The first printers printed books at their own expense, and sold them
themselves. It was necessary therefore that they should have large
capitals. Paper and all other materials, as well as labour, were in
the infancy of the art exceedingly dear for those periods; and on
the other hand the purchasers of books were few, partly because the
price of them was too high, and partly because, knowledge being less
widely diffused, they were not so generally read as at present. For
these reasons many of the principal printers, notwithstanding their
learning and ingenuity, became poor[1282]. In this manner my countrymen
Conrade Sweynheim and Arnold Pannarz, who were the first, and for a
long time the only printers at Rome, a city which on many accounts,
particularly in the sixteenth century, might be called the first in
Christendom, were obliged, after the number of the volumes in their
warehouses amounted to 12,475, to solicit support from the pope[1283].
In the course of time this profession was divided, and there arose
booksellers. It appears that the printers themselves first gave up the
bookselling part of the business, and retained only that of printing;
at least this is said to have been the case with that well-known
bookseller John Rainmann, who was born at Oehringen, and resided at
Augsburg[1284]. He was at first a printer and letter-founder, and from
him Aldus purchased his types. Books of his printing may be found from
the year 1508 to 1524; and in many he is styled the celebrated German
bookseller. About the same period lived the booksellers Jos. Burglin
and George Diemar. Sometimes there were rich people of all conditions,
particularly eminent merchants, who caused books which they sold to be
printed at their own expense. In this manner that learned man Henry
Stephens was printer at Paris to Ulric Fugger at Augsburg, from whom he
received a salary for printing the many manuscripts which he purchased.
In some editions, from the year 1558 to 1567, he subscribes himself
Henricus Stephanus, illustris viri Hulderici Fuggeri typographus. In
the like manner also, in the beginning of the seventeenth century, a
society of learned and rich citizens of Augsburg, at the head of whom
was Marx Welser, the city-steward, printed a great number of books,
which had commonly at the end these words, _ad insigne pinus_. Printing
therefore thus gave rise to a new and important branch of trade, that
of bookselling, which was established in Germany, chiefly at Frankfort
on the Maine, where, particularly at the time of the fairs, there were
several large bookseller’s shops in that street which still retains the
name of _Book-street_.
George Willer, whom some improperly call Viller, and others Walter,
a bookseller at Augsburg, who kept a very large shop, and frequented
the Frankfort fairs, first fell upon the plan of publishing every fair
a catalogue of all the new books, adding the size, and publishing
names. Le Mire, better known under the name of Miræus[1285], says,
that catalogues were first printed in the year 1554; but Labbe[1286],
Reimann[1287], and Heumann[1288], who took their information from
Le Mire, make the year, perhaps erroneously, to be 1564. Willer’s
catalogues were printed till the year 1592, by Nicol. Bassæus, printer
at Frankfort. Other booksellers however must have soon published
catalogues of the like kind, though that of Willer continued a long
time to be the principal[1289].
In all these catalogues, which are in quarto, and not paged, the
following order is observed. The Latin books occupy the first place,
beginning with the Protestant theological works, perhaps because
Willer was a Lutheran; then come the Catholic; and after these, books
of jurisprudence, medicine, philosophy, poetry, and music. The second
place is assigned to German books, which are arranged in the same
manner.
In the year 1604, the general Easter Catalogue was printed with a
permission from government.
After this the Leipsic booksellers began not only to reprint the
Frankfort catalogues, but to enlarge them with many books which had not
been brought to the fairs in that city. I have, dated 1600, a catalogue
of all the books on sale in Book-street, Frankfort, and also of the
books published at Leipsic, which have not been brought to Frankfort;
with the permission of his highness the elector of Saxony to those new
works which have appeared at Leipsic. Printed at Leipsic, by Abraham
Lamberg; and to be had at his shop. On the September catalogue of the
same year, it is said that it is printed from the Frankfort copy,
with additions. I find an imperial privilege, for the first time, on
the Frankfort September catalogue of 1616. Some imperial permissions
however may be of an earlier date; for I have not seen a complete
series of these catalogues.
Reimmann says that, after Willer’s death, the catalogue was published
by the Leipsic bookseller Henning Grosse, and by his son and grandson.
