A case occurring in 1516 shows, however,_Books and their makers during the Middle Ages（#72282）

became modified. Soardi, a publisher, applied for an _imprimatur_

for certain theological works. The Council of Ten replies that as

Soardi has already secured the _testamurs_ of the Patriarch and

the Inquisitor, they, _quoad se_, have no objection to offer, and

_permittunt fieri quantum præfati Reverendissimus et Inquisitor

concessere_.[148] Brown accepts this phrase, _quoad se_, which occurs

also in later _imprimaturs_, as evidence that the Council of Ten had

practically resigned the direct control of the religious censorship,

and had accepted the Patriarch and the Inquisitor as the proper persons

to deal with the responsibility. It is still, however, the secular

authority and not the ecclesiastical which grants the _imprimatur_,

and the term _permittunt fieri_ implies that the permit was necessary

and could be withheld. In this same year, 1515, a claim was raised by

the Papal Government which, later, gave rise to many disputes between

the Church and the Republic of Venice, and also between the Church and

several other of the States of Italy.

The Holy See assumed the right to grant copyrights and _imprimaturs_ in

States other than those of the Church, and to support these monopolies

by the threat of spiritual punishments. The earliest instance of such

a contention was that of Fra Felice of Prato, a converted Jew, who

secured from the Pope, for certain Hebrew books and translations of

the same, a copyright which covered not only the States of the Church

but all the States of Europe. The punishment of excommunication was

threatened against any who refused to recognise this copyright or who

committed infringements against it. Fra Felice, desiring to print his

book in Venice, and apparently distrusting the adequacy of the Pope’s

privilege, applied to the College for a copyright for ten years, which

was duly granted to him; while the College of Venice apparently made

no comments upon the Papal brief which had also undertaken to give him

authority for Venice. Later on, the Venetian Government found occasion

to make vigorous protests against similar contentions from Rome.

The second class of censorship, that relating to literary quality, also

developed but gradually. The need for some kind of literary supervision

is indicated by the publishers themselves, who in their petitions

make reference to the misprints and scandalous errors in editions

previously produced, and promise that their own editions shall be

printed with the utmost care and accuracy.

The earliest instance of the establishment of a literary censorship

was in 1503, when the Senate made Marcus Musurus censor of all books

printed in Greek. Thirteen years later Musurus was still holding the

office.

In 1515, an order was issued by the Council of Ten which established

a general censorship for the literature of the Humanities. The order

was worded as follows: “In all parts of the world, and in the famous

cities not only of Italy but also of barbarous countries, that the

honour of the nation may be preserved, it is not allowed to publish

works until they shall have been examined by the most learned person

available. But in this our city, so famous and so worthy, no thought

has as yet been bestowed on this matter, whence it comes to pass that

the most incorrect editions which appear before the world are those

issued in Venice, to the dishonour of the city. Be it, therefore,

charged upon our noble Andrea Navagero to examine all works in Humanity

which, for the future, may be printed; and without his signature in the

volumes they shall not be printed, under pain of being confiscated and

burned, and a fine of three hundred ducats for him who disobeys this

order.” This is the first Italian example of a general or prevention

censorship, applied to a whole class of literature.[149]

The third kind of censorship concerned itself with the morals of

literature, political morality, the attitude of the writer or of the

publisher towards the State or rather towards government, and private

morality, having to do with the influence of the book upon decency and

_bonos mores_. The Government of Venice was peculiarly sensitive in

regard to any criticism, direct or indirect, of its public documents.

In 1515, the Council of Ten granted permission to Marino Sanuto,

who was engaged in the preparation of a history of the operations of

Charles VIII. in Italy, to examine the State Papers of more than two

years back, on the condition that the work should, when completed, be

submitted for the approval of the Council, before any one else should

have seen it. Later in the same year, an _imprimatur_ was granted to

Andrea Mocenigo for his history of the League of Cambrai, the work

having been examined and approved by the Grand Chancellor, who had the

special custody of the State Papers.

The political censorship was apparently more effective than the

censorship of morals. It was certainly the case that the _imprimatur_

was given to not a few books of a scandalous character.

In 1527, Alvise Cynthio (or Fabritii) published a work on _The Origin

of Vulgar Proverbs_. He had secured from the Senate a copyright for ten

years, which prohibited any one from reprinting the collection unless

he should add to the material as many new proverbs as were contained

in the original. Cynthio took occasion to say in one of his editorial

paragraphs that he intended to show the true character of those who

pretended to follow the rule of S. Francis. The Franciscans naturally

found objections to the book, and registered a complaint against it on

the ground of heresy and indecency.

The Council of Ten issued in January, 1526-1527 a general order,

reciting that, owing to the freedom which everyone enjoys in Venice,

it sometimes happens that obscene and corrupt works issue from the

Press. It is, therefore, decreed that for future publications, the

_imprimatur_ of the Council of Ten shall be required, and that before

this is given, the work must have been examined by two censors, who

shall make a sworn report that its character is satisfactory. This

order is of importance as being the first official recognition of the

necessity of a moral censorship.

The censors who examined Cynthio’s volume, ordered the author to

expunge the obnoxious passages. In the meantime, however, the monks

took the matter into their own hands (although they claimed to act

with the authority of the Council) and carried off from the printer’s

shop all the copies on hand. Cynthio petitioned the Council for their

restoration, and the printer put in a claim on his part that the

volumes should be replaced in his hands until his printing account

had been paid. An order to such effect was given, but apparently

only a small portion of the volumes were received, the others having

disappeared while in the custody of the monks. Copies of the work

have since been extremely rare. The author is reported to have died a

violent death.[150]

Up to this time there had been no attempt to formulate a code of laws

for the regulation of the Press; such action as had been taken by the

Government, had been in the shape of isolated decrees, or special acts

prepared to meet specific cases. There was no such thing as preventive

legislation; it was always planned either to present a remedy for

some immediate difficulty or to repress some specific wrong-doing.

The lines upon which the press-code of Venice was finally promulgated

had, however, been gradually indicated by the customs and precedents

established for particular cases.

Before the period of general legislation, the practice had, as we

have seen, been arrived at by securing, first from the College,

and later from the Senate, privileges, taking the shape either of

monopolies or of copyrights; while for the _imprimatur_ or authority

to print, application was made to the Council of Ten. The first law of

censorship made such _imprimatur_ obligatory. The censorship of the

character of the books thus fell upon the Ten, which retained in its

own hands the direct control of the political censorship and delegated

to ecclesiastical examiners the task of theological censorship,

accepting, as a rule, the report of such examiners as final. When,

later, it was found necessary to give consideration not only to the

political and theological influence of books, but to their literary

quality and their moral character, these divisions of the censorship

were also assumed by the Council of Ten.

In 1487, was issued the first Papal Bull having to do with the

productions of the printing-press. It was addressed by Pope Innocent

VIII. to seven governments as follows: Romana, Curia, Italia, Germania,

Francia, Hispania, Anglia, and Scotia. It is entitled: _Bulla S. D. N.

Innocentii contra Impressores Librorum Rebrobatorum_, and was printed

in Rome in 1487. The opening paragraph reads: _Et ea propter nos qui

illius locum tenemus in terris qui ad illuminandum hominum mentes et

errorum tenebros exterminandum descendit e coelis_ (and, therefore,

we who hold on earth the place of Him who came down from heaven to

enlighten the minds of men and to disperse the darkness of error).

The Bull does not appear to have attracted any special attention in

Venice, and the Government of the Republic continued to frame in its

own way the regulations for the control of the printers.

=The Earliest Legislation in Venice.=--The legislation of the Republic

relating to the productions of the printing-press concerned itself

with five general purposes: first, the embodiment into law of custom

and precedent; second, the protection against outside competition

of the book-manufacturing trade of Venice, and the preservation of

the excellence of the Venetian Press; third, the protection of the

book-buyer against bad workmanship and exorbitant charges; fourth, the

protection of the author’s rights; fifth, the institution of a Bureau

to administer the Press laws and to regulate the industry.

