale' or heraldic shield marked with a red bar down
the middle invited buyers to the press he established in the
Almonry at Westminster, a little enclosure containing a chapel
and almshouses near the west front of the church, where the
alms of the abbey were distributed to the poor. … Caxton was a
practical man of business, … no rival of the Venetian Aldi or
of the classical printers of Rome, but resolved to get a
living from his trade, supplying priests with service books
and preachers with sermons, furnishing the clerk with his
'Golden Legend' and knight and baron with 'joyous and pleasant
histories of chivalry.' But while careful to win his daily
bread, he found time to do much for what of higher literature
lay fairly to hand. He printed all the English poetry of any
moment which was then in existence. His reverence for that
'worshipful man, Geoffrey Chaucer,' who 'ought to be eternally
remembered,' is shown not merely by his edition of the
'Canterbury Tales,' but by his reprint of them when a purer
text of the poem offered itself. The poems of Lydgate and
Gower were added to those of Chaucer. The Chronicle of Brut
and Higden's 'Polychronicon' were the only available works of
an historical character then existing in the English tongue,
and Caxton not only printed them but himself continued the
latter up to his own time. A translation of Boethius, a
version of the Eneid from the French, and a tract or two of
Cicero, were the stray first-fruits of the classical press in
England. Busy as was Caxton's printing-press, he was even
busier as a translator than as a printer. More than four
thousand of his printed pages are from works of his own
rendering. The need of these translations shows the popular
drift of literature at the time; but keen as the demand seems
to have been, there is nothing mechanical in the temper with
which Caxton prepared to meet it. A natural, simple-hearted
taste and enthusiasm, especially for the style and forms of
language, breaks out in his curious prefaces. … But the work
of translation involved a choice of English which made
Caxton's work important in the history of our language. He
stood between two schools of translation, that of French
affectation and English pedantry. It was a moment when the
character of our literary tongue was being settled, and it is
curious to see in his own words the struggle over it which was
going on in Caxton's time. 'Some honest and great clerks have
been with me and desired me to write the most curious terms
that I could find;' on the other hand, 'some gentlemen of late
blamed me, saying that in my translations I had over many
curious terms which could not be understood of common people,
and desired me to use old and homely terms in my
translations.' 'Fain would I please every man,' comments the
good-humoured printer, but his sturdy sense saved him alike
from the temptations of the court and the schools. His own
taste pointed to English, but 'to the common terms that be
daily used' rather than to the English of his antiquarian
advisers. 'I took an old book and read therein, and certainly
the English was so rude and broad I could not well understand
it,' while the Old-English charters which the Abbot of
Westminster lent as models from the archives of his house
seemed 'more like to Dutch than to English.' To adopt current
phraseology however was by no means easy at a time when even
the speech of common talk was in a state of rapid flux. …
Coupling this with his long absence in Flanders we can hardly
wonder at the confession he makes over his first translation,
that 'when all these things came to fore me, after that I had
made and written a five or six quires, I fell in despair of
this work, and purposed never to have continued therein, and
the quires laid apart, and in two years after laboured no more
in this work.' He was still however busy translating when he
died [in 1491].
{2591}
All difficulties in fact were lightened by the general
interest which his labours aroused. When the length of the
'Golden Legend' makes him 'half desperate to have accomplished
it' and ready to 'lay it apart,' the Earl of Arundel solicits
him in no wise to leave it and promises a yearly fee of a buck
in summer and a doc in winter, once it were done. 'Many noble
and divers gentle men of this realm came and demanded many and
often times wherefore I have not made and imprinted the noble
history of the San Graal.' … Caxton profited in fact by the
wide literary interest which was a mark of the time."
_J. R. Green,
History of the English People,
book 5, chapter 1 (volume 2)._
"Contemporary with Caxton were the printers Lettou and
Machlinia, … who carried on business in the city of London,
where they established a press in 1480. Machlinia had
previously worked under Caxton. … Wynkyn de Worde … in all
probability … was one of Caxton's assistants or workmen, when
the latter was living at Bruges, but without doubt he was
employed in his office at Westminster until 1491, when he
commenced business on his own account, having in his
possession a considerable quantity of Caxton's type. Wynkyn de
Worde, who was one of the founders of the Stationers' Company,
died in 1534, after having printed no less than 410 books
known to bibliographers, the earliest of which bearing a date
is the 'Liber Festivalis,' 4to, 1493."
_J. H. Slater,
Book Collecting,
chapter 9._
ALSO IN:
_C. Knight,
William Caxton._
_C. H. Timperley,
Encyclopœdia of Literary and Typographical Anecdote,
pages 138-194._
_T. C. Hansard,
History and Process of Printing
("The Five Black Arts," chapter 1)._
_Gentleman's Magazine Library:
Bibliographical Notes, and Literary Curiosities._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1496-1598.
The Estienne or Stephanus Press in Paris.
"With the names of Aldus and Elzevir we are all acquainted;
the name of Estienne, or Stephanus, has a less familiar sound
to English ears, though the family of Parisian printers was as
famous in its day as the great houses of Venice and Leyden.
The most brilliant member of it was the second Henry, whose
story forms a melancholy episode in French literary history of
the 16th century. … The Estiennes are said to have come of a
noble Provençal family, but nothing is exactly known of their
descent. The art of printing was not much more than fifty
years old when Henry Estienne, having learnt his trade in
Germany, came to Paris, and set up his press [about 1496] in
the Rue Saint Jean de Beauvais, opposite the school of Canon
Law. There for some twenty years he laboured diligently,
bringing out in that time no less than 120 volumes, chiefly
folios. The greater number of these are theological and
scholastic works; among the few modern authors on the list is
the name of Erasmus. Henry Estienne died in 1520 leaving three
sons. Robert, the second of them, was born probably in 1503.
The boys all being minors, the business passed into the hands
of their mother, who in the following year married Simon de
Colines, her late husband's foreman, and perhaps partner. …
Robert worked with De Colines for five or six years before he
went into business on his own account in the same street." It
was he who first gave celebrity to the name and the press.
"The spell of the Renaissance had early fallen upon the young
printer, and it held him captive almost till the end of his
life." He married "the daughter of the learned Flemish printer
Jodocus Badius, notable for her culture and her beauty. Latin
was the ordinary language of the household. The children
learned it in infancy from hearing it constantly spoken. … At
one time ten foreign scholars lived in Estienne's house to
assist him in selecting and revising his manuscripts and in
correcting his proofs. … Both Francis [King Francis I.] and
his sister Marguerite of Navarre had a great regard for
Robert, and often visited the workshop; to that royal
patronage the printer was more than once indebted for his
liberty and his life." His danger came from the bigoted
Sorbonne, with whom he brought himself into collision by
printing the Bible with as careful a correction of the text as
he had performed in the case of the Latin classics. After the
death of Francis I., the peril of the printer's situation
became more serious, and in 1550 he fled to Geneva, renouncing
the Roman Catholic faith. He died there in 1559.
_H. C. Macdowall,
An old French Printer
(Macmillan's Magazine, November 1892)._
The second Henry Estienne, son of Robert, either did not
accompany his father to Geneva, or soon returned to Paris, and
founded anew the Press of his family, bringing to it even more
learning than his father, with equal laboriousness and zeal.
He died at Lyons in 1598.
_E. Greswell,
A View of the Early Parisian Greek Press._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1535-1709.
Introduction in America.
The first Spanish printing in Mexico.
The early Massachusetts Press.
Restrictions upon its freedom.
"The art of printing was first introduced into Spanish
America, as early as the middle of the 16th century. The
historians whose works I have consulted are all silent as to
the time when it was first practiced on the American
continent; … but it is certain that printing was executed,
both in Mexico and Peru, long before it made its appearance in
the British North American colonies. [The precise date of the
introduction of printing into Mexico was for a long time in
doubt. … When Mr. Thomas wrote his 'History of Printing in
America,' early works on America were rare, and it is probable
that there was not one in the country printed in either
America or Europe in the 16th century, except the copy of
Molina's dictionary; now many of the period may be found in
our great private libraries. The dictionary of Molina, in
Mexican and Spanish, printed in Mexico, in 1571, in folio,
was, by many, asserted and believed to be the earliest book
printed in America. … No one here had seen an earlier book
until the 'Doctrina Christiana,' printed in the house of Juan
Cromberger, in the city of Mexico, in the year 1544, was
discovered. Copies of this rare work were found in two well
known private libraries in New York and Providence. For a long
time the honor was awarded to this as the earliest book
printed in America. But there is now strong evidence that
printing was really introduced in Mexico nine years before
that time, and positive evidence, by existing books, that a
press was established in 1540. Readers familiar with early
books relating to Mexico have seen mention of a book printed
there as early as 1535, … the 'Spiritual Ladder' of St John
Climacus. … It seems that no copy of the 'Spiritual Ladder'
has ever been seen in recent times, and the quoted
testimonials are the only ones yet found which refer to it.
