made with his invention, was certainly ignorant of its importance. In
those days the only libraries were those belonging to convents and to a
few nobles of literary acquirements; private individuals, with the
exception of some learned men who were richer than their fellows,
possessed no books at all. The copyists and illuminators by profession
were employed exclusively in reproducing “Livres d’Heures”
(prayer-books), and school books: the first were sumptuous volumes,
objects of an industry quite exceptional; the second, destined for
children, were always simply executed, and composed of a few leaves of
strong paper or parchment. The pupils limited themselves to writing
passages of their lessons from the dictation of their teachers; to the
monks was assigned the task of transcribing, at full length, the sacred
and profane authors. Coster could not even have thought of reproducing
these works, the sale of which would have seemed to him impossible, and
he at first fell back upon the “Specula,” religious books which
addressed themselves to all the faithful, even to those who could not
read, by means of the stories or illustrations (_images_) of which these
books were composed; then he occupied himself with the “Donati,” which
he reprinted many times from xylographic plates, if not with movable
type, and for which he must have found a considerable demand. It was one
of these “Donati” that, falling under the eyes of Gutenberg, revealed to
him, according to the “Chronique de Cologne,” the secret of printing.
This secret was kept faithfully for fifteen or twenty years by the
workmen employed in his printing-house, who were not initiated into the
mysteries of the new art till they had served a certain time of
probation and apprenticeship: a terrible oath bound together those whom
the master had considered worthy of entering into partnership with him;
for on the preservation of the secret depended the prosperity or the
ruin of the inventor and his coadjutors, since all printed books were
then sold as manuscripts.
[Illustration: Fig. 393.--Fac-simile of the fifth Page of the first
Xylographic Edition of the “Ars Moriendi,” representing the Sinner on
his Death-bed surrounded by his Family. Two Demons are whispering into
his ear, “Think of thy treasure,” and “Distribute it to thy friends.”]
But while the secret was so scrupulously maintained by the first Dutch
printer and his partners, a lawsuit was brought before the superior
court of Strasbourg which, though the motives for it were apparently but
of private interest, was nevertheless to give the public the key to the
mysterious trade of the typographer. This lawsuit,--the curious
documents relating to which were found only in 1760, in an old tower at
Strasbourg,--was brought against John Gensfleisch, called Gutenberg (who
was born at Mayence, but was exiled from his native town during the
political troubles, and had settled at Strasbourg since 1420), by George
and Nicholas Dritzehen, who, as heirs of the deceased Andrew Dritzehen,
their brother, and formerly Gutenberg’s partner, desired to be admitted
as his representatives into an association of whose object they were
ignorant, but from which they no doubt knew their brother expected to
derive some beneficial results. It was, in short, printing itself which
was on its trial at Strasbourg towards the end of the year 1439; that
is, more than fourteen years before the period at which printing is
known to have been first employed in Mayence.
Here is a summary, as we find them in the documents relating to this
lawsuit, of the facts stated before the judge. Gutenberg, an ingenious
but a poor man, possessed _divers secrets_ for becoming rich. Andrew
Dritzehen came to him with a request that he would teach him _many
arts_. Gutenberg thereupon initiated him into the art of _polishing
stones_, and Andrew “derived great profit from this secret.”
Subsequently, with the object of carrying out _another art_ during the
pilgrimage of Aix-la-Chapelle,[60] Gutenberg agreed with Hans Riffen,
mayor of Lichtenau, to form a company, which Andrew Dritzehen and a man
named Andrew Heilman desired to join. Gutenberg consented to this on
condition that they would together purchase of him the right to a third
of the profits, for a sum of 160 florins, payable on the day of the
contract, and 80 florins payable at a later date. The agreement being
made, he taught them the _art_ which they were to exercise at the proper
period in Aix-la-Chapelle; but the pilgrimage was postponed to the
following year, and the partners required of Gutenberg that he should
not conceal from them any of the _arts and inventions_ of which he was
cognisant. New stipulations were entered upon whereby the partners
pledged themselves to pay an additional sum, and in which it was stated
that the _art_ should be carried on for the benefit of the four
partners during the space of five years; and that, in the event of one
of them dying, _all the implements of the art, and all the works already
produced_, should belong to the surviving partners; the heirs of the
deceased being entitled to receive no more than an indemnity of 100
florins at the expiration of the said five years.