The legislative bodies of the State were the Senate and the Council of

Ten. The earliest legislation for the regulation of the Press (unless

we may count as a law the general order of the Ten, previously referred

to, establishing a literary censorship for works in Humanity) was a law

of the Senate passed August 1, 1517. This law recalled every privilege

heretofore granted, placing in the public domain, open for the use of

any one, all of the works named in these cancelled privileges.

The purpose of this law was to sweep away a mass of obstruction,

and in giving full freedom to printing undertakings, to further the

development of Venetian publishing. Among its advocates were many

of the printer-publishers, who were willing to lose their property

rights in existing copyrights for the sake of getting rid of the evils

that had arisen from the accumulation of overlapping privileges,

or of privileges which had been secured not for direct use but for

obstruction and for sale, and of privileges which on various grounds

had not been obtained in good faith. Under the law of 1517, privileges

were thereafter to require a two-thirds vote in the Senate and were to

be issued only for works which were new or which had not before been

printed. (_Solum pro libris et operibus novis, numquam antea impressis

et non pro aliis._)

The next law, that of 1526, has already been referred to in connection

with the case of Cynthio’s _Origin of Vulgar Proverbs_. It provided

that no book should be printed without the _imprimatur_ of the Council,

and that this _imprimatur_ should be granted only after the book had

been approved by two censors appointed by the Council as free from

scandalous or objectionable matter.

In 1533, the question of copyright was again attracting attention.

The law of 1517 had not worked well, and abuses had arisen under it.

No definition had been given limiting or constructing the term _opus

novum_, and the contention had been made that very slight additions or

alterations in a book already published would constitute it a new work

within the meaning of the act. It was only necessary for a publisher

to make application, under such a contention, for a copyright for a

previously unprinted classic, to prevent the work from being printed by

any other publisher.

A decree was now issued ordering that a publisher must complete the

publication of a work within twelve months from the date of securing

his copyright, under pain of the forfeiture of the copyright. A

modification was afterwards made under which, if the work was too large

to be completed within a year, the copyright could be preserved by the

production of not less than one folio a day. If the work were printed

out of Venice, the copyright was forfeited. No publisher could apply

twice for a copyright for the same work. The matter of prices was also

gone into; and publishers were directed to submit to the Bureau of

Arts and Industries an advance copy of each new book, which was to be

appraised by experts and the price set by them was to be that at which

the book should be published. No copies were to be sold at any higher

price.

In 1537, a further law was enacted, directed to the protection of the

interests of the consumer, and to the wholesome development of the

trade of book-manufacturing. The preamble speaks of “the ruinous and

disgraceful practices of the Venetian printers,” who used to be the

best in the world, and complains that now, for the sake of gain, they

use vile paper that will not hold the ink and that cannot be written

upon with marginal notes. This blemish cannot be due to any difficulty

in securing proper material, as foreign books come to Venice printed on

excellent paper.

It is, therefore, ordered that under a penalty of forfeiture of

be printed on paper that can be written upon without blotting. This

penalty shall be incurred if of any edition five copies blot, and

a copy shall be held to be defective if any five leaves in it blot.

Pamphlets and books below the value of ten _soldi_ are excepted from

the provisions of the law. New books are again defined as works which

have never been published before. The execution of the law is given to

the _Avogadori di Comun_, the law officers of the State.[151]

The enactments of 1542-1543 give evidence that the regulations for the

supervision of the publishing trade had not yet produced satisfactory

results, and that there was no little irritation on the part of the

Government at their failure. The Council complains that, contrary to

the censorial law of 1526, its _imprimatur_ was not always sought for

new publications, and that, as a result of this non-observance, books

were being printed and sold which offended the honour of God, were

repugnant to the Christian Faith, and were in many instances most

licentious. To remedy these evils, it was decreed that the printers

of unlicensed books should be fined fifty ducats, in addition to the

penalties previously decreed. The booksellers dealing in them were to

be fined twenty-five ducats, while those who hawked unlicensed books

about the streets were to be flogged from S. Mark’s to the Rialto, and

to be imprisoned for six months. A publisher using a false imprint was

to be imprisoned for twelve months, and then banished from Venice in

perpetuity.

In spite of these severe penalties, the law does not appear to have

secured more satisfactory obedience than had been given to the previous

decrees. As Brown points out, the law was probably not supported by

public opinion.

In 1544, the Commissioners of the University of Padua were constituted

the permanent censors of Venetian books submitted for the _imprimatur_

of the Council. The censorship of the Commissioners covered all points

excepting those relating to religion or theology, which were still

left to be passed upon by ecclesiastical censors.

In 1544-5, the Council of Ten gave attention to the question of the

ownership of literary productions. In no one of the several acts

that had been passed for the regulation of the Press, had it been

made apparent whether literary property was brought into existence

as property, by the process of securing the copyright, or whether

it existed, _ipso facto_, in the author of a work. In the latter

case, the copyright entry and the issue of the privilege constituted

simply an official recognition of the right and not a creation of

it. During the half century in which their business had been carried

on, the printer-publishers in Venice (in common with those of the

rest of Europe) were in the habit of ignoring literary proprietorship

altogether, and were accustomed to print any work they pleased, even

in direct opposition to the wishes of the author. It became evident

that some measure for the protection of the author was necessary, and

in the year 1544-5, a decree was issued forbidding anyone to print or

to sell a work without having first presented to the _Rifformatori_

(the University Commissioners) documentary proof of the consent of the

author or of his representatives.

All books printed without the consent of the author were to be

confiscated and burned; the printer was to be fined one ducat for each

copy of the book printed, and was to be imprisoned for one month. In

1547, a fresh attempt was made to restrain the sale of blasphemous or

obscene books.

One manner in which the law of 1543 had been evaded was by importing

books of a character for which an _imprimatur_ in Venice could not have

been secured. Brown says that in a number of cases, however, books of a

scandalous character, sold as importations, had really been printed in

Venice, the foreign imprint being forged. It was now ordered that any

one importing scandalous books should pay a fine of fifty ducats, the

books themselves being also forfeited.

The _Savii Sopra l’Eresia_, the three Venetian noblemen who served

as assessors to the Holy Office, and who now had in their hands the

examination of new publications with reference to matters of religion

or doctrine, were charged with the supervision also of imported books.

The Lutheran heresy was beginning to be promulgated by means of the

Press, and the ecclesiastical authorities were, therefore, especially

suspicious of literature coming from Germany.

In 1548, the first catalogue of prohibited books was issued in Venice.

The addition to the regular executive of the three Commissioners on

Heresy indicates as well a greater activity on the part of the Church

in regard to the supervision of literature, as a readiness on the part

of the Government to accept this ecclesiastical coöperation as long as,

in form at least, the State was recognised as the controlling authority

in the matter.

The year 1548-9 marks an era in the history of printing and publishing

not only in Venice, but of the world. In that year, under a decree

of the Council dated January 18th, the printers, publishers, and

booksellers of Venice were organised into a guild. The very natural

reason assigned for the formation of such a guild was that the trade

in question was the only important trade in the city that was not

already so organised. We find, however, as an additional reason,

which doubtless acted as an important incentive, the necessity of so

organising the business of the production of books that the work of the

Commissioners of Heresy in discovering and in punishing the publishers

of heretical books, should be facilitated.

=The Guild of Printers and Booksellers=, 1549-1595.--The organisation

into a guild of the printers and publishers of Venice was an important

event in the history of literary property in Italy. This guild was

the earliest trade association of book-men in Europe, the decree for

its institution bearing date 1548-9, or six years earlier than the

charter of Queen Mary of England, under which was incorporated the

Stationers’ Company. The publishers of Germany had organised the

Frankfort book-fair (in connection with the general Fair) as early as

1500, but this organisation had not yet taken the shape of a guild.

The _Libraires jurés_ of Paris, comprising members of the University,

organised as a division of the University, and subject to the control

of the University authorities, cannot, at least in its earlier stages,

be classed as a trade guild.