_Note by Hon. John R. Bartlett,
appendix A., giving a 'List of Books printed in Mexico
between the years 1540 and 1560 inclusive.'_
{2592}
… In January, 1639, printing was first performed in that part
of North America which extends from the Gulf of Mexico to the
Frozen ocean. For this press our country is chiefly indebted
to the Rev. Mr. Glover, a nonconformist minister, who
possessed a considerable estate. … Another press, with types,
and another printer, were, in 1660, sent over from England by
the corporation for propagating the gospel among the Indians
in New England. This press, &c., was designed solely for the
purpose of printing the Bible, and other books, in the Indian
language. On their arrival they were carried to Cambridge, and
employed in the printing house already established in that
place. … The fathers of Massachusetts kept a watchful eye on
the press; and in neither a religious nor civil point of view
were they disposed to give it much liberty. … In 1662, the
government of Massachusetts appointed licensers of the press;
and afterward, in 1664, passed a law that 'no printing should
be allowed in any town within the jurisdiction, except in
Cambridge'; nor should any thing be printed there but what the
government permitted through the agency of those persons who
were empowered for the purpose. … In a short time, this law
was so far repealed as to permit the use of a press at Boston.
… It does not appear that the press, in Massachusetts, was
free from legal restraints till about the year 1755 [see
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1704-1729]. … Except in
Massachusetts, no presses were set up in the colonies till
near the close of the 17th century. Printing then [1686] was
performed in Pennsylvania [by William Bradford], 'near
Philadelphia' [at Shackamaxon, now Kensington], and afterward
in that city, by the same press which, in a few years
subsequent, was removed to New York.
See PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1685-1693;
also PENNSYLVANIA: A. D. 1692-1696.
The use of types commenced in Virginia about 1681; in 1682 the
press was prohibited. In 1709 a press was established at New
London, in Connecticut."
_I. Thomas,
History of Printing in America,
2nd edition. (Translated and Collection
of the American Antiquity Society, volume 5),
volume 1, pages 1-17._
ALSO IN:
_J. L. Bishop,
History of American Manufactures,
volume 1, chapter 7._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1612-1650.
Origin of printed newspapers.
The newspaper defined.
Its earliest appearances in Germany and Italy.
"Lally-Tollendal, in his 'Life of Queen Elizabeth,' in the
'Biographie Universelle' (vol. xiii, published in 1815, p. 56)
… remarks that 'as far as the publication of an official
journal is concerned, France can claim the priority by more
than half a century; for in the Royal Library at Paris there
is a bulletin of the campaign of Louis XII. in Italy in 1509.'
He then gives the title of this 'bulletin,' from which it
clearly appears that it is not a political journal, but an
isolated piece of news—a kind of publication of which there
are hundreds in existence of a date anterior to 1588 [formerly
supposed to be the date of the first English newspaper—see
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1622-1702], and of which there
is no doubt that thousands were issued. There is, for
instance, in the British Museum a French pamphlet of six
printed leaves, containing an account of the surrender of
Granada to Ferdinand and Isabella on the 'first of January
last past' (le premier jour de janvier dernierement passe), in
the year 1492; and there are also the three editions of the
celebrated letter of Columbus, giving the first account of the
discovery of America, all printed at Rome in 1493. Nay, one of
the very earliest productions of the German press was an
official manifesto of Diether, Archbishop of Cologne, against
Count Adolph of Nassau, very satisfactorily proved to have
been printed at Mentz in 1462. There is among the German
bibliographers a technical name for this class of printed
documents, which are called 'Relations.' In fact, in order to
arrive at a satisfactory conclusion with regard to the origin
of newspapers, it is requisite, in the first place, to settle
with some approach to precision what a newspaper is. Four
classes of publications succeeded to each other from the 15th
to the 19th century, to which the term has by different
writers been applied:
1st. Accounts of individual public transactions of recent
occurrence.
2nd. Accounts in one publication of several public
transactions of recent occurrence, only connected together by
having taken place about the same period, so as at one time to
form the 'news of the day.'
3rd. Accounts similar to those of the second class, but issued
in a numbered series.
4th. Accounts similar to those of the second class, but issued
not only in a numbered series, but at stated intervals.
The notices of the surrender of Granada and the discovery of
America belong to the first class, and so also do the last
dying speeches, which are in our own time cried about the
streets. These surely are not newspapers. The Times and Daily
News [London] belong to the fourth class, and these, of
course, are newspapers. … Are not, in fact, all the essentials
of a newspaper comprised in the definition of the second
class, which it may be as well to repeat: 'Accounts in one
publication of several public transactions of recent
occurrence, only connected together by having taken place
about the same period, so as at one time to form the news of
the day'? Let us take an instance. There is preserved in the
British Museum a collection of several volumes of interesting
publications issued in Italy between 1640 and 1650, and
containing the news of the times. They are of a small folio
size, and consist in general of four pages, but sometimes of
six, sometimes only of two. There is a series for the month of
December, 1644, consisting entirely of the news from Rome. The
first line of the first page runs thus:—'Di Roma,' with the
date, first of the 3rd, then of the 10th, then the 17th, then
the 24th, and lastly the 31st of December, showing that a
number was published every week, most probably on the arrival
of the post from Rome. The place of publication was Florence,
and the same publishers who issued this collection of the news
from Rome, sent forth in the same month of December, 1644, two
other similar gazettes, at similar intervals, one of the news
from Genoa, the other of the news from Germany and abroad.
That this interesting series of publications, which is well
worthy of a minute examination and a detailed description, is
in reality a series of newspapers, will, I believe, be
questioned by very few; but each individual number presents no
mark by which, if separately met with, it could be known to
form part of a set. …
{2593}
The most minute researches on the history of newspapers in
Germany are, as already mentioned, those of Prutz, who has
collected notices of a large number of the 'relations,' though
much remains to be gleaned. There are, for instance, in Van
Heusde's Catalogue of the Library at Utrecht (Utrecht, 1835,
folio), the titles of nearly a hundred of them, all as early
as the sixteenth century; and the British Museum possesses a
considerable quantity, all of recent acquisition. Prutz has no
notice of the two that have been mentioned, and, like all
preceding writers, he draws no distinction between the
publications of the first class and the second. The view that
he takes is, that no publication which does not answer to the
definition of what I have termed the fourth class is entitled
to the name of a newspaper. There was in the possession of
Professor Grellman a publication called an 'Aviso,' numbered
as '14,' and published in 1612, which has been considered by
many German writers as their earliest newspaper, but Prutz
denies that honour to it, on the ground of there being no
proof that it was published at stated intervals. In the year
1615 Egenolph Emmel, of Frankfort-on-the-Main, issued a weekly
intelligencer, numbered in a series, and this, according to
Prutz, is the proper claimant. Its history has been traced
with some minuteness in a separate dissertation by
Schwarzkopf, who has also the credit of having published in
1795 the first general essay on newspapers of any value, and
to have followed up the subject in a series of articles in the
Allgemeine Litterarische Anzeiger. … The claims of Italy have
yet to be considered. Prutz dismisses them very summarily,
because, as he says, the Venetian gazettes of the sixteenth
century, said to be preserved at Florence, are in manuscript,
and it is essential to the definition of a newspaper that it
should be printed. These Venetian gazettes have never, so far
as I am aware, been described at all; they may be mere
'news-letters,' or they may be something closely approaching
to the modern newspaper. But I am strongly inclined to believe
that something of the second class of Italian origin will turn
up in the great libraries of Europe when further research is
devoted to the subject. … The existence of these 'gazettes' in
so many languages furnishes strong ground for supposing that
the popularity of newspapers originated in Italy."
_T. Watts,
The fabricated "Earliest English Newspaper"
(Gentleman's Magazine, 1850, reprinted in the Gentleman's
Magazine Library; Bibliographical Notes, pages 146-150)._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1617-1680.
The Elzevirs.
"Just as the house of Aldus waned and expired, that of the
great Dutch printers, the Elzevirs, began obscurely enough at
Leyden in 1583. The Elzevir's were not, like Aldus, ripe
scholars and men of devotion to learning. Aldus laboured for
the love of noble studies; the Elzevirs were acute, and too
often 'smart' men of business. The founder of the family was
Louis (born at Louvain, 1540, died 1617). But it was in the
second and third generations that Bonaventura and Abraham
Elzevir began to publish at Leyden their editions in small
duodecimo. Like Aldus, these Elzevirs aimed at producing books
at once handy, cheap, correct, and beautiful in execution.