Gutenberg accordingly offered to pay the heirs of his late partner the
stipulated sum; but they demanded of him an account of the capital
invested by Andrew Dritzehen, which, as they alleged, had been absorbed
in the speculation. They mentioned especially a certain account for
_lead_, for which their brother had made himself responsible. Without
denying this account, Gutenberg refused to satisfy their demands.
Numerous witnesses gave evidence, and their depositions for and against
the object of the association show us a faithful picture of what must
have been the inner life of four partners exhausting themselves and
their money in efforts to realise a scheme the nature of which they were
very careful to conceal, but from which they expected to derive the most
splendid results.
We find them working by night; we hear them answering those who
questioned them on the object of their work, that they were
“mirror-makers” (_spiegel-macher_); we find them borrowing money,
because they had in hand “something in which they could not invest too
much money.” Andrew Dritzehen, in whose care the _press_ was left, being
dead, Gutenberg’s first object was to send to the deceased’s house a man
he could trust, who was commissioned to unscrew the press, so that the
pieces (or _forms_), which were fixed closely together by it, might
become detached from each other, and then to place these forms in or on
the press “in such a manner that no one might be able to understand what
they were.” Gutenberg regrets that his servant did not bring him back
all the forms, many of which “were not to be found.” Lastly, we find
figuring among the witnesses a turner, a timber-merchant, and a
goldsmith who declared that he had worked during three years for
Gutenberg, and that he had gained more than 100 florins by preparing for
him “the things belonging to printing” (_das zu dem Trucken gehoret_).
_Trucken_--printing! Thus the grand word was pronounced in the course of
the lawsuit, but certainly without producing the least effect on the
audience, who wondered what was this occult _art_ which Gutenberg and
his partners had carried on with so much trouble, and at such great
expense. However, it is quite certain that, with the exception of the
indiscretion, really very insignificant, of the goldsmith, Gutenberg’s
secret remained undiscovered, for it was supposed it had to do with the
_polishing of stones_ and the manufacture of _mirrors_. The judge, being
informed as to the good faith of Gutenberg, pronounced the offers he
made to the plaintiffs satisfactory, decided against the heirs of Andrew
Dritzehen, and the three other partners remained sole proprietors of
their process, and continued to carry it out.
If we study with some attention the documents relating to this singular
trial at Strasbourg, and if we also notice, that our word _mirror_ is
the translation of the German word _spiegel_ and of the Latin word
_speculum_, it is impossible not to recognise all the processes, all the
implements made use of in printing, with the names they have not ceased
to bear, and which were given to them as soon as they were invented; the
forms, the screw (which is not the _printing_-press, for they printed in
those days with the _frotton_, or rubber, but the frame in which the
types were _pressed_), the lead, the work, the art, &c. We see Gutenberg
accompanied by a turner who made the screw for the press, the timber
merchant who had supplied the planks of box or of pear wood, the
goldsmith who had engraved or cast the type. Then we ascertain that
these “mirrors,” in the preparation of which the partners were occupied,
and which were to be sold at the pilgrimage of Aix-la-Chapelle, were no
other than the future copies of the “Speculum Humanæ Salvationis,” an
imitation more or less perfect of the famous book of illustrations of
which Holland had already published three or four editions, in Latin and
in Dutch.
We know, on the other hand, that these “Mirrors” or “Specula” were, in
the earliest days of printing, so much in request, that in every place
the first printers rivalled each other in executing and publishing
different editions of the book with illustrations. Here, there was the
reprint of the “Speculum,” abridged by L. Coster; there, the “Speculum”
of Gutenberg, taken entirely from manuscripts; now it was the “Speculum
Vitæ Humanæ,” by Roderick, Bishop of Zamora; then the “Speculum
Conscienciæ,” of Arnold Gheyloven; then the “Speculum Sacerdotum,” or
again, the voluminous “Speculum” of Vincent de Beauvais, &c.
It cannot now any longer be assumed that Gutenberg really made mirrors
or looking-glasses at Strasbourg, and that those pieces “laid in a
press,” those “forms which came to pieces,” that lead sold or wrought by
a goldsmith, were, as they wished it to be supposed, only intended to be
used “for printing ornaments on the frames of looking-glasses!”