The Guild of Venice had, as we have seen, been brought into existence

not merely for the protection of trade interests, but for the purpose

of facilitating the work of the State and of the Church in keeping

a close supervision upon all the productions of the Press, and of

promptly suppressing those likely to prove pernicious. The regulations

framed by the Guild and the enactments secured by it were of service

in defining literary property and in protecting copyrights, but this

result was rather an incidental than an essential part of its work.

Seventeen years elapsed after the decree of 1548, before the

organisation of the corporation was fully completed through the

formulation of its by-laws; but from various references during that

time, it seems evident that shortly after 1548, an association was

in existence with a President and a Council, exercising some general

supervision over the printers and publishers. When the Guild was

finally organised, it appears to have been a more official and more

authoritative body than the London Company of Stationers. Its officers

comprised a prior, two councillors, six assessors, a secretary,

and a beadle. Membership in the Guild was compulsory upon all

master-printers, publishers, and booksellers, and each member was to

pay annually the sum of one lira, five soldi. The list of officials

included two syndics, one of whom was to be present at each election

and to administer the oath of office to the new officers. No member was

permitted to decline either nomination or election, under a penalty of

ten ducats. No member of the Guild could hold office unless during five

years previous he had been a master-printer or had kept a book-shop.

The by-laws of the Guild were called _Mariegole_, a term which is said

to come from _Matricule_, or matriculation books.

The Guild thus constituted, outlived the Government that had created it

and many succeeding governments. It even survived the Republic and the

period of revolutions and of Napoleonic invasions; and came to a close

only with the first decade of the present century, after an existence

of more than two hundred and fifty years. The Stationers’ Company of

London still exists under that name, but its control over the printing

and publishing trades of England disappeared many years before the

dissolution of the Guild of Venice.

The Guild appears to have moved but slowly in the work of controlling

the printing and the book-trade of the city; it was not until 1571

that it issued a decree (which apparently had the force of a decree

of the Council) forbidding anyone not a member of the Guild from

setting up a printing-press or opening a book-store. It was also

forbidden for anyone to exercise any of the functions of a printer or a

bookseller unless he had served a five years’ apprenticeship in Venice.

Foreigners who desired to exercise the art of printing, or to carry

on the business of bookselling, must first serve five years in some

shop in Venice, and after examination and approval by the authorities

of the Guild, must pay ten ducats for matriculation. The penalty for

infringement of the above decree was fifty ducats.

A protest was made to the _Proveditore di Comun_ concerning the

authority of the Guild to make or to enforce any such regulation, but

the _Proveditore_ promptly confirmed the action of the Guild, and in so

doing confirmed its authority to control the business of printing and

book-selling.

This control seems, however, during no period to have been complete.

Up to the year 1600, the Guild had at no time contained more than

seventy-five members. In 1596, according to the reports of the

_Rifformatori_, there were one hundred and twenty presses at work

in Venice, and it was necessary to print one hundred and fifty

copies of the _Concordat_ of 1596, in order to distribute them

among the booksellers of the city. It is probable, therefore, that

the master-printers and book-sellers must together have exceeded

seventy-five, and in that case the Guild could not have included them

all. While the Guild claimed, as we have seen, full jurisdiction over

the printers and booksellers, and claimed also the right to forbid any

person to carry on these trades without having obtained a certificate

of competence from its own examiners, it is probable that it lacked the

power to enforce its authority or to carry into effect its decrees.

The establishment of a system of censorship did not meet all the

difficulties in the way of a thorough supervision and regulation of

literature. The University Commissioners, to whom had been referred

the censorship other than ecclesiastical, were apparently not always

able to make examination of all pending publications or did not, at

least, always insist upon a personal examination. The publishers began

to make a practice (on the ground of lightening the labours of the

Commissioners) of having their forthcoming works examined by readers

selected by themselves.

On the strength of a favourable report from these friendly examiners,

the Commissioners would issue their certificate that the work contained

nothing objectionable, and with this _testamur_ the publishers

would secure, without further question, the _imprimatur_ of the Ten.

Under this procedure a number of objectionable works found their way

into print. The Commissioners finally, in 1562, gave orders to their

secretary that thereafter no authorisations should be given for any

printing whatsoever until the work had been examined and favourably

reported upon, first, by the Inquisitor or one of his vicars, or by

some person selected by the Tribunal of the Inquisition; second,

by the Reader in philosophy or some other public reader; third, by

a ducal secretary. The petitioner for a certificate was to bring a

_testamur_ signed by each of these, declaring that there was nothing

in the book contrary to religion, nothing injurious to morality, and

nothing hostile to princes, and that it was worthy to see the light.

The _testamurs_ should state the number of leaves in the book and must

quote the first and last lines.

After the book had been printed, but before it was issued to the

public, a copy was to be submitted to the _Rifformatori_ in order that

they might assure themselves that no additions or alterations had been

made after the securing of the _imprimatur_. Each of the three persons

who should examine the book was to be paid the sum of one _bezzo_ for

each leaf (sheet?). The _bezzo_ was worth the one hundred and sixtieth

part of a ducat. All the expenses connected with the three examinations

and with the issue of the _imprimatur_ must be borne by the petitioner.

Four years later, in 1566, it was ordered that all persons obtaining

licences should, before printing their works, register their licences

at the office of the _Esecutori contro la Bestemmia_, but for such

registration there should be no charge. This is the first attempt

that was made to institute a complete registry of the publications

of Venice. Unfortunately, the law was persistently evaded, and the

registers which have come down to us are very incomplete.

The system of censorship, as now completed, proved both cumbersome and

irritating, and must have seriously interfered with the development

of the publishing business of Venice. It was, however, not quite so

exacting as might have been expected from the stringent nature of

its provisions, for the reason that these were not and could not be

effectively enforced. The Government of Venice lacked the means to

enforce its literary regulations, and had no police adequate to the

special requirements of these regulations.

While the censorship of the State became more or less nominal, that of

the Church was enforced with comparative rigour, and exercised a very

material influence on the selection of the literature to be printed.

The Church had at hand a very effective machinery for the enforcement

of its supervision, as every priest and every friar was ready to act as

a policeman for the cause of ecclesiastical control over the Press.

=Copyrights in Venice=, 1500-1600.--Up to the middle of the fifteenth

century the average term of a copyright had been ten years. From the

year 1560, the terms began to increase, until towards the close of the

century the average is nineteen years. There are, however, examples

of terms as short as one year, and as long as thirty; while it is not

easy to trace the grounds for the discrimination. The fines inflicted

for contraband publications also varied very considerably. The amounts

collected were usually divided into three parts, which were assigned

one to the informer, one to the author, and the third, either to the

court, the arsenal, or to one of the three asylums. There is record

of but one instance during the century of a piratical printer being

deprived of his licence to print. It was the case of a copyright

granted to Pappa Alesio, of Corfu, the infringer of which was fined two

hundred ducats, and ten ducats for each unauthorised copy printed, and

was forbidden to print for ten years.[152]

The number of works for which copyright was secured varied very much

from year to year. The largest number of entries during the century was

one hundred and seventeen in 1561, and the smallest seven, in 1599. The

decrease during the last quarter of the century was in part due to the

Great Plague.

There were but two instances during the century in which the Senate

refused to grant an application for copyright, one of these refusals

being for the _Lettere Amorose_ of Pasqualigo. While the greater number

of the copyrights were issued in the names of the publishers, there

is, after the middle of the sixteenth century, an increasing number of

entries in the names of the authors. A copyright was given, in 1515,

to Ariosto for his _Orlando_, to last for his lifetime; and in 1535, a

of the poet’s works. Copyrights were also issued directly to Tasso,

Aretino, Giraldi, and other authors.

The making of maps and charts formed, as was natural in a great

centre of commerce, an important feature in the publishing of Venice;

while in company with these, there were long lists of works of

travel and adventure. Early in the sixteenth century, the production

of engravings, on wood and on copper, grew to be a considerable

industry. In 1521, a copyright was issued to Castellazzo for certain

illustrations for the _Pentateuch_ which he had engraved and for

certain others which he had in plan.