Their adventure was a complete success. The Elzevirs did not,
like Aldus, surround themselves with the most learned scholars
of their time. Their famous literary adviser, Heinsius, was
full of literary jealousies, and kept students of his own
calibre at a distance. The classical editions of the Elzevirs,
beautiful, but too small in type for modern eyes, are anything
but exquisitely correct. … The ordinary marks of the Elzevirs
were the sphere, the old hermit, the Athena, the eagle, and
the burning faggot. But all little old books marked with
spheres are not Elzevirs, as many booksellers suppose. Other
printers also stole the designs for the tops of chapters, the
Aegipan, the Siren, the head of Medusa, the crossed sceptres,
and the rest. In some cases the Elzevirs published their
books, especially when they were piracies, anonymously. When
they published for the Jansenists, they allowed their clients
to put fantastic pseudonyms on the title pages. But, except in
four cases, they had only two pseudonyms used on the titles of
books published by and for themselves. These disguises are
'Jean Sambix' for Jean and Daniel Elzevir, at Leyden, and 'for
the Elzevirs of Amsterdam, 'Jacques le Jeune.' The last of the
great representatives of the house, Daniel, died at Amsterdam,
1680. Abraham, an unworthy scion, struggled on at Leyden till
1712. The family still prospers, but no longer prints, in
Holland."
_A. Lang,
The Library,
chapter 3._
"Though Elzevirs have been more fashionable than at present,
they are still regarded by novelists as the great prize of the
book collector. You read in novels about 'priceless little
Elzevirs,' about books 'as rare as an old Elzevir.' I have
met, in the works of a lady novelist (but not elsewhere) with
an Elzevir 'Theocritus.' The late Mr. Hepworth Dixon
introduced into one of his romances a romantic Elzevir Greek
Testament, 'worth its weight in gold.' Casual remarks of this
kind encourage a popular delusion that all Elzevirs are pearls
of considerable price."
_A. Lang,
Books and Bookmen,
chapter 6._
ALSO IN:
_J. H. Slater,
Book Collecting,
chapter 8._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1622-1702.
The first printed Newspaper and
the first daily Newspaper in England.
"Up to 1839 (when Mr. Watts, of the British Museum, exposed
the forgery) the world was led to believe that the first
English newspaper appeared in 1588." Mr. Watts "ascertained
that 'The English Mercurie,' which Mr. George Chalmers first
discovered on the shelves of the British Museum, and which was
said to have been 'imprinted in London by her highness's
printer, 1588,' was a forgery, for which the second Earl of
Hardwicke appears to be answerable." As to the actual date of
the appearance of the first printed newspaper in England, "Mr.
Knight Hunt, in his 'Fourth Estate,' speaks confidently. …
'There is now no reason to doubt,' he says, 'that the puny
ancestor of the myriads of broad sheets of our time was
published in the metropolis in 1622; and that the most
prominent of the ingenious speculators who offered the novelty
to the world, was one Nathaniel Butter.' As the printing press
had then been at work in England for a century and a half,
Caxton having established himself in Westminster Abbey in
1471, and as manuscript news-letters had been current for many
years previous to 1622, one cannot help wondering that the
inventive wits of that age should have been so slow in finding
out this excellent mode of turning Faust's invention to
profitable account.
{2594}
Butter's journal was called—'The Weekly Newes,' a name which
still survives, although the original possessor of that title
has long since gone the way of all newspapers. The first
number in the British Museum collection bears date the 23rd of
May, 1622, and contains 'news from Italy, Germanie,' &c. The
last number made its appearance on the 9th of January, 1640; a
memorable year, in which the Short Parliament, dismissed by
King Charles 'in a huff,' after a session of three weeks, was
succeeded by the Long Parliament, which unlucky Charles could
not manage quite so easily. … It was nearly a century after
'The Weekly Newes' made its first appearance, before a daily
newspaper was attempted. When weekly papers had become firmly
established, some of the more enterprising printers began to
publish their sheets twice, and ultimately three times a week.
Thus at the beginning of last century we find several papers
informing the public that they are 'published every Tuesday,
Thursday, and Saturday morning.' One of the most respectable
looking was entitled 'The New State of Europe,' or a 'True
Account of Public Transactions and Learning.' It consisted of
two pages of thin, coarse paper … and contained altogether
about as much matter as there is in a single column of the
'Times' of 1855. The custom at that period was to publish the
newspaper on a folio or quarto sheet, two pages of which were
left blank to be used for correspondence. This is expressly
stated in a standing advertisement in the 'New State of
Europe,' in which the names of certain booksellers are given
'where any person may have this paper with a blank half sheet
to write their own private affairs.' … The first number of the
'Daily Courant' [the first daily newspaper in England] was
published on the 11th of March, 1702, just three days after
the accession of Queen Anne. … As regards the form and size of
the new journal, the 'author' condescends to give the
following information, with a growling remark at the
impertinence of the 'Postboys,' 'Postmen,' 'Mercuries,' and
'Intelligencers' of that day:—'This "Courant" (as the title
shows) will be published Daily, being designed to give all the
Material News as soon as every Post arrives, and is confined
to half the compass to save the Publick at least half the
Impertinences of ordinary Newspapers.' In addition to the
Prospectus we have quoted, the first number of the 'Daily
Courant' contains only nine paragraphs, five of which were
translated from the 'Harlem Courant,' three from the 'Paris
Gazette,' and one from the 'Amsterdam Courant.' They all
relate to the war of the Spanish Succession then waging, or to
the attempts making by diplomats to settle the affairs of the
Continent at some kind of Vienna or Utrecht Conference. After
adhering for several weeks to the strict rule of giving only
one page of news, and those entirely foreign, the 'Courant'
begins to show certain symptoms of improvement. The number for
April 22, contains two pages of news and advertisements. … The
alteration in the getting-up of the 'Courant' was owing to a
change of proprietorship. The paper had now come into the
hands of 'Sam Buckley, at the Dolphin, Little Britain.' … Mr.
Samuel Buckley, who continued to publish and conduct the
'Daily Courant' for many years, was a notable man among London
publishers, as we find from various references to him in the
fugitive literature of that age."
_The London Daily Press
(Westminster Review, October, 1855)._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1631.
The first printed Newspaper in France.
Dr. Renandot and his "Gazette."
"The first Frenchman to found a printed newspaper was Dr.
Théophraste Renaudot, who obtained the King's privilege for
the 'Gazette de France' in 1631. … He was a shrewd man, born
at London in 1567, brought up in Paris, but graduate of the
Faculty of Montpellier. In 1612, being then twenty-six, he
returned to the capital, and somehow got appointed at once
doctor to the King. But there was no salary attached to this
post, which was in his case purely honorary, and so Renaudot
opened a school, though the fact that he, a mere provincial
doctor, had obtained a medical appointment at court, was very
sore to the Paris Faculty of Medicine, who began to annoy him
from that moment. Renaudot, however, was a man far ahead of
his contemporaries in sagacity, patience, learning and
humanity. Petty spite did not disturb him, or at least it did
not deter him from executing any of the numerous plans he had
in mind for the welfare of his contemporaries. … This
extraordinary man not only inaugurated in France an Estate,
Professional and Servants' Agency, as well as an office for
private sales and exchanges, but further laid the basis of the
Poste Restante, Parcels Delivery, Post-Office Directory,
Tourist's Guide and Money Order Office; besides affording an
outlet to troubled spirits like those who correspond through
the agony column of 'The Times.' It is not surprising that his
office in the Rue de la Calandre should soon have been all too
small for its multifarious duties and that his original staff
of six clerks should, in less than three months, have swelled
to fifty. Richelieu, in sheer admiration at the man, sent for
him and thanked him for the services he was rendering the
King's subjects. He also offered him money to extend his
offices, and this Renaudot accepted, but only as a loan. It
was his custom to levy a commission of six deniers per livre
(franc) on the sales he effected, and by means of these and
other receipts he soon repaid the Cardinal every penny that
had been advanced to him. But he did more than this. Finding
that his registers were not always convenient modes of
reference, by reason of the excessive crowds which pressed
round them, he brought out a printed advertiser, which is
almost the exact prototype of a journal at present well known
in London. It was called 'Feuille du Bureau d'Adresses,' and
appeared every Saturday, at the price of 1 sou. Opinions
differ as to whether this paper preceded the 'Gazette de
France,' or was issued simultaneously with it. Probably it was
first published in manuscript form, but came out in print at
least six months before the 'Gazette,' for a number bearing
the date of June 14th, 1631, shows a periodical in full
organisation and containing indirect references to
advertisements which must have appeared several weeks before.