The council of Frankfort caused several regulations to be issued
respecting catalogues, an account of which may be seen in Orth’s
work on the Imperial Fairs at Frankfort[1290]. After the business
of bookselling was drawn from Frankfort to Leipsic, occasioned
principally by the restrictions to which it was subjected at the
former by the censors, no more catalogues were printed there; and the
shops in Book-street were gradually converted into taverns.
In perusing these old catalogues one cannot help being astonished at
the sudden and great increase of books; and when one reflects that
a great many of them no longer exist, this perishableness of human
labours will excite the same sensations as those which arise in the
mind when one reads in a church-yard the names and titles of persons
long since mouldered into dust. In the sixteenth century there were
few libraries; and these, which did not contain many books, were in
monasteries, and consisted principally of theological, philosophical
and historical works, with a few however on jurisprudence and medicine;
while those which treated of agriculture, manufactures and trade, were
thought unworthy of the notice of the learned, and of being preserved
in large collections. The number of these works was, nevertheless, far
from being inconsiderable; and at any rate many of them would have been
of great use, as they would have served to illustrate the instructive
history of the arts. Catalogues which might have given occasion to
inquiries after books, that may be still somewhere preserved, have
suffered the fate of tombstones, which, being wasted and crumbled to
pieces by the destroying hand of time, become no longer legible. A
complete series of them, perhaps, is nowhere to be found.
This loss might in some measure be supplied by two works, were they not
now exceedingly scarce. I mean those of Cless and Draudius, who, by
the desire of some booksellers, collected together, as Georg[1291] did
at a later period, all the catalogues published at the different fairs
in different years. The work of Cless has the following title:--Unius
sæculi ejusque virorum litteratorum monumentis tum florentissimi, tum
fertilissimi, ab anno 1500 ad 1602 nundinarum autumnalium inclusive,
elenchus consummatissimus--desumtus partim ex singularum nundinarum
catalogis, partim ex bibliothecis. Auctore, Joanne Clessio,
Wineccensi, Hannoio, philosopho ac medico[1292]. By the editor’s
preface it appears that the first edition was published in 1592. The
order is almost the same as that observed by Willer in his catalogues.
The work of Draudius, which was printed in several quarto volumes,
for the first time, in 1611, and afterwards in 1625, is far larger,
more complete, and more methodical. I have never seen a perfect copy
of either edition; but perhaps the following information may afford
some satisfaction to those who are fond of bibliography. One part,
which I consider as the first, has the title of Bibliotheca Classica,
sive Catalogus officinalis, in quo singuli singularum facultatum ac
professionum libri, qui in quavis fere lingua extant, recensentur;
usque ad annum 1624 inclusive. Auctore M. Georgio Draudio. It contains
Latin works on theology, jurisprudence, medicine, history, geography
and politics. The copy in the library of our university ends at
page 1304, which has however a catchword that seems to indicate a
deficiency. The second part is entitled Bibliotheca Classica, sive
Catalogus officinalis, in quo philosophici artiumque adeo humaniorum,
poetici etiam et musici libri usque ad annum 1624 continentur.
This part, containing Latin books also, begins at page 1298, and ends
with page 1654, which is followed by an index of all the authors
mentioned. A smaller volume of 302 pages, without an index, has for
title, Bibliotheca Exotica, sive Catalogus officinalis librorum
peregrinis linguis usualibus scriptorum; and a fourth part, forming 759
pages besides an index of the authors, is called, Bibliotheca Librorum
Germanicorum Classica; that is, A Catalogue of all the books printed in
the German language till the year 1625. By the indices, and the proper
arrangement of the matter, the use of this work is much facilitated. I
must however observe that the oldest catalogues had the same faults as
those of the present time, and that these have been copied by Draudius.
Many books are mentioned which were never printed, and many titles,
names and dates, are given incorrectly; but Draudius, nevertheless, is
well worth the attention of any one who may be inclined to employ his
time and ingenuity on the history of literature.
[Towards the end of the seventeenth and especially during the
eighteenth century, book-catalogues of every description multiplied
rapidly. Their progress is copiously treated of in Nichols’s Literary
Anecdotes, vol. iii. pp. 608-693, to which the reader is referred.
Perhaps the most remarkable bookseller’s-catalogue ever printed is Mr.
Henry Bohn’s so-called Guinea Catalogue, which is upwards of six inches
thick, and contains, in about 2000 pages, merely the details of his own
stock.]