During the whole of the century, Venice continued to be the chief

publishing centre in Europe for Greek literature, and a place of resort

for Greek scholars. Its presses also became noted for the printing of

books in Hebrew. This latter industry, however, had to encounter no

little opposition on the part of the Government, an opposition in the

main due to jealousy of the ecclesiastical censors, who dreaded the

heresies that might be hidden in the unknown tongue. The dread was,

however, one that might be overcome if the inducement were sufficient.

The printer Bomberg, who had been refused a renewal of his ten years’

privilege for his Hebrew publications, made fresh application with

successive offers of one hundred, one hundred and fifty, and three

hundred ducats, all of which were rejected. A fourth offer of five

hundred ducats, however, finally secured the desired privilege.

Privileges were granted in 1498, and again early in the sixteenth

century, for the printing of works in Arabic and in other Oriental

languages, but the total number of Arabic books issued appears to

have been small. Beginning with the year 1565, there are from time to

time examples of publications in Armenian. The list of musical works

produced and copyrighted during the century was large and important.

=The Inquisition.=--The first instance of trials undertaken in Venice

by the Holy Office for offences committed through the printing-press,

was in the year 1547. The list is closed in 1730 with the trial of

Giovanni Checcazzi. In the sixteenth century there were one hundred and

thirty-two cases; in the seventeenth, fifty-five, and in the eighteenth

but four. It is not clear whether the diminished activity of the

Inquisition during the later years was due to the increasingly hostile

attitude taken by the Government of Venice towards the Church of Rome

after 1596, or to the fact that the vigour of the Press prosecutions

during the last half of the sixteenth century had effectively stamped

out the publication in Venice of heretical and immoral publications.

The great activity of these prosecutions between 1549 and 1592,

was doubtless due to the dread of the Lutheran heresy, and of its

propagation throughout Italy by means of the printing-press.

Heretical books could be presented to the Holy Office by denunciations

submitted without signature. If the court held that there was

ground for prosecution, the charges were formulated and the accused

was directed to appear for his defence within eight days from the

publication of the summons. The writers and the printers of heretical

books appear to have been considered about equally guilty, while the

offence of keeping such books for sale (even though ignorance of their

contents could be shown) was also a very grave one. In the great

majority of cases, the accused allowed judgment to go by default.

=The Index and the Book-Trade.=--It is in connection with the _Index

Expurgatorius_ of Pope Clement and the _Concordat_ that the history of

publishing in Venice comes for the first time into touch with general

history. The claim of the Church to the supervision of all publications

soon became involved in the larger question of the relation between

Venice and Rome.

Paolo Sarpi, who became the champion of the cause of the independence

of the State against ecclesiastical domination, comes into the

history of literature as the upholder of the rights of authors and of

publishers against the crushing censorship of the Inquisition. The

problem presented to the Venetian Government was: whether the Venetian

Press, supported in its liberty by the Government, should continue to

maintain its character as the freest Press in Europe (and therefore one

with the most active production); or whether it should be permitted,

for want of the support of the Government, to fall under the repressive

influence of the Inquisition and the _Index_.

The earliest instance of a censorial order on the subject of books in

Venetian territory, and also in Italy, is the order issued in 1491 by

Franco, Bishop of Treviso and Papal Legate. This decree prohibited

anyone from printing, or from causing or permitting to be printed,

any books treating of the Catholic faith or of matters ecclesiastical,

without the express permission of the Bishop or Vicar-General of the

diocese. The Legate proceeded at once to name two works, Rosselli’s

_Monarchia_ and Mirandola’s _Theses_, which were absolutely prohibited,

and all existing copies of which were to be burned in the cathedral

or in the parish churches within fifteen days from the publication of

the decree.[153] There was no charge that these works were in any way

immoral or scandalous. They were condemned simply on the ground of the

unsoundness of their doctrine. The contention raised in this order on

behalf of the Church was far-reaching. If it were heretical to discuss,

in a sense at all hostile to the Curia, the relative powers of the

Pope and the Emperor, there would be an implied right in the Church to

censure and to condemn any political writings in which the authority of

the Pope or the responsibilities of the Emperor were referred to.

It became, in fact, the keystone of the ecclesiastical position that in

the case of the Church no separation was possible between politics and

ecclesiastical dogma. The work which had been condemned to the flames

had been dedicated to the Doge Foscari, but the Government appears to

have taken no notice of the Bishop’s decree.

In 1544, the University of Paris published a catalogue of books

adjudged worthy of censure, and, in 1546, the University of Louvain

issued a similar catalogue of books which had been condemned by its

Faculty of Theology. The first Italian catalogue or index of censurable

books was that of La Casa, printed in Venice, either in 1548 or in

1549. No copy is known to exist, and the precise date is a matter

of dispute. La Casa was the Papal Nuncio, and his catalogue may,

therefore, be considered as the act of the Holy See, differing in this

respect from the black lists issued in Louvain and in Paris.

In 1554, the Inquisition first takes action in regard to books,

publishing a catalogue based upon that of La Casa and the Milan _Index_

of Arcimboldi. This catalogue of the Inquisition was largely utilised

for the first _Index_ issued from Rome, that of Paul IV. In the year

1558, the Inquisition in Venice issued a decree forbidding importers

from taking any books out of bond until they had deposited with the

tribunal a full list of the books imported. Such a list rendered, of

course, comparatively easy the subsequent seizure in the shops of any

works considered heretical or suspicious. As, under the laws of 1562,

the Inquisition had secured the right to take part in the censorship

required for the _imprimaturs_, it now possessed supervision over all

the literature supplied to the Venetian public.

The first Roman _Index_ was that published in 1559 by Paul IV., under

the title of: _Index auctorum et librorum qui ab officio sanctæ Romanæ

et universalis Inquisitionis caveri ab omnibus et singulis in universa

Christiana Republica Mandantur._ The _Index_ was divided into three

lists: first, the names of those authors each and all of whose works,

whether published or to be published, were absolutely prohibited;

second, names of writers certain of whose works (the titles of which

were given) were prohibited; third, the titles of anonymous books

prohibited. At the close of the _Index_ appears a list of sixty-one

printers with a prohibition of all works printed by them. In this list

there is but one Venetian name, that of Francesco Riccioli. Throughout

Italy, the _Index_ was received either coldly or with hostility. The

Viceroy of Naples and the Governor of Milan refused to allow it to be

published in their dominions. In Venice it appears never to have been

in force, while the Government of Florence waited to see what action

would be taken in other countries. In Spain, permission to print the

_Index_ was refused, and in Paris it was never published.

In the year 1562, the Council of Trent turned its attention to the

question of book-trade, and, after a long discussion, appointed a

committee of eighteen members to examine into the subject, and to draft

a decree, together with a revised _Index_.

The _Tridentine Index_ is based upon the _Index_ of Paul IV. Both

devote almost their entire space to works of heresy, giving but

trifling consideration to the question of immoral literature. The

_Tridentine Index_ presents ten rules for guidance in the enlargement

and continuation of the _Index_. It introduces also the formula _donec

corrigatur_. This formula signified either a temporary or partial

prohibition of a work not absolutely condemned, or a conditional

permission for its continued sale, provided that, in all copies of

existing editions, the condemned passages were either blotted out or

corrected by pen, while in all subsequent editions they were to be

omitted or modified. The fifth rule provided that all booksellers must

have in their shops a list of the books which they kept on sale, such

list being signed by the Inquisitor and the Bishop’s delegate; and

they were forbidden to have, to sell, or to distribute any other books

than those on said list, under penalty of forfeiture of the books and

of such other punishment as might be ordered by the Inquisition. Under

the seventh rule, one who had imported books was forbidden to give or

to loan them for the reading of another, or to part with them in any

way without written permission. The eighth rule provided that heirs

were to submit to the authorities a list of books inherited by them,

before using or parting with any of them. The ninth rule gave to Bishop

and Inquisitors-General the authority to forbid within their diocese

or provinces books other than those which appeared in the _Index_.