At all events this 'Feuille' was purely an advertisement
sheet—a forerunner of the 'Petites Affiches' which were
reinvented in 1746—it was in no sense a newspaper. … It is
clear that from the moment he started his 'Feuille du Bureau
d'Adresses,' Renaudot must have conceived the possibility of
founding a news-sheet. … The manuscript News Letters had
attained, by the year 1630, to such a pitch of perfection, and
found such a ready sale, that the notion of further
popularising them by printing must have suggested itself to
more than one man before it was actually put into practice.
{2595}
But the great bar was this, that nothing could be printed
without the King's privilege, and this privilege was not
lightly granted. … Renaudot, who had no wish to publish
tattle, had no reason to fear censorship. He addressed himself
to Richelieu, and craved leave to start a printed newspaper
under royal patronage. The politic Cardinal was quite shrewd
enough to see how useful might be to him an organ which would
set information before the public in the manner he desired,
and in that manner alone; so he granted all Renaudot wished,
in the form of 'letters patent,' securing him an entire
monopoly of printing newspapers, and moreover he conferred on
his protégé the pompous title of Historiographer of France.
The first number of the 'Gazette de France' appeared on
Friday, May 30, 1631. Its size was four quarto pages, and its
price one sol parisis, i. e. ½d., worth about l½d. modern
money. … The first number contained no preface or address,
nothing in the way of a leading article, but plunged at once
in medias res, and gave news from nineteen foreign towns or
countries, but oddly enough, not a line of French
intelligence. … The bulk of the matter inserted was furnished
direct by Richelieu from the Foreign Office, and several of
the paragraphs were written in his own hand. … The publication
of the 'Gazette' was continued uninterruptedly from week to
week but the press of matter was so great that Renaudot took
to issuing a Supplement with the last number of every month.
In this he condensed the reports of the preceding numbers,
corrected errors, added fresh news, and answered his
detractors. … At the end of the year 1631 he suppressed his
monthly Supplement, increased the 'Gazette' to eight pages,
and announced that for the future he would issue supplements
as they were needed. It seems they were needed pretty often,
for towards the beginning of the year 1633 Renaudot published
Supplements, under the title of 'Ordinaries and
Extraordinaries,' as often as twice, and even three times in
one week. In fact whenever a budget of news arrived which
would nowadays justify a special edition, the indefatigable
editor set his criers afoot with a fresh printed sheet,
shouting, 'Buy the "Extraordinary," containing the account of
the superb burial of the King of Denmark!' or, 'Buy and read
of the capture of the beautiful island of Curaçoa in the
Indies by the Dutch from the Spaniards!' Renaudot understood
the noble art of puffing. He dressed his criers in red, and
gave them a trumpet apiece to go and bray the praises of the
'Gazette' on the off days, when the paper did not appear. … On
the death of Renaudot, he was succeeded by his sons Eusèbe and
Isaac, who in their turn bequeathed the Gazette' to Eusèbe
junior, son of the elder brother, who took orders and
consequently left no progeny. After this the 'Gazette' became
Government property. … In 1762 the 'Gazette' was annexed to
the Foreign Office Department. … The 'Gazette de France'
continued to appear under royal patronage until May 1st, 1792,
when its official ties were snapped and it came out as a
private and republican journal with the date 'Fourth Year of
Freedom.' The 'Gazette' has flourished with more or less
brilliancy ever since, and has been for the last fifty years a
legitimist organ, read chiefly in the provinces."
_The French Press
(Cornhill Magazine, June, 1873)._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1637.
Archbishop Laud's Star-Chamber restriction of printing.
On the 11th of July, 1637, "Archbishop Laud procured a decree
to be passed in the star chamber, by which it was ordered,
that the master printers should be reduced to twenty in
number; and that if any other should secretly, or openly,
pursue the trade of printing, he should be set in the pillory,
or whipped through the streets, and suffer such other
punishment as the court should inflict upon him; that none of
the master printers should print any book or books of
divinity, law, physic, philosophy, or poetry, till the said
books, together with the titles, epistles, prefaces, tables,
or commendatory verses, should be lawfully licensed, on pain
of losing the exercise of his art, and being proceeded against
in the star chamber, &c.; that no person should reprint any
book without a new license; that every merchant, bookseller,
&c., who should import any book or books, should present a
catalogue of them to the archbishop or bishop, &c., before
they were delivered, or exposed to sale, who should view them,
with power to seize those that were schismatical; and, that no
merchant, &c., should print or cause to be printed abroad, any
book, or books, which either entirely or for the most part,
were written in the English tongue, nor knowingly import any
such books, upon pain of being proceeded against in the star
chamber, or high commission court. … That there should be four
founders of letters for printing, and no more. That the
archbishop of Canterbury, or the bishop of London, with six
other high commissioners, shall supply the places of those
four as they shall become void. That no master founder shall
keep above two apprentices at one time. That all journeymen
founders be employed by the masters of the trade; and that all
the idle journeymen be compelled to work upon pain of
imprisonment, and such other punishment as the court shall
think fit. That no master founder of letters shall employ any
other person in any work belonging to casting and founding of
letters than freemen and apprentices to the trade, save only
in putting off the knots of metal hanging at the end of the
letters when they are first cast; in which work, every master
founder may employ one boy only, not bound to the trade."
_C. H. Timperley,
Encyclopœdia of Literary and Typographical Anecdote,
page 490._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1647.
Renewed ordinance, in England, against the printers.
"An ordinance of parliament passed the house of lords on this
day [September 30, 1647], that no person shall make, write,
print, sell, publish or utter, or cause to be made, &c., any
book, pamphlet, treatise, ballad, libel, sheet, or sheets of
news whatsoever (except the same be licensed by both or either
house of parliament,) under the penalty of 40s. and an
imprisonment not exceeding forty days, if he can not pay it:
if a printer, he is to pay a fine of only 20s., or suffer
twenty days' imprisonment, and likewise to have his press and
implements of printing broken in pieces. The book-seller, or
stationer, to pay 10s., or suffer ten days' imprisonment,—and,
lastly, the hawker, pedlar, or ballad-singer, to forfeit all
his printed papers exposed to sale, and to be whipped as a
common rogue in the parish where he shall be apprehended.
{2596}
Early in the following year, the committee of estates in
Scotland passed an act prohibiting the printing under the pain
of death, any book, declaration, or writing, until these were
first submitted to their revisal. … One of the consequences of
these persecutions was the raising up of a new class of
publishers, those who became noted for what was called
'unlawful and unlicensed books.' Sparkes, the publisher of
Prynne's Histriomastix, was of this class. The presbyterian
party in parliament, who thus found the press closed on them,
vehemently cried out for its freedom; and it was imagined,
that when they ascended into power, the odious office of a
licenser of the press would have been abolished; but these
pretended friends of freedom, on the contrary, discovered
themselves as tenderly alive to the office as the old
government, and maintained it with the extremest vigour. Both
in England and Scotland, during the civil wars, the party in
power endeavoured to crush by every means the freedom of the
press."
_C. H. Timperley,
Encyclopœdia of Literary and Typographical Anecdote,
page 506._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1654-1694.
Freedom of the press under Cromwell.
Censorship under the restored Stuarts.
Roger L'Estrange and the first news reporters.
"During the Protectorate of Cromwell the newspaper press knew
… what it was to enjoy the luxury of freedom. The natural
result was that a very great increase took place in the number
of new political journals. Most of them, however, had only a
very brief existence. Many of their number could not boast of
a longer life than six or seven months—nay, many of them not
so much as even that term of life. But, as might have been
expected, from what was known of the antecedents of Charles
II., the freedom of the press, which previously existed, came
to an immediate end on his ascending the throne. Hardly had he
done so, than an edict was issued, prohibiting the publication
of any journal except the London Gazette, which was originally
printed at Oxford, and called the Oxford Gazette,—the Court
being then resident there on account of the plague raging in
London at the time, 1665, when it was commenced, and for some
time afterwards. This was an act of pure despotism. But
Government at this time reserved to itself the right —a right
which there was none to dispute—to publish a broad sheet in
connexion with the London Gazette, whenever they might deem it
expedient, which should contain either foreign or domestic
matters of interest,—of the knowledge of which some of the
King's subjects might wish to be put in early possession. …
The newspapers of the seventeenth century were permitted,
until the time of Charles II., to be published without being
licensed by the Government of the day; but in the reign of
that despotic sovereign, a law was passed [1662] prohibiting
the publication of any newspaper without being duly licensed.