[Illustration: Fig. 394.--Interior of a Printing-office in the Sixteenth
Century, by J. Amman.]
Would it not have been surprising that the pilgrims who were to visit
Aix-la-Chapelle on the occasion of the grand jubilee of 1440, should be
so anxious to buy ornamented mirrors? As to the art “_of polishing
stones_,” which Gutenberg had taught at first to Andrew Dritzehen, who
derived from it “_so much profit_,” having anything to do with printing
was, no doubt, also questionable; but we have not been able to solve the
enigma, and wait to clear up the difficulty till a new _incunable_
(_incunabula_, “a cradle,” the word is applied to the first editions
ever printed) is discovered, the work of some Peter (πἑτρος “a stone”)
or other; as, for example, the Latin sermons of Hermann de Petra on the
Lord’s Prayer; for Gutenberg, when speaking of _polishing stones_, might
have enigmatically designated a book he was printing; just as his
partner, in answer to the judge, after having raised his hand on high
and sworn to give true evidence, could call himself _a maker of
mirrors_, without telling a falsehood, without committing perjury. The
secret of printing was to be religiously kept by those who knew it.
In short, it results from all this that Gutenberg, “an ingenious man and
a man of invention,” having seen a xylographie “Donatus,” had
endeavoured to imitate it, and had succeeded in doing so, the secret
being confided to Andrew Dritzehen; that the other _arts_, which
Gutenberg at first kept to himself, but which he subsequently
communicated to his partners, consisted in the idea of substituting
movable type for tabular printing; a substitution that could only be
effected after numerous experiments had been made, and which were just
about to be crowned with success when Andrew Dritzehen died. We may then
consider it as nearly certain that printing was in some sort discovered
twice successively--the first time by Laurent Coster, whose small
printed books, or books in letterpress (_en moule_), attracted the
attention of Gutenberg; and the second time by Gutenberg, who raised the
art to a degree of perfection such as had never been attained by his
predecessor.
It was after the Strasbourg lawsuit between the years 1440 or 1442, as
stated by many historians, that Gutenberg went to Holland, and there
became a workman in the establishment of Coster; this is asserted in
order that they might be able to accuse him of the theft which Junius
has laid to the account of a certain man whose name was John. Only--and
the coincidence is not, in this case, unworthy of remark--two unedited
chronicles of Strasbourg and the Alsatian Wimpfeling relate, almost at
the same time, a robbery of type and implements used in printing, but
mentioning Strasbourg instead of Haarlem, Gutenberg instead of Laurent
Coster, and naming the thief John Gensfieisch. But, according to the
Strasbourg tradition, this John Gensfieisch the elder, related to and
employed by Gutenberg, robbed him of his secret and his tools, after
having been his rival in the discovery of printing, and established
himself at Mayence, where, by a just visitation of Providence, he was
soon struck blind. It was then, adds the tradition, that in his
repentance he sent for his former master to come to Mayence, and gave up
to him the business he had founded. But this last part of the tradition
seems to savour too much of the moral deductions of a story; and as it
is very improbable, moreover, that two thefts of the same kind were
committed at the same period, and under the same circumstances, we are
inclined to believe that the John mentioned by Junius was, in fact,
Gutenberg’s relative, who went to Haarlem to perfect himself in the art
of printing, and robbed Coster; for there really existed at Mayence, at
the time mentioned, a John Gensfleisch, who might have printed, before
Gutenberg went to join him there, the two school books, “Doctrinale
Alexandri Galli,” and “Petri Hispani Tractatus.” This is rendered still
more probable from the fact that, after search had been long made for
these books, which were absolutely unknown when Junius mentioned them,
three fragments of the “Doctrinale,” printed on vellum with the type of
the Dutch “Speculum,” were at length found.
However, Gutenberg had not succeeded with his printing at Strasbourg.
When he quitted the town, where he left such pupils as John Mentell and
Henry Eggestein, he removed to Mayence, and established himself in the
house of _Zum Jungen_. There he again printed, but he exhausted his
means in experiments, alternately taking up and laying aside the various
processes he had employed--xylography, movable types of wood, lead, and
cast iron. He used, for printing, a hand-press which he had made on the
same principle as a wine-press; he invented new tools; he began ten
works and could finish none. At last, his resources all gone, and
himself in a state of despair, he was just going to give up the art
altogether, when chance sent him a partner, John Fust or Faust, a rich
goldsmith of Mayence.