This _Tridentine Index_ appears to have been recognised at once as the

authoritative utterance of the Church on the subject of books, and to

have been very generally circulated. It was printed in Venice by the

Aldine Press, and it was printed ten times subsequently between 1564

and 1593. The whole position of the censorship of the Press, as well

in Venice as in the other publishing centres of Italy, was essentially

modified through the publication of the _Tridentine Index_. The

coöperation or approval of the secular authority, which, in Venice at

least, had kept in its own hands the nominal control of the censorship,

was now disregarded; while the powers of the Inquisition and the range

of its detailed supervision were widely extended.

The stringent effects of the _Index_ and the _Rules_ soon made their

influence felt upon the publishing and book-selling trade throughout

Europe. In 1581, the Dominican Castiglione writes: “The Inquisitors

frequently publish orders forbidding the sale of this or that work.

The booksellers are no longer willing, therefore, to take the risk of

importing books, while they are frequently prevented from selling those

already in stock. There must be in Rome at present unsalable books to

the amount of several thousand scudi.”

As early, in fact, as 1565, just after the publication of the _Index_,

Josias Simler writes: “A new _Index_ has appeared wherein so many books

are condemned that a number of professors in the Italian universities

complain they cannot lecture if the edict remains in force. Frankfort

and Zurich and other German cities have written to the Senate of

Venice, urging it not to accept an edict whereby the book-trade will be

ruined.” As a matter of fact, the Italian book-trade with Germany was

all but destroyed, while the home book-trade was isolated and gradually

starved.

As it was in Venice that the importing as well as the publishing

business had been the most important, so it was the Venetian book-trade

which now suffered more seriously than that of any other Italian

city. The relations of Venice with Germany were particularly close,

and the annals of the Frankfort as well as of the Zurich publishers

give frequent instances of works of importance being undertaken in

coöperation with Houses in Venice, and of the division with such Houses

of editions of books which had already been printed.

The Venetian Government, however, accepted in full the authority of the

Council of Trent in the matter, and, in 1567, new regulations for the

book-trade were drawn up, based upon the ten _Tridentine Rules_. From

this date, the number of Holy Office trials for offences of the Press

shows a steady increase. In the year 1571, Pope Pius V. instituted

the Congregation of the _Index_ for the purpose of dealing with all

questions relating to the examination, prohibition, or expurgation of

books; and in the year 1588, Sixtus V. ordered the Congregation to draw

up a new and enlarged edition of the _Tridentine Index_. This contained

large additions to the lists of prohibited books, and amplified the ten

_Rules_ to twenty-two.

In 1596, appeared the _Clementine Index_, of Clement VIII., and shortly

thereafter, friction arose between Rome and Venice in connection with

the supervision of the Press. In 1593, Maximus Margounios, a learned

Greek, who was Bishop of Cythera, was resident in Venice, and was

engaged in editing numerous Greek works for the Venetian publishers.

He had made himself obnoxious to the authorities at Rome for certain

heretical utterances, and he was summoned to appear at the Vatican.

He declined to leave Venice and the Senate refused to give him up.

In July, 1593, Paruta, the Ambassador of Venice at the Vatican,

submitted to the Pope a vigorous protest against the publication of the

_Clementine Index_, which was then in readiness, but which the Pope was

still keeping under advisement. Paruta set forth before the Pope the

various grounds for objection to the proposed _Index:_

1st. The great commercial importance of the book-trade in Venice, which

he represented as exceeding that of any city in Europe;

2d. The contention that the book-trade was in itself worthy of

protection and consideration;

3d. That a sufficient censorship was already exercised by the

_imprimaturs_ of the Council of Ten, which were not conceded without

the _testamurs_ of the examiners, among whom was the Inquisitor;

4th. The fact that the publication of this _Index_ would destroy the

property and might cause the ruin of many who, believing it safe as

long as they kept within the regulations of the Council of Trent, had

published books which were now to be prohibited in the _Clementine

Index_;

5th. That the new _Index_ not only made long additions to the lists

of prohibited books, but proposed a radical change in the standard of

prohibition. A great number of books were now to be condemned which did

not touch at all upon ecclesiastical or religious questions, simply on

the ground of some trivial expressions having nothing to do with dogma;

6th. The importance for the Church of keeping the men of learning

throughout the world well affected, and the certainty that they would

be very much troubled by any measures which interfered with scholarly

undertakings and with the distribution of important literature.

Venetian publishers had interested themselves largely in the production

of non-religious books, such as editions of the classics, the writings

of the poets, and romances, and Paruta was especially anxious to

prevent this class of publications from being interfered with, and

took pains, therefore, to emphasise that it had no importance for

the purposes of the Church. The arguments of Paruta, and similar

protests which came to Rome from Germany and from Paris had the effect

of convincing the Pope that some modifications in his _Index_ were

necessary. The matter remained in abeyance for some four months longer,

when the _Index_ was finally printed, but much altered and diminished.

Among the omissions from the first lists were the titles of the whole

class of non-religious books printed in Venice, in behalf of which

Paruta had spoken.

In the year 1594, Clement VIII. granted to a Venetian publisher,

Domenico Bassa, a copyright of a very comprehensive character. It

covered, in the first place, a specific list of books (which was

attached to the order), and, secondly, all other books of which

Bassa should issue the first editions, and gave him full control

of the same for the term of ten years. Any persons infringing this

and excommunication. The privilege covered territory both within and

without Italy. The book-trade of Venice petitioned the Government

against the continuance of any such privilege, contending that it

was calculated to bring immoderate gains to one man, and that if

it were fully enforced, the Venetian publishers would be compelled

either to emigrate to Rome or to abandon their business. The Venetian

Government instructed its Ambassador, Paruta, to protest against

this extraordinary monopoly granted to Bassa, as well because of its

interference with interests of the home book-trade, as on the broader

ground that it was an assault upon the independence of the Republic. He

also contended that there was no precedent for the use in purely lay

matters of ecclesiastical weapons.

The Pope replied that according to his understanding, the copyright

given to Bassa applied only to books in the Vatican library, but that

he would refer the matter to the Congregation of the _Index_.

Paruta reported to his Government that Bassa was bankrupt, and that the

Venetian publishers need not fear his competition. It was, further,

his impression that Bassa had obtained the privilege principally as

a “bluff” to his creditors. The privilege was not recalled, but does

not appear ever to have been utilised by Bassa. Much to the discontent

of Venice, however, the precedent remained of authority claimed if not

exercised by Rome over copyrights throughout Italy. The _Clementine

Index_ was published in 1596, and, as finally framed, modified very

materially the severe regulations of the _Sistine Index_ of 1590.

Between the years 1564 and 1596, the Inquisitorial censorship of

books had been weighing more and more heavily on the publishers and

booksellers in Venice and throughout Italy. The _Indexes_ which had

appeared since the issue of La Casa’s Catalogue had so increased the

number of unpublishable books, many of them forming a large staple

in the trade of Venetian publishers, that the interests of these

publishers, and particularly their export trade, had suffered severely.

The attempt had been made to take away the right of the Venetian

printers to print Bibles and missals, and to restrict the printing of

such books to Rome. The business was interfered with for a time, but

the attempt to stop it altogether was in the end successfully resisted.

In spite of Paruta’s opinion that Venetian interests had been

sufficiently consulted, the printers and booksellers at once appealed

to the Senate for support against the new _Index_. The negotiations

lasted for some months, but in the end the Pope gave way on the more

important points complained of, and a Declaration or _Concordat_

was agreed upon which lessened, as far as Venice was concerned,

the stringency of some of the more objectionable features of the

_Index_. When this _Concordat_ had been signed, the Senate authorised

the publication of the _Index_. The most important clause in the

_Concordat_ was the seventh, which provided that the right of the

Bishops and Inquisitors to prohibit books which are not on the present

_Index_, should refer only to books which attacked religion, or which

were printed outside of Venice, or which were issued with a false

imprint. This right was to be exercised only on just cause shown, and

with the consent of the three lay assessors. This limitation of the

ecclesiastical Inquisition to purely religious or theological questions

constituted a most valuable precedent in the long fight between the

Church and the secular authorities concerning the control of the Press.