… Sir John Birkenhead, … one of the three men whom Disraeli
the elder called the fathers of the English press, was
appointed to the office of Licenser of the Press. But he was
soon succeeded by Sir Roger l'Estrange."
_J. Grant,
The Newspaper Press,
volume 1, chapter. 2._
Roger L'Estrange "is remarkable for having been the writer of
the best newspapers which appeared before the age of Queen
Anne, and, at the same time, a most bitter enemy to the
freedom of the press. He was appointed licenser or censor in
1663, and in the same year was given authority to publish all
newspapers, periodicals, and pamphlets, not exceeding two
sheets in size. He appears to have looked upon his newspaper
as a noxious thing, suffered to exist only that an income
might be created for him in return for the labour of purging
the press. Yet he spared no pains to make his Public
Intelligencer readable, and if we may trust his letters now
preserved at the State Paper Office, expended in the first
year more than £500 on 'spyes for collecting intelligence.'
Three years afterwards he estimated the profits at £400 a
year. … He sent paid correspondents, or 'spyes' as they were
called, to all parts of the country, and even induced some
respectable persons, under promise of concealing their names,
to contribute occasional paragraphs; these persons were for
the most part repaid by sending to them their newspapers and
letters free of postage. Another set of 'spyes' was employed
in picking up the news of the town on Paul's Walk or in the
taverns and coffee–houses. L'Estrange printed about sixteen
reams of his Intelligencer weekly, which were for the most
part sold by the mercury-women who cried them about the
streets. One Mrs. Andrews is said to have taken more than
one-third of the whole quantity printed. … Advantage was taken
of a slip in the weekly intelligence to deprive L'Estrange of
his monopoly in favour of the new Oxford Gazette, published in
the winter of 1665 and transferred to London in the ensuing
spring. The Gazette was placed under the control of
Williamson, then a rising under-Secretary of State, under
whose austere influence nothing was suffered to appear which
could excite or even amuse the public. … L'Estrange has not
been a favourite with historians, and we confess that his
harsh measures towards the press are apt to raise a feeling of
repugnance. … But he was certainly an enthusiastic and
industrious writer, who raised the tone of the press, even
while taking pains to fetter its liberty. When he lost his
monopoly, that era of desolation began which Macaulay has so
forcibly described. The newspapers became completely sterile,
omitting events even of such importance as the trial of the
seven bishops, and were supplanted in popular favour by the
manuscript news-letters, which were, in fact, the only
journals of importance. On the day after the abdication of
James II. three fresh newspapers appeared, and many more burst
out after the appearance of the official journal under the
style of the Orange Gazette. But it was not until 1694 that
the king was induced to abolish the censorship and to permit
free trade in news; 'he doubted much,' says Hume, 'of the
salutary effects of such unlimited freedom.' The newspapers
increased and multiplied exceedingly for the eighteen years
between the abolition of the office of licenser and the
passing of the Stamp Act, in 1712, by which a halfpenny tax
was laid on every half-sheet of intelligence."
_Early English Newspapers
(Cornhill Magazine, July, 1868)._
{2597}
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1685-1693.
William Bradford and his Press in Philadelphia and New York.
William Bradford, a young printer, of the Society of Friends,
came to Philadelphia in the autumn of 1685, and established
himself in business. "His first publication was 'Kalendarium
Pennsilvaniense, or America's Messenger; Being an Almanack for
the Year of Grace 1686.' This brought him a summons before the
Governor and Council, for referring to the Proprietary, in the
table of chronology, ns 'Lord Penn;' and, on his appearance,
he was ordered to blot out the objectionable title, and
forbidden to print anything without license from the
Provincial Council. In 1687 he was cautioned by the
Philadelphia meeting not to print anything touching the
Quakers without its approval. Two years later he was again
called before the Governor, and Council—this time for printing
the charter of the province. The spirited report, in his own
handwriting, of his examination on this occasion, is now
preserved in the collection of the New York Historical
Society. Disappointed at the non-fulfilment of Penn's promise
of the government printing and the failure of his scheme for
printing an English Bible, which, although indorsed by the
meeting, found few subscribers, and harassed by both the civil
and religious authorities, Bradford determined to leave the
province," which he did, with his family, sailing to England
in 1689. He was induced, however, by promises of increased
business and a yearly salary of £40, to return. In 1692,
having become one of the supporters of George Keith, and
having printed Keith's "Appeal", he was arrested and
imprisoned.
See PENNSYLVANIA: A. D. 1692-1696.
This occurred in August, and his trial followed in December.
The jury disagreed, and he was held for appearance at the next
court. "In the meantime the dissensions in the province
aroused by the Keithian schism had led to the abrogation of
Penn's charter by the crown, and the appointment of Benjamin
Fletcher to be Royal Governor of Pennsylvania as well as New
York." This change led to the dropping of proceedings against
Bradford, and to his removal from Philadelphia to New York,
whither he seems to have been invited. His removal was
undoubtedly prompted by a resolution which the Provincial
Council of New York adopted on the 23d of March, 1693: "That
if a Printer will come and settle in the city of New York for
the printing of our Acts of Assembly and Publick Papers, he
shall be allowed the sum of £40 current money of New York per
annum for his salary and have the benefit of his printing
besides what serves the publick." "Bradford's first warrant
for his salary as 'Printer to King William and Queen Mary, at
the City of New York,' was dated October 12, 1693, and was for
six months, due on the 10th preceding," showing that he had
established himself in the colony more hospitable to his art
as early as the 10th of April, 1693. "What was the first
product of his press is a matter of doubt. It may have been,
as Dr. Moore suggests, the 'Journal of the Late Actions of the
French at Canada,' or 'New England's Spirit of Persecution
Transmitted to Pennsilvania'"—which was a report of his own
trial at Philadelphia—or it may have been an Act of the New
York Assembly—one of three which his press produced early that
year, but the priority among which is uncertain.
_C. R Hildeburn,
Printing in New York in the 17th Century
(Memorial History of the City of New York,
volume 1, chapter 15.)_
ALSO IN:
_I. Thomas,
History of Printing in America,
2d edition, volume 1._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1695.
Expiration of the Censorship law in England.
Quick multiplication of Newspapers.
"While the Licensing Act was in force there was no newspaper
in England except the 'London Gazette,' which was edited by a
clerk in the office of the Secretary of State, and which
contained nothing but what the Secretary of State wished the
nation to know. There were indeed many periodical papers: but
none of those papers could be called a newspaper. Welwood, a
zealous Whig, published a journal called the Observator: but
his Observator, like the Observator which Lestrange had
formerly edited, contained, not the news, but merely
dissertations on politics. A crazy bookseller, named John
Dunton, published the Athenian Mercury: but the Athenian
Mercury merely discussed questions of natural philosophy, of
casuistry and of gallantry. A fellow of the Royal Society,
named John Houghton, published what he called a Collection for
the Improvement of Industry and Trade: but his Collection
contained little more than the prices of stocks, explanations
of the modes of doing business in the City, puffs of new
projects, and advertisements of books, quack medicines,
chocolate, Spa water, civet cats, surgeons wanting ships,
valets wanting masters, and ladies wanting husbands. If ever
he printed any political news, he transcribed it from the
Gazette. The Gazette was so partial and so meagre a chronicle
of events that, though it had no competitors, it had but a
small circulation. … But the deficiencies of the Gazette were
to a certain extent supplied in London by the coffeehouses,
and in the country by the news-letters. On the third of May
1695 the law which had subjected the press to a censorship
expired. Within a fortnight, a stanch old Whig, named Harris,
who had, in the days of the Exclusion Bill, attempted to set
up a newspaper entitled Intelligence Domestic and Foreign, and
who had been speedily forced to relinquish that design,
announced that the Intelligence Domestic and Foreign,
suppressed fourteen years before by tyranny, would again
appear. Ten days later was printed the first number of the
English Courant. Then came the Packet Boat from Holland and
Flanders, the Pegasus, the London Newsletter, the London Post,
the Flying Post, the Old Postmaster, the Postboy, and the
Postman. The history of the newspapers of England from that
time to the present day is a most interesting and instructive
part of the history of the country. At first they were small
and mean-looking. … Only two numbers came out in a week; and a
number contained little more matter than may be found in a
single column of a daily paper of our time."
_Lord Macaulay,
History of England,
chapter 21._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1704-1729.
The first Newspapers in America.
"There was not a newspaper published in the English colonies,
throughout the extensive continent of North America, until the
24th of April, 1704. John Campbell, a Scotchman, who was a
bookseller and postmaster in Boston, was the first who began
and established a publication of this kind. It was entitled
'The Boston News-Letter.' … It is printed on half a sheet of
pot paper, with a small pica type, folio.