This partnership took place in 1450. Fust, by a deed properly drawn up
by a notary, promised Gutenberg to advance him 800 gold florins
for the manufacture of implements and tools, and 300 for other
expenses--servants’ wages, rent, firing, parchment, paper, ink, &c.
Besides the “Specula” and “Donati” already in circulation, which
Gutenberg probably continued to print, the object of the partnership was
the printing of a Bible in folio of two columns, in large type, with
initial letters engraved on wood; an important work requiring a great
outlay.
A caligrapher was attached to Gutenberg’s printing establishment, either
to trace on wood the characters to be engraved, or to _rubricate_ the
printed pages; in other words, to write in red ink, to paint with a
brush or to illuminate (_au frottou_) the initials, the capital letters,
and the headings of chapters. This caligrapher was probably Peter
Schœffer or Schoiffer, of Gernsheim, a small town in the diocese of
Darmstadt, a clerk of the diocese of Mayence, as he styles himself, and
perhaps a German student in the University of Paris; since a manuscript
copied by him, and preserved at Strasbourg, is terminated by an
inscription in which he testifies that he himself wrote it in the year
1449, in “the very glorious University of Paris.” Schœffer was not only
a literary man, but was also a man of ingenuity and prudence
(_ingeniosus et prudens_). Having entered Gutenberg’s establishment, on
whom Fust had forced him, in 1452, to take part in the new association
they were then forming, Schœffer invented an improved mould with which
he could cast separately all the letters of the alphabet in metal,
whereas up to this time they had been obliged to engrave the type with a
_burin_. He concealed his discovery from Gutenberg, who would naturally
have availed himself of it; but he confided the secret to Fust, who,
being very experienced in casting metals, carried out his idea. It was
evidently with this cast type, which resisted the action of the press,
that Schœffer composed and executed a “Donatus,” of which four leaves,
in parchment, were found at Treves in 1803, in the interior of an old
bookcover, and were deposited in the Imperial Library of Paris. An
inscription in this edition, printed in red, announces formally that
Peter Schœffer alone had executed it, with its type and its initial
letters, according to the “new art of the printer, without the help of
the pen.”
That was certainly the first public disclosure of the existence of
printing, which up to this time had passed off its productions as the
work of caligraphers. It seems that Schœffer thus desired to mark the
date and to appropriate to himself the invention of Gutenberg. It is
certain that Fust, allured by the results Schœffer had obtained,
secretly entered into partnership with him, and, in order to get rid of
Gutenberg, profited by the power which his bond gave him over that
unfortunate individual. Gutenberg, summoned to dissolve the partnership
and to return the sums he had received, which he was quite incapable of
paying, was obliged, in order to satisfy the demands of his pitiless
creditor, to give up to him his printing establishment with all the
materials it contained; among them was included this same Bible, the
last leaves of which were, perhaps, in the press at the moment when they
robbed him of the fruits of his long-protracted labours.
Gutenberg evicted, Peter Schœffer, and Fust, who had given Schœffer his
daughter in marriage, completed the great Bible, which was ready for
sale in the early months of 1456. This Bible, being passed off as a
manuscript, must have commanded a very high price. This accounts for the
non-appearance on it of any inscription to show by what means this
immense work had been executed; let us add that in any case we may well
suppose Schœffer and Fust were not willing to give to Gutenberg a share
of the glory which they dared not yet appropriate to themselves.
[Illustration: Fig. 395.--Fac-simile of the Bible of 1456 (1 Samuel xix,
1-5), printed at Mayence by Gutenberg.]
The Latin Bible, without date, which all bibliographers agree in
considering as that of Gutenberg, is a large in-folio of six hundred and
forty-one leaves, divided into two, or three, or even four volumes. It
is printed in double columns, of forty-two lines each in the full pages,
with the exception of the first ten, which consisted of only forty or
forty-one lines (Fig. 395). The characters are Gothic; the leaves are
all numbered, and have neither _signatures_ nor _catchwords_. Some
copies of it are on vellum, others on paper. The number of copies which
were printed of this Bible may be estimated at one hundred and fifty--a
considerable number for that period. The simultaneous publication of so
many Bibles, exactly alike, did not contribute less than the lawsuit of
Gutenberg and Fust to make known the discovery of printing. Besides
which, Fust and his new partner, although they had mutually agreed to
keep the secret as long as possible, were the first to reveal it, in
order to get all the credit of the invention for themselves, when public
rumour allowed them no longer to conceal it within their
printing-office.