The fifth clause drew a nice distinction: Printers were forbidden to

use lascivious woodcuts, but they might use cuts which were profane

without being lascivious.

A few months before the arrangement of the _Concordat_, and while

the settlement was still pending, the Senate had published a decree

condemning the practice which had begun to come into vogue among the

publishers and printers of Venice of applying to Rome for privileges

and monopolies. The Senate announced that any privileges that had

been thus obtained must be renounced or they would be disregarded and

prohibited, under penalty of a fine of ten ducats, any future attempts

to secure, either directly or indirectly, publishing privileges from

any authority other than the officials appointed for the purpose by the

Government of the Republic.

The _Concordat_ was the last arrangement arrived at between Rome

and Venice on the matter of the supervision of the Press until the

year 1766. During the century and a half following the date of the

_Concordat_, repeated attempts were made by the Holy See to induce

the Venetian Government to authorise the publication of an augmented

_Index_, but the Republic had persistently refused. The list of new

prohibitions finally accepted in 1766 was announced as _juxta formam

concordatorum_.

The contest of 1596 gave evidence of a material change in the attitude

of Venice towards the Church since the passing of the law of 1562. The

tone of the Government had become suspicious and hostile. While it was

still ready to leave to the Church the responsibility of supervising

matters which were purely theological or dogmatic, it objected

decidedly to the attempts made by the Church to extend its control over

all classes of literature, and still more to the tendency of the Church

to utilise the censorship of literature as a means of asserting its

authority over the State as a whole.

The varying phases of the long contest between the Papacy and the other

Catholic States of the world, had of necessity an important influence

upon the stability and upon the value of literary property, and, in

fact, in not a few instances, upon its existence. When the promulgation

of a new _Index_ could, without warning, stop the sale and therefore

destroy the selling value of a book or of a series of books, the

readiness of the publishers to invest capital in literary undertakings

must have been not a little hampered, and the possibility of securing

from such undertakings any adequate returns for the authors was much

lessened.

The efforts of the Church to extend its control over all literature

and to enforce a general censorship which should expurgate and, if it

seemed necessary, re-shape books in every division of thought, hampered

enormously the development of literature and of publishing not only in

Italy but in Spain and France. In Germany and in England the Papacy

was never permitted to interfere seriously with the production or the

distribution of books.

It was not only in Venice and in Florence that the attempts of the

Church of Rome to enlarge its control over the Press excited active

opposition. King Philip II. had refused to permit the promulgation in

Spain of the _Tridentine Index_ and its ten _Rules_. He wrote to his

ambassador at Rome that, “Spain has her own special _Index_ and her own

special _Rules_ on the prohibition of books. It cannot be permitted to

Rome to place her under general orders. Books which in one country may

be innocuous, in another may be dangerous.”

Between 1596 and 1623, the contest of Venice to retain in the hands

of its own Government the control of its printing and publishing,

continued with varying success. The contention that it endeavoured to

establish was that the Holy Office was not and could not be a separate

and independent power in the State; but that the Inquisition could take

action in Venetian territory (in regard not only to the censorship

of books but to matters of any kind) only through the consent of the

Government.

The theory was that the Government could delegate some particular

function to be performed by an ecclesiastic official, and that (even

though such official should be selected by the Church) he would, in

fulfilling such function, be an officer of the State. Under such a

theory, the idea was preserved of the independence of the State.

This view of the organisation of the censorship was preserved under

the provisions of the _Concordat_, and the _Concordat_ soon became,

therefore, an object of attack by the Church. The further contention

of the Venetians that the duties of the ecclesiastical Inquisitor

should be limited to questions of theology and dogma could be more

easily evaded by the Church, for it raised the wide question--what is

heretical? and what is the limit of dogma?

In the face of many difficulties, however, the Republic succeeded for

some years in maintaining its position, and fought hard to protect

its book-trade from further burdens. After securing the _Concordat_

from an unwilling Pope, and insisting upon the enforcing of its

provisions, it succeeded in absolutely preventing any public and

official enlargement of the _Index_ within Venetian territory. It is

evident, notwithstanding, that even with the restricted powers conceded

by the _Concordat_, the _Index_, and the Inquisition were able largely

to increase the rigour of their censorship, and the results of their

supervision and interference were shown in the very considerable

decline in printing and publishing undertakings immediately after 1596.

Within a few months of the publication of the _Index_, and in spite of

the protection of the _Concordat_, the presses of Venice were reduced

from one hundred and twenty-five to forty. The copyright entries which,

in 1596, had aggregated twenty-four, amounted in 1597 to only seven.

It was evident that the attempts of the Republic to protect publishing

undertakings and to further literary production had not been

successful, and that the failure was in the main due to the relation

of the Venetians to the Church. The effect of the _Concordat_ in

lessening the burdens of the censorship under the _Index_ was in great

part nullified by the labours of the clergy, who, for the purpose of

carrying out the policy of the Church, made full use of the powerful

instrumentality of the confessional.

The confessors announced to their penitents that books condemned in

Rome were prohibited for believers; and as a rule such books, although

not included in any _Index_ accepted by the Republic, could find no

sale in Venice. While other causes also contributed to the extinction

of the prestige of the Venetian Press, and to the very great decline

in its business, the chief responsibility for such decline must rest

with the Church for its persistent hostility to the smallest measure of

freedom of the Press, and for its insistence upon restrictive measures

of censorship which were absolutely incompatible with publishing

activity and with literary production.

=The Interdict and Fra Paolo Sarpi.=--While the contest between Rome

and Venice had turned very largely upon questions connected with the

censorship of the Press, many other matters were involved which assumed

still larger proportions in the relations between the Church and the

Republic.

Between 1605 and 1650, a number of issues were fought over, issues

connected sometimes with the control by the State Government of

ecclesiastics accused of crimes or misdemeanours, sometimes with the

control exercised by the Church over ecclesiastical property within

the borders of the Republic, and again with the relations of the

Jesuits and Capuchins to the law of the State. Venice was fighting

for her civil and secular independence; while the Pope had declared

his position when he announced that he would not submit to be Pope

everywhere save in Venice. Paul addressed a _monitorium_ to the clergy

of Venice, threatening excommunication to the Doge and Senate and

interdict upon the Republic. The Doge forbade the publication of the

_monitorium_, and the excommunication and interdict came into operation.

While all the business of the Republic necessarily suffered, its export

trade in books was, for a time, brought practically to a standstill.

The interdict lasted for a little more than a year, when it was finally

removed under a compromise settlement brought about through the French

Ambassador.

The most prominent figure in the whole of the struggle of this period

between Venice and the Papacy was Fra Paolo Sarpi. Cleric though he

were, he contended vigorously that the Church was embarking upon a

wrong course, and he held that the State was justified in resisting,

in secular matters, ecclesiastical encroachments upon the rights of

the sovereign. In the end, notwithstanding some temporary success

on the part of the State Governments of Italy, the Papacy succeeded

in establishing nearly all of its contentions, including a rigorous

censorship of the Press and the resulting limitations in literary

activities.

The fight made by Sarpi on behalf of the independence of the State, and

particularly of the right of the State to supervise and control its

literary productions was, notwithstanding, of first importance for

the intellectual activities of Europe. The arguments used in Venice

were repeated in Madrid, Paris, Zurich, and Oxford. Time was gained for

authors and for printers until, largely by means of the presses which

the Church was endeavouring to throttle, the spirit of resistance to

the domination of the Papacy and the feeling of national independence

against the right of Rome to lay down the law for Europe had gathered

so much strength that the claims of the Church were either withdrawn or

very much moderated.

In 1602, an instance occurred of censorship on the part of the Church

not for the expression of heretical opinions, but for the omission from

a work of authority of certain passages which the Church considered to

be important. The work was a commentary by Suarez on the Tractate _De

Censuris_ of Thomas Aquinas. The permission to the booksellers Ciotto

and Franceschi to print the volume was given by the Venetian censorship

only on condition of the omission of the passages in question. The

Congregation of the _Index_ at Rome thereupon forbade said booksellers

to continue the printing of the work (the publication of which was

stigmatised as a _crimen falsi_) under penalty of excommunication.