{2598}
The first page is filled with an extract from 'The London
Flying Post,' respecting the pretender. … The queen's speech
to both houses of parliament on that occasion, a few articles
under the Boston head, four short paragraphs of marine
intelligence from New York, Philadelphia, and New London, and
one advertisement, form its whole contents. The advertisement
is from Campbell, the proprietor of the paper." In 1719, a
rival paper was started in Boston, called the "Gazette," and
in 1721, a third, founded by James Franklin, took the name of
"The New England Courant." Meantime there had appeared at
Philadelphia, on the 22nd of December, 1719,—only one day
later than the second of the Boston newspapers—"The American
Weekly Mercury," printed by Andrew Bradford, son of William
Bradford. The same printer, Andrew Bradford, removing to New
York, brought out "The New York Gazette," the first newspaper
printed in that city, in October, 1725.
_I. Thomas,
History of Printing in America,
volume 2, page 12, and after._
"In 1740, the number of newspapers in the English colonies on
the continent had increased to eleven, of which one appeared
in South Carolina, one in Virginia, three in Pennsylvania—one
of them being in German—one in New York, and the remaining
five in Boston. … The New England 'Courant,' the fourth
American periodical, was, in August 1721, established by James
Franklin as an organ of independent opinion. Its temporary
success was advanced by Benjamin, his brother and apprentice,
a boy of fifteen, who wrote for its columns, worked in
composing the types as well as printing off the sheets, and,
as carrier, distributed the papers to the customers. The sheet
satirized hypocrisy, and spoke of religious knaves as of all
knaves the worst. This was described as tending 'to abuse the
ministers of religion in a manner which was intolerable.' … In
July 1722, a resolve passed the council, appointing a censor
for the press of James Franklin; but the house refused its
concurrence. The ministers persevered; and, in January 1723, a
committee of inquiry was raised by the legislature. Benjamin,
being examined, escaped with an admonition; James, the
publisher, refusing to discover the author of the offence, was
kept in jail for a month; his paper was censured as reflecting
injuriously on the reverend ministers of the gospel; and, by
vote of the house and council, he was forbidden to print it,
'except it be first supervised.' Vexed at the arbitrary
proceedings, Benjamin Franklin, then but seventeen years old,
in October 1723, sailed clandestinely for New York. Finding
there no employment, he crossed to Amboy; went on foot to the
Delaware; for want of a wind, rowed in a boat from Burlington
to Philadelphia; and bearing marks of his labor at the oar,
weary, hungry, having for his whole stock of cash a single
dollar, the runaway apprentice—the pupil of the free schools
of Boston, rich in the boundless hope of youth and the
unconscious power of modest genius—stepped on shore to seek
food and occupation. On the deep foundations of sobriety,
frugality and industry, the young journeyman built his
fortunes and fame; and he soon came to have a printing-office
of his own. … The assembly of Pennsylvania chose him its
printer. He planned a newspaper [the 'Pennsylvania Gazette'];
and, when (1729] he became its proprietor and editor, he
defended freedom of thought and speech, and the inalienable
power of the people."
_G. Bancroft,
History of the United States of America,
part 3, chapter 15 (volume 2)._
ALSO IN:
_J. Parton,
Life of Franklin,
parts 1-2 (volume l)._
_B. Franklin,
Life by Himself,
edited by J. Bigelow,
part 1._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1709-1752.
The Periodicals of the Essayists.
The "Tatler," "Spectator," and their successors.
"In the spring of 1709, Steele [Sir Richard] formed a literary
project, of which he was far indeed from foreseeing the
consequences. Periodical papers had during many years been
published in London. Most of these were political; but in some
of them questions of morality, taste, and love-casuistry had
been discussed. The literary merit of these works was small
indeed; and even their names are now known only to the
curious. Steele had been appointed gazetteer by Sunderland, at
the request, it is said, of Addison; and thus had access to
foreign intelligence earlier and more authentic than was in
those times within the reach of an ordinary news-writer. This
circumstance seems to have suggested to him the scheme of
publishing a periodical paper on a new plan. It was to appear
on the days on which the post left London for the country,
which were, in that generation, the Tuesdays, Thursdays, and
Saturdays. It was to contain the foreign news, accounts of
theatrical representations, and the literary gossip of Will's
and of the Grecian. It was also to contain remarks on the
fashionable topics of the day, compliments to beauties,
pasquinades on noted sharpers, and criticisms on popular
preachers. The aim of Steele does not appear to have been at
first higher than this. … Issac Bickerstaff, Esquire,
Astrologer, was an imaginary person, almost as well known in
that age as Mr. Paul Pry or Mr. Pickwick in ours. Swift had
assumed the name of Bickerstaff in a satirical pamphlet
against Partridge, the almanac-maker. Partridge had been fool
enough to publish a furious reply. Bickerstaff had rejoined in
a second pamphlet still more diverting than the first. All the
wits had combined to keep up the joke, and the town was long
in convulsions of laughter. Steele determined to employ the
name which this controversy had made popular; and, in April,
1709, it was announced that Isaac Bickerstaff, Esquire,
Astrologer, was about to publish a paper called the 'Tatler.'
Addison had not been consulted about this scheme; but as soon
as he heard of it, he determined to give it his assistance.
The effect of that assistance cannot be better described than
in Steele's own words. 'I fared,' he said, 'like a distressed
prince who calls in a powerful neighbour to his aid. I was
undone by my auxiliary. When I had once called him in, I could
not subsist without dependence on him.' 'The paper,' he says
elsewhere, 'was advanced indeed. It was raised to a greater
thing than I intended it.'"
_Lord Macaulay.
Life and Writings of Addison (Essays)._
"Steele, on the 12th of April 1709, issued the first number of
the 'Tatler.' … This famous newspaper, printed in one folio
sheet of 'tobacco paper' with 'scurvy letter,' ran to 271
numbers, and abruptly ceased to appear in January 1711. It
enjoyed an unprecedented success, for, indeed, nothing that
approached it had ever before been issued from the periodical
press in England. The division of its contents was thus
arranged by the editor: 'All accounts of gallantry, pleasure,
and entertainment shall be under the article of White's
Chocolate House; poetry under that of Will's Coffee-House;
learning under the title of Grecian; foreign and domestic news
you will have from St. James's Coffee-House; and what else I
shall on any other subject offer shall be dated from my own
apartment.'
{2599}
The political news gradually ceased to appear. … Of the 271
'Tatlers,' 188 were written by Steele, 42 by Addison, and 36
by both conjointly. Three were from the pen of John Hughes. …
These, at least, are the numbers usually given, but the
evidence on which they are based is slight. It rests mainly
upon the indications given by Steele to Tickell when the
latter was preparing his edition of Addison's Works. The
conjecture may be hazarded that there were not a few Tatlers
written by Addison which he was not anxious to claim as his
particular property. … Addison, … remained Steele's firm
friend, and less than two months after the cessation of the
'Tatler' there appeared the first number of a still more
famous common enterprise, the 'Spectator,' on the 1st of March
1711. It was announced to appear daily, and was to be composed
of the reflections and actions of the members of an imaginary
club, formed around 'Mr. Spectator.' In this club the most
familiar figure is the Worcestershire Knight, Sir Roger de
Coverley, the peculiar property of Addison. … The 'Spectator'
continued to appear daily until December 1712. It consisted of
555 numbers, of which Addison wrote 274, Steele 236, Hughes
19, and Pope 1 (The Messiah, 'Spectator' 378). Another
contributor was Eustace Budgell (1685-1736), Addison's cousin.
… The 'Spectator' enjoyed so very unequivocal a success that
it has puzzled historians to account for its discontinuance.
In No. 517 Addison killed Sir Roger de Coverley 'that nobody
else might murder him.' This shows a voluntary intention to
stop the publication, which the Stamp Act itself had not been
able to do by force."
_E. Gosse,
A History of Eighteenth Century Literature,
chapter 6._
"After this, in 1713, came the 'Guardian'; and in 1714 an
eighth volume of the 'Spectator' was issued by Addison alone.