It was then they printed the “Psalmorum Codex” (Collection of Psalms),
the earliest book bearing their names, and which fixed, in a manner, for
the first time, a date for the new art they had so much improved. The
_colophon_, or inscription at the end of the “Psalmorum Codex,”
announces that the book was executed “without the help of the pen, by an
ingenious process, in the year of our Lord, 1457.”
This magnificent Psalter, which went through three editions without any
considerable alterations being made in it in the space of thirty-three
years, is a large in-folio volume of one hundred and seventy-five
leaves, printed in red and black characters, imitated from those used in
the liturgical manuscripts of the fifteenth century. There exists,
however, of the rarest edition of this book but six or seven copies on
vellum (Fig. 396).
From this period printing, instead of concealing itself, endeavoured, on
the contrary, to make itself generally known. But it does not as yet
seem to have occurred to any one that it could be applied to the
reproduction of other books than Bibles, psalters, and missals, because
these were the only books that commanded a quick and extensive sale.
Fust and Schœffer then undertook the printing of a voluminous work,
which served as a liturgical manual to the whole of Christendom, the
celebrated “Rationale Divinorum Officiorum” (“Manual of Divine
Offices”), by William Durand, Bishop of Mende, in the thirteenth
century. It suffices to glance over this “Rationale,” and to compare it
with the coarse “Specula” printed in Holland, to be convinced that in
the year 1459 printing had reached the highest degree of perfection.
This edition, dated from Mayence (_Moguntiæ_), was no longer intended
for a small number of buyers; it was addressed to the entire Catholic
world, and copies of it on vellum and on paper were disseminated so
rapidly over the whole of Europe as to cause the belief, thenceforward,
that printing was invented at Mayence.
[Illustration: Fig. 396.--Fac-simile of a page of the Psalter of 1459,
second edition, or the second copy that was struck off. Printed at
Mayence, by J. Fust and P. Schœffer.]
The fourth work printed by Fust and Schœffer, and dated 1460, is the
collection of the Constitutions of Pope Clement V., known by the name of
“Clementines”--a large in-folio in double columns, having superb initial
letters painted in gold and colours in the small number of copies still
extant.
But Gutenberg, though deprived of his typographic apparatus, had not
renounced the art of which he considered himself, and with reason, the
principal inventor. He was, above all, anxious to prove himself as
capable as his former partners of producing books “without the help of
the pen.” He formed a new association, and fitted up a printing-office
which, we know by tradition, was actively at work till 1460, the year
wherein appeared the “Catholicon” (a kind of encyclopædia of the
thirteenth century), by John Balbi, of Genoa, the only important work
the printing of which can be attributed to Gutenberg (Fig. 397), and
which can bear comparison with the editions of Fust and Schœffer.
Gutenberg, who had imitated the Dutch “Donati” and “Specula,” doubtless
felt a repugnance at appropriating to himself the credit of an invention
he had only improved; accordingly, in the long and explicit anonymous
inscription placed at the end of the volume, he attributed to God alone
the glory of this divine invention, declaring that the “Catholicon” had
been printed without the assistance of reed, _stylus_, or pen, but by a
marvellous combination of points, matrices, and letters.
[Illustration: Fig. 397.--Fac-simile of the “Catholicon” at 1460,
printed at Mayence by Gutenberg.]
This undertaking brought to a happy termination, Gutenberg, no doubt
weary of the annoyances incident to business, transferred his
printing-office to his workmen, Henry and Nicholas Bechtermuncze,
Weigand Spyes, and Ulric Zell. Then, having retired near to Adolphus
II., elector and archbishop of Mayence, where he occupied the post of
gentleman of the ecclesiastical court of that prince, he contented
himself with the modest stipend attached to that office, and died at a
date not authentically determined, but which cannot be later than
February 24, 1468. His friend, Adam Gelth, erected in the Church of the
Récollets at Mayence, a monument to his memory, with an epitaph styling
him formally “the inventor of the typographic art.”