The omitted passages contained attacks upon the temporal authority

of princes. Sarpi pointed out that the formula of the _imprimatur_

was unwisely worded, in that it expressed the “approbation” of the

Government for the works issued, thus assuming on the part of the State

a practical approval of the doctrines contained in such work. The term

should, he suggested, be modified to “with the permission.”

In 1611, Thomas Preston, writing under the _nom de plume_ of Roger

Widdrington, published his _Apologia Cardinalis Bellarmini_, and in

1613, his _Disputatio Theologica_. Both works were placed on the

_Index_ by a special decree of the Congregation, _Nisi auctor quam

primum se purgaverit_.

The Nuncio in Venice begged that the decree might be published and

enforced upon Venetian booksellers. The Government, acting under

Sarpi’s advice, refused to allow the prohibition to take effect in

Venice, on the two grounds that the theological doctrines taught by

Widdrington were sound and orthodox, and that his arguments against the

pernicious doctrine of the temporal authority of the Pope over princes

were eminently worthy of dissemination. It will be noted that the

Nuncio had in his application expressly conceded one of the principal

contentions of the Republic that no Roman prohibition was valid in

Venice until confirmed by the Government.

In 1615, Andrea Morosini completed his History of Venice, in which

he had occasion to deal with the question of Interdict. The Venetian

Inquisition refused to sign the _testamur_, which was requisite before

the Council of Ten could grant an _imprimatur_. Paolo Morosini, who

was in charge of his brother’s work, appealed to the Senate, and

secured a declaration to the effect that the narrative in the History

was an exact and trustworthy account, that the Inquisitor drew his

authority to act from no other power than the Republic, that that

authority extended only to the supervision of books having to do with

questions of faith, and that no such questions came into the History.

The Government thereupon ordered the immediate publication of the book

without the _testamur_, and with the words _superiorum permissu_. It

is to be noted that the prohibition of Rome probably prevented the

sale of the book in Italy outside of Venice, and must, therefore, have

materially lessened the prospects of profit for author or publisher.

There were also instances of books which were approved by the Church

but the publication of which was considered detrimental to the

interests of the State, and their sale in Venice was accordingly

prohibited. One book of this class was the _Recantation_ of the

Archbishop of Spalato, printed in Rome in 1623, by the Apostolic

printers. The Republic objected to the contention of the Archbishop

that the Pope had power in things temporal as well as in things

spiritual.

A second example is the _History of the Council of Trent_, by Cardinal

Pallavicini, written in answer to Sarpi’s History. Through the Venetian

Ambassador at Rome, Pallavicini made application for permission to sell

his book in Venice. The application was refused on the ground that

the History contained sentiments obnoxious to the Government of the

Republic.

In a report written to the Government by Sarpi at this time, he takes

the ground that the tendency on the part of the Church during the

past few years has produced a whole series of books whose doctrines

are entirely subversive of all secular government. They teach that no

government but the ecclesiastical has a divine origin; that secular

government is a thing profane and tyrannical which God permits to

be imposed upon His people as a kind of trial or persecution; that

the people are not in conscience bound to obey the secular law or to

pay taxes; that the imposts and public subventions are, for the most

part, iniquitous and unjust, and that the princes who impose these

have in many cases been excommunicated, and that because of such

excommunication of princes, death, want, and other public misfortunes

have come upon their communities. In short, princes and rulers are

held up to view as impious and unjust; subjects may have to obey them

perforce, but, in conscience, they are free to do all that in them lies

to break their yoke.

Sarpi goes on to point out that the prince who had first perceived

the danger was Philip II. of Spain. The only books that he allowed

to remain under the censorship of the Inquisition were missals,

breviaries, and school-books. The censorship of all other literature

was confided to a commission appointed by himself. Sarpi recalls that

this had been the course taken also by the Republic, and emphasises

the importance on the part of the Republic of retaining in its own

hands a similar control of literary censorship. Sarpi closes his report

by recommending the establishment of a code of general rules, behind

which the ducal secretary can shelter himself from the importunate, the

interested, and the over-zealous, and by means of which a consistent

censorship policy can be maintained.

While Sarpi’s main purpose was the maintaining the independence of the

State against the encroachments of the Papacy, the principles for which

he contended were of first importance for the prosperity and, in fact,

for the continued existence of the Venetian publishing interest. Unless

the burden of Papal censorship could be lessened, literary production

in Venice must cease. In the schemes submitted to the Government for

a code of general rules by which was to be directed the system of

political censorship, Sarpi specified four classes of writers whose

books, in his judgment, ought to be placed upon the _State Index_:

I. Those who attack the Constitution of the Republic and its laws by

name; II. Those who attack the laws and constitution adopted by the

Republic without naming her; III. Those who, even within the limits of

fair controversy, argue against the legislation of the State; IV. Those

who attack no laws of the State, but who broadly maintain the absolute

and universal superiority of the ecclesiastical over the temporal

authority.

Sarpi further contended that “In the correction of books which are

open to censure, it is not advisable to follow the practice of the

Church in raking through the entrails of an author and altering the

sense and the intention of whole passages, so that the writer is made

to say the reverse of what he desired to say; first, because all the

world stigmatises such action as falsification; secondly, because such

conduct would bring upon Venice the infamous charge of castrating

books; thirdly, because the Court of Rome assumes for itself the sole

right to alter passages in books.” Sarpi concludes his report by

submitting ten propositions, upon which he recommends the Government to

take action:

I. The _Index_ of 1595, having received the consent of the Prince, the

books which appear upon it must remain there. II. For the future, no

prohibition is to be permitted unless corroborated by public authority,

as agreed upon in the _Concordat_. III. If ecclesiastics ask civil

authorities for support in prohibition of heretical works, it must

be granted to them after the works have been examined. IV. Under the

title of heresy, dogmatical support of civil authority in its own

proper sphere, is not to be included. V. Foreign books inimical to

good government are to be absolutely prohibited. VI. In the reprints

of books, nothing favourable to good government is to be removed. VII.

In issuing these reprints, the old editions, before the ecclesiastical

expurgations were made, are to be used. VIII. In printing the

_Index_ of 1595, no new names are to be allowed to creep in. IX. The

prohibitions of the Inquisitor shall be confined entirely to heretical

works. X. The _Concordat_ shall always be printed along with the

_Index_.

As well from these propositions as from the general course of the long

controversy, it is evident that Venice was, ostensibly at least, as

anxious as the Church could be for the purity of the Press. In fact,

judging from the _Indexes_, this point had not caused the Church any

particular anxiety. The unsettled question was, which should exercise

the censorship over the offences of libel, scandal, and obscenity--the

Church or the State. It was the opinion of Sarpi that all such books

should be absolutely prohibited. The risk, as emphasised by Sarpi, was

that the _Concordat_ might fall into desuetude, leaving the Venetian

Press completely under the control of the Inquisition and deprived of

the bulwark which the State had secured for its defence.

The future justified his dread. The heat of the quarrel died away, and

the _Concordat_ was substantially forgotten. The Inquisition secured

full control of the censorship. The Press of Venice came under the

influence of the _Index_ and the _Rules_. Its losses were greater than

those of the other Presses that the Council of Trent had undertaken to

regulate, for the reason that it had so much more to lose. From the

beginning of the seventeenth century, the Venetian Printing-Press,

although not destroyed, ceases to hold preëminence in Europe.

In 1601, the Senate took serious alarm at the emigration of the

publishers and the printers. The latter took with them even the

materials of their trade, their type, presses, and ink. A drastic law

was at once passed making it illegal for any printer to leave Venice

without the written authority of the Government, and prescribing severe

penalties for any who undertook to sell for export the materials and

instruments used in printing. This measure, severe as it was, appears

not to have proved effective in checking the decline of printing, and,

in 1603, the Senate undertook a general reform of the art. The new

regulations included the following provisions:

None but official proof-readers were to be employed by the printers.