He was also the sole author of the 'Freeholder,' 1715, which
contains the admirable sketch of the 'Tory Foxhunter.' Steele,
on his side, followed up the 'Guardian' by the 'Lover,' the
'Reader,' and half-a–dozen abortive efforts; but his real
successes, as well as those of Addison, were in the three
great collections for which they worked together. … Between
the 'Guardian' of 1713 and the 'Rambler' of 1750-2 there were
a number of periodical essayists of varying merit. It is
scarcely necessary to recall the names of these now forgotten
'Intelligencers,' 'Moderators,' 'Remembrancers,' and the like,
the bulk of which were political. Fielding places one of them,
the 'Freethinker' of Philips, nearly on a level with 'those
great originals the "Tatlers" and the "Spectators;"' but the
initial chapters to the different books of 'Tom Jones' attract
us more forcibly to the author's own 'Champion,' written in
conjunction with the Ralph who 'makes night hideous' in the
'Dunciad.' … Another of Fielding's enterprises in the
'Spectator' vein was the 'Covent Garden Journal,' 1752. …
Concurrently with the 'Covent Garden Journal' appeared the
final volume of Johnson's 'Rambler,' a work upon the cardinal
defect of which its author laid his finger, when in later
life, he declared it to be 'too wordy.' Lady Mary said in her
smart way that the 'Rambler' followed the 'Spectator' as a
pack horse would do a hunter. … In the twenty-nine papers
which Johnson wrote for Hawkesworth's 'Adventurer,' the
'Rambler' style is maintained. In the 'Idler,' however, which
belongs to a later date, when its author's mind was unclouded,
and he was comparatively free from the daily pressure" of
necessity, he adopts a simpler and less polysyllabic style."
_A. Dobson,
Eighteenth Century Essays,
introduction._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1712.
The first Stamp Tax on Newspapers in England.
The first stamp tax on newspapers in England went into effect
on the 12th day of August, 1712. "An act had passed the
legislature, that 'for every pamphlet or paper contained in
half a sheet, or lesser piece of paper so printed, the sum of
one halfpenny sterling: and for every such pamphlet or paper
being larger than half a sheet, and not exceeding one whole
sheet, so printed, a duty after the rate of one penny sterling
for every sheet printed thereof.' This act, which was to curb
the licentiousness of the press, was to be in force for the
space of thirty-two years, to be reckoned from the 10th day of
June, 1712. Addison, in the 'Spectator' of this day, says,
'this is the day on which many eminent authors will probably
publish their last works. I am afraid that few of our weekly
historians, who are men that above all others delight in war,
will be able to subsist under the weight of a stamp duty in an
approaching peace. In short, the necessity of carrying a
stamp, and the impracticability of notifying a bloody battle,
will, I am afraid, both concur to the sinking of these thin
folios which have every other day related to us the history of
Europe for several years last past. A facetious friend of
mine, who loves a pun, calls this present mortality among
authors, "the fall of the leaf.'" On this tax Dean Swift thus
humorously alludes in his Journal to Stella, as follows
(August 7):—'Do you know that all Grub-street is dead and gone
last week? No more Ghosts or murders now for love or money. I
plied it close the last fortnight, and published at least
seven papers of my own, besides some of other people's; but
now every single half-sheet pays a halfpenny to the queen. The
'Observator' is fallen; the 'Medleys' are jumbled together
with the 'Flying Post'; the 'Examiner' is deadly sick; the
'Spectator' keeps up and doubles its price; I know not how
long it will hold. Have you seen the red stamp the papers are
marked with? Methinks the stamping is worth a half-penny.' The
stamp mark upon the newspapers was a rose and thistle joined
by the stalks, and enclosing between the Irish shamrock, the
whole three were surmounted by a crown. … It is curious to
observe what an effect this trifling impost had upon the
circulation of the most favourite papers. Many were entirely
discontinued, and several of those which survived were
generally united into one publication. The bill operated in a
directly contrary manner to what the ministers had
anticipated; for the opposition, who had more leisure, and
perhaps more acrimony of feeling, were unanimous in the
support of their cause. The adherents of ministers, who were
by no means behind the opposition in their proficiency in the
topic of defamation, were, it seems, not so strenuously
supported; and the measure thus chiefly destroyed those whom
it was Bolinbroke's interest to protect.
{2600}
For some reason, which we have not been able to trace, the
stamp-duties were removed shortly after their imposition, and
were not again enforced until 1725. In order to understand how
so small a duty as one halfpenny should operate so strongly
upon these periodical publications, we must look at the price
at which they were vended at that period. The majority of them
were published at a penny, many at a halfpenny, and some were
even published so low as a farthing."
_C. H. Timperley,
Encyclopædia of Literary and Typographical Anecdote,
pages 601-602._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1723.
End of Newspaper monopoly in France.
"Until Louis XVI. was dethroned, Paris was officially supposed
to possess but three periodicals: the 'Gazette de France' for
politics, 'Le Journal des Savants' for literature and science,
and the 'Mercure de France' for politics, literature, and
social matters mingled. For a time these monopolies were
respected, but only for a very short time. … During the
Regency of the Duke of Orleans (1715-23), the 'Gazette de
France,' 'Mercure,' and 'Journal des Savants' combined to
bring an action for infringement against all the papers then
existing, but they were non-suited on a technical objection;
and this was their last attempt at asserting their
prerogative."
_The French Press
(Cornhill Magazine, October, 1873)._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1734.
Zenger's trial in New York.
Determination of the freedom of the Press.
See NEW YORK: A. D. 1720-1734.
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1771.
Freedom of Parliamentary reporting won in England.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1771.
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1777.
The first Daily Newspaper in France.
"In 1777 there appeared the 'Journal de Paris,' which only
deserves notice from its being the first daily paper issued in
France."
_Westminster Review,
July 1860, page 219._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1784-1813.
The earliest daily Newspapers in the United States.
"The first daily newspaper published in the United States was
the 'American Daily Advertiser.' It was issued in Philadelphia
in 1784, by Benjamin Franklin Bache, afterwards of the Aurora.
When the seat of national government was in Philadelphia, it
shared the confidence and support of Jefferson with the
'National Gazette.' It was strong in its opposition to the
Federal section of the administration of Washington, and to
all the measures originating with Hamilton. Zachariah Poulson
became its proprietor and publisher in 1802, and it was known
as 'Poulson's Advertiser,' and we believe he continued its
publisher till October 28, 1839, when the establishment was
sold to Brace and Newbold, the publishers of a new paper
called the 'North American.' The name after that was the
'North American and Daily Advertiser.' … The 'New York Daily
Advertiser,' the second real journal in the United States, was
published in 1785. It was commenced on the 1st of March by
Francis Childs & Co. … On the 29th of July, 1786, the
'Pittsburg (Pennsylvania) Gazette,' the first newspaper
printed west of the Alleghany Mountains, appeared, and in 1796
the 'Post' was issued. … 'The United States Gazette' was
started in New York in 1789 by John Fenno, of Boston. Its
original name was 'Gazette of the United States.' It was first
issued in New York, because the seat of the national
government was then in that city. When Congress removed to
Philadelphia in 1790, the 'Gazette' went with that body. In
1792 it was the special organ of Alexander Hamilton. … Noah
Webster, the lexicographer of America, was a lawyer in 1793,
and had an office in Hartford, Connecticut. 'Washington's
administration was then violently assailed by the 'Aurora,'
'National Gazette,' and other organs of the Republican Party,
and by the partisans of France. Jefferson was organizing the
opposition elements, and Hamilton was endeavoring to
strengthen the Federal party. Newspapers were established on
each side as the chief means of accomplishing the objects each
party had in view. Noah Webster was considered, in this state
of affairs, the man to aid the Federalists journalistically in
New York. He was, therefore, induced to remove to that city
and take charge of a Federal organ. On the 9th of December,
1793, he issued the first number of a daily paper, which was
named the 'Minerva.' According to its imprint, it appeared
'every day, Sundays excepted, at four o'clock, or earlier if
the arrival of the mail will permit.' … With the 'Minerva' was
connected a semi-weekly paper called the 'Herald.' … The names
of 'Minerva' and 'Herald' were shortly changed to those of
'Commercial Advertiser' and 'New York Spectator,' and these
names have continued. … The 'Commercial Advertiser' is the
oldest daily newspaper in the metropolis. Of the hundreds of
daily papers started in New York, from the time of Bradford's
Gazette in 1725 to the 'Journal of Commerce' in 1827, there
are now [1872] only two survivors—the 'Evening Post' and the
'Commercial Advertiser.' … The first prominent daily paper
issued in New England was the Boston Daily Advertiser, the
publication of which was commenced on the 3d of March, 1813.
There was a daily paper begun in that city on the 6th of
October, 1796, by Alexander Martin, and edited by John O'Ley
Burk, one of the 'United Irishmen.' It lived about six months.
It was called the Polar Star and Boston Daily Advertiser.
Another was attempted on the 1st of January, 1798, by Caleb P.
Wayne, who was afterwards editor of the United States Gazette
of Philadelphia. This second daily paper of Boston was named
the Federal Gazette and Daily Advertiser. It lived three
months. The third attempt at a daily paper in the capital of
Massachusetts was a success. It was published by William W.