These proof-readers were to be appointed by the _Rifformatori_. The

manuscript copy and proofs were to be preserved as evidence that no

alterations had been made after the examination for the _imprimatur_.

A fine of twenty-five ducats was to be imposed upon every printer who

should place the name _Venetia_ on books not printed in Venice.

Terms of copyright were fixed as follows:

In the case of first editions for which the necessary _testamur_ and

_imprimatur_ had been secured, the publisher or printer securing the

first registry was to have a copyright for twenty years.

For books printed in Italy but not in Venice, the publisher who should

secure a Venetian registry with the Guild was to have a copyright for

ten years. A similar copyright was given for the reissue of books that

had not been printed in Venice during the preceding twenty years. For

new editions of books which had not been printed in Venice during the

preceding ten years, a copyright of five years was to be conceded.

All terms of copyright depended upon the condition that the printing

was begun at once and was continued at the rate of not less than half

a folio a day. There was a long list of regulations concerning the

standard and quality of the paper, ink, and type. Books which were

found after publication to be badly printed or full of typographical

errors were to forfeit their copyright.

The measure was a comprehensive one, and ought to have proved of

service in restoring the quality of Venetian editions if its provisions

could have been enforced. There appears, however, to have been a lack

of adequate machinery for such enforcement.

It was evidently intended that the Guild should become a sort of

Stationers’ Hall for the registration of copyrights. No such register

is now in existence, and there is some doubt as to its ever having

actually been created.

In 1614, a new office was created in addition to the number already

charged with the supervision of the Press. The incumbent was called

the Superintendent of the Press, and his special duty appears to have

been the passing upon the printers’ “copy” before this was put into

the hands of the typesetters. In 1653, a fresh attempt was made to

strengthen the Guild of Printers, for the purpose as well of improving

the quality of Venetian printing, as of checking the increasing

importations of foreign books. The tax on imported books was raised to

eight ducats ($18) per hundred pounds.

In 1671, there were increasing complaints concerning the bad

workmanship and inaccurate typography of Venetian editions, and also

as to the non-delivery of the copyright copies for the libraries of

S. Mark and of Padua. The failure to secure obedience to the various

provisions of the press-law is not to be wondered at when we remember

how complex these provisions were, and that there was practically no

police machinery to utilise for their enforcement.

At the close of the seventeenth century, the following processes had

to be gone through with before a book could be published: _testamur_

from the Inquisitor; _testamur_ from the ducal secretary; certificate

from the _Rifformatori_ of the University of Padua; _imprimatur_ from

the Chiefs of the Ten; revision by the Superintendent of the Press;

revision by the public proof-reader; collation of the original text

with the text as printed by the secretary to the _Rifformatori_;

certificate from the librarian of S. Mark that a copy had been

deposited in the library; examination by experts appointed by the

_Proveditori_ to establish the market price of the book.

In connection with the majority of these operations a fee was

required. The failure to secure any one of the several _testamurs_

or _imprimaturs_ delayed or indefinitely blocked the publication of

the book. This stopping of the publication might be made necessary

only after a considerable outlay had been incurred by the publisher

in addition to the expenditure of labour and time on the part of the

author. It is not to be wondered at that with such heavy burdens

and annoying obstacles literary production should have lessened,

and publishing enterprise and investment have been checked. It is

only surprising that under such a complex machinery of supervision

publishing should have continued possible at all. It is certain that

the possibility of securing from the business remunerative returns had,

by the close of the seventeenth century, very much diminished, and

that there must have been a corresponding reduction in the earnings

of literary labour. By the beginning of the seventeenth century, the

centre of literary production and of publishing activity had been

transferred from Italy to Germany, from Venice and Rome to Zurich,

Frankfort, and Leipzig.

=The Printers’ Guild and Press Legislation.=--The Venetian Guild of

Printers and Booksellers, while nominally given a very general control

over the printing and publishing operations in the Republic, was never

in a position to exercise so direct an effective influence over this

business as had been secured by the similar English Guild chartered in

1556, under the name of “Stationers’ Hall.” It would appear that the

printing and publishing trade had never given the same hearty support

to their organisation as had been given to the early printers of

London. It is certain that the Guild was not well governed by its own

officers, as from year to year we find in the records long declarations

of abuses which had arisen.

Even the yearly election of officers fell into neglect, and it

sometimes happened that the same officials remained in office, without

the formality of re-election, for six or seven years running. It was

only a very strong and thoroughly supported trade body that could have

secured for itself the right to take an active part in coöperation

with, or in antagonism to, the representatives of the Church on the

one hand or of the State on the other, in framing the long series of

regulations concerning copyright, literary property, press supervision,

and typographical standards.

The Guild of Venice did not have the continued sturdiness and

self-assertion requisite for maintaining such influence. Its principal

attention was given to shaping new taxes and new hindrances upon the

importation of books from abroad, and to attempts, often fruitless, to

prevent the migration from Venice of the more enterprising members of

its own body. A very much larger influence was exercised upon the Press

legislation of its time by the associated printers and publishers of

Frankfort and Leipzig, and by the well organised Printer-publishers

of Paris. The interference of the Church in the German publishing

centres was never very serious; while in Paris the supervision of the

ecclesiastics was, from the outset, overshadowed by the controlling

influence (often fussy and bothersome) of the Parliament of Paris.

In spite of feeble and ineffective management, however, the Guild of

Venice accumulated property; and in 1638, it was rich enough to plan

for the purchase of a Guild Hall, which was finally opened in 1642. The

hall formed part of the cloisters attached to the Monastery of S. John

and S. Paul, and was leased in perpetuity.

It was apparently in keeping with the general attitude of the Press

of Italy towards the Church, that its first headquarters should have

been under an ecclesiastical roof. The Guild of Venice was the only

book-trade association in Europe the home of which was not entirely

under secular control. Unfortunately for Venice, the lease of these

convent premises had been made in perpetuity, and perpetual also was

the obligation assumed with the premises to perform in them each

year a specific number of masses. The expense account of the Guild

increased from year to year, and this increasing outlay made requisite

an increase in the membership list. The number of members who belonged

during the first year of organisation appears to have been about

eighty. The average membership during the succeeding years until 1732

was from three hundred to four hundred. In this year, the Guild took

into its ranks, in addition to the master-printers and booksellers,

master-binders.

In 1667, the Guild printed the examination paper prepared for those

seeking matriculation as booksellers. This paper probably covered

in substance the same range of subjects and the same standard of

proficiency as had been in vogue for a number of years previous to

its publication. The following are the principal questions for which

answers were required:

1st. Name the principal bibles (doubtless the principal editions of

the Bible).

2d. Name the principal Saints and Fathers, both Greek and Latin.

3d. Name the principal expositors of Holy Writ.

4th. Name the principal theologians, controversialists, and

polemical writers.

5th. Name the principal writers in ecclesiastical history.

6th. Name the ancient writers on philosophy and history; also

the principal poets, tragic as well as comic, in Greek and Latin

literature.

7th. Name the principal writers on the law of nature, the law of

nations, on civil and canon law, on philosophy, metaphysics, and

ethics.

8th. Name the principal geographers, Greek, Latin, Italian, and

French (the geographical science of Germany, which had already

produced some of the most trustworthy maps in existence, was

apparently not appreciated).

9th. Name the principal historians, ancient and modern,

letter-writers, antiquarians, numismatists, mathematicians,

physicians, surgeons, anatomists, and jurists.

10th. Name the principal writers on the fine arts, painting,

sculpture, and architecture, civil and military.

11th. Name the principal writers on natural history and botany.

Further, all candidates must be able to read and write Italian

fluently, and must have a thorough knowledge of Latin and a working

knowledge of French. Greek was not required, but was commended as a

useful accomplishment. (In the retail shop attached to the office

of Aldus, one or more salesmen had been required who could talk

intelligently to Greek scholars about their editions of the Greek

classics; but this was two hundred and thirty years earlier.) In

addition to the above series of questions on scholarship, the examiners

were instructed to make test of the candidates’ practical knowledge