Clapp, afterwards of the Saturday Evening Gazette, and edited
by Horatio Biglow."
_F. Hudson,
Journalism in the United States,
pages 175-194, and 378._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1785-1812.
The founding of "The Times," in London.
The beginning of "leading articles."
The newspaper afterwards famous as "The Times" was started, in
1785, under the name of the "Daily Universal Register," and
did not adopt the title of "The Times" until the 1st of
January, 1788.
_J. Grant,
The Newspaper Press,
volume 1, chapter 16._
"All the newspapers that can be said to have been
distinguished in any way till the appearance of the 'Times'
were distinguished by some freak of cleverness. … The 'Times'
took up a line of its own from the first day of its existence.
The proprietors staked their fortunes upon the general
character of their paper, upon the promptitude and accuracy of
its intelligence, upon its policy, upon the frank and
independent spirit of its comments on public men. … The chief
proprietor of the 'Times' was John Walter—a man who knew
nothing or next to nothing of newspaper work, but who knew
precisely what the public wanted in a newspaper, and
possessed, with this instinct and intelligence, the
determination and enterprise which constitute the character of
a successful man of business.
{2601}
He saw how a newspaper ought to be conducted, and he thought
he saw how, by the development of a new idea in printing, he
could produce the 'Times' a good deal cheaper than any of its
contemporaries. The whole English language, according to Mr.
Walter, consisted of about 90,000 words; but by separating the
particles and omitting the obsolete words, technical terms,
and common terminations, Mr. Walter believed it to be possible
to reduce the stock in common use to about 50,000, and a large
proportion of these words, with all the common terminations,
he proposed to have cast separately, so that the compositor,
with a slip of MS. before him to set in type, might pick up
words or even phrases instead of picking up one by one every
letter of every word in his copy, and thus, of course, save a
good deal of time. The idea was impracticable, utterly
impracticable, because the number of words required to carry
out the system must in itself be so great that no case of type
that a printer could stand before would hold them all, even if
the printer 'learn his boxes' with a case of some 4,000 or
5,000 compartments before him; but it took a good many years,
a good many experiments, and the expenditure of some thousands
of pounds to convince Mr. Walter that the failure was not due
to the perversity of his printers but to the practical
difficulties which surrounded his conception. John Walter was
far more successful in the general conduct of the 'Times' as a
newspaper than he was in the management of the 'Times'
printing office. He set all the printers in London by the ears
with his whim about logographic printing. But he had a very
clear conception of what a national newspaper ought to be, and
with the assistance of a miscellaneous group of men, who, as
they are sketched for us by Henry Crabb Robinson, were
apparently far more picturesque than practical, John Walter
made the 'Times' what the 'Times' has been for nearly a
century, pre-eminently and distinctly a national newspaper.
The 'Times,' in its original shape, consisted merely of the
day's news, a few advertisements, some market quotations,
perhaps a notice of a new book, a few scraps of gossip, and in
the session, a Parliamentary report. The 'Morning Chronicle'
had the credit … of inventing the leading article, as it had
the credit of inventing Parliamentary reporting. The 'Morning
Chronicle,' on the 12th of May, 1791, published a paragraph,
announcing that 'the great and firm body of the Whigs of
England, true to their principles, had decided on the dispute
between Mr. Fox and Mr. Burke, in favor of Mr. Fox, as the
representative of the pure doctrines of Whiggery,' and that in
consequence of this resolution Mr. Burke would retire from
Parliament. It was very short, but this paragraph is the
nearest approximation that is to be found in the newspapers of
that time to a leading article, and appearing as it did in the
part of the 'Morning Chronicle' where a year or two afterwards
the leading articles were printed, Mr. Wingrove Cooke cites it
as the germ of the leaders which, when they became general,
gave a distinctive colour and authority to newspapers as
independent organs of opinion and criticism. The idea soon
became popular; and in the 'Morning Post' and the 'Courier'
the leading article, developed as it was by Coleridge and
Macintosh into a work of art, often rivalling in argument,
wit, and eloquence the best speeches in Parliament, became the
object of quite as much interest as the Parliamentary reports
themselves. The 'Times,' knowing how to appropriate one by one
all the specialties of its contemporaries, and to improve upon
what it appropriated, was one of the first newspapers to adopt
the idea of leading articles, and in adopting that idea, to
improve upon it by stamping its articles with a spirit of
frankness and independence which was all its own. … The reign
of John Walter, practically the founder of the 'Times,' ended
in the year 1812, and upon his death his son, the second John
Walter, took possession of Printing House Square, and, acting
in the spirit of his father, with ampler means, soon made the
'Times' the power in the State that it has been from that day
to this."
_C. Pebody,
English Journalism,
pages 92-99._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1817.
The trials of William Hone.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1816-1820.
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1830-1833.
The first Penny Papers in the United States.
"The Penny Press of America dates from 1833. There were small
and cheap papers published in Boston and Philadelphia before
and about that time. The Bostonian was one. The Cent, in
Philadelphia, was another. The latter was issued by
Christopher C. Cornwall in 1830. These and all similar
adventures were not permanent. Most of them were issued by
printers when they had nothing else to do. Still they belonged
to the class of cheap papers. The idea came from the
illustrated Penny Magazine, issued in London in 1830. … The
Morning Post was the first penny paper of any pretensions in
the United States. It was started on New-Year's Day, 1833, as
a two-cent paper, by Dr. Horatio David Shepard, with Horace
Greeley and Francis V. Story as partners, printers, and
publishers. … After one week's trial, with the exhaustion of
the capital, the original idea of Dr. Shepard, his dream of
the previous year 1832 was attempted, and the price reduced to
one cent; but it was too late. … This experiment, however, was
the seed of the Cheap Press. It had taken root. On Tuesday,
the 3d of September, in the same year 1833, the first number
of the Sun was issued by Benjamin H. Day."
_F. Hudson,
Journalism in the United States,
pages 416-417._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1853-1870.
Extinction of taxes on Newspapers in England.
The beginning of Penny Papers.
Rise of the provincial daily press.
"In 1853 the advertisement duty was repealed; in 1855 the
obligatory newspaper stamp was abolished, and in 1861, with
the repeal of the paper duty, the last check upon the
unrestrained journalism was taken away. As a matter of course,
the resulting increase in the number of newspapers has been
very great as well as the resulting diminution in their price.
… When it was seen that the trammels of journalism were about
to be loosed the penny paper came into existence. The 'Daily
Telegraph,' the first newspaper published at that price, was
established in June, 1855, and is now one of the most
successful of English journals."
_T. G. Bowles,
Newspapers (Fortnightly Review,
July 1, 1884)._
{2602}
"With the entire freedom from taxation began the modern era of
the daily press. At this time [1861] London had nine or ten
daily newspapers, with the 'Times' in the lead. Of these, six
or seven still survive, and are holding their own with
competitors of more recent origin. Up to the time of the
abolition of the stamp duties, London was the only city which
had a daily press; but between 1855 and 1870 a large number of
newspapers published in the provincial cities, which had
hitherto been issued in weekly or bi-weekly form, made their
appearance as daily journals. With only one or two exceptions,
all the prosperous provincial morning papers of to-day were
originally weeklies, and as such had long occupied the ground
they now hold as dailies."
_E. Porritt,
The Englishman at Home,
chapter 13._
PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1874-1894.
Surviving Press Censorship in Germany.
"It would be wrong to speak of the Newspaper Press of Germany
as the fourth estate. In the land which gave Gutenberg and the
art of printing to the world, the Press has not yet
established a claim to a title so imposing. To the growth and
power of a Free Press are needed liberal laws and
institutions, with freedom of political opinion and civil
action for the subject. Hitherto these fundamental conditions
have been absent. During the last fifty years little has been
done to liberate the newspaper, to give it free play, to
unmuzzle it. It is the misfortune of the German Press that the
special laws for the regulation of newspapers and serial
publications have been evolved from a system of legislation
which was devised in times of great political unrest and
agitation. … Liberty of the Press has been one of the leading
political watchwords of the reform party during the last
three-quarters of a century. Yet though the Press does not
stand where it stood at the beginning of the century, when
even visiting cards could not be printed without the solemn
assent of the public censor, and when objectionable prints
were summarily suppressed at the mere beck of a Minister or
his subordinate, little ground has been won since the severer
features of the measures passed in 1854 for the repression of
democratic excesses were abandoned. The constitution of
Prussia says that 'Every Prussian has the right to express his
opinion freely by word, writing, print, or pictorial
representation' (Article 27). But this right is superseded by
the provision of the imperial constitution (Article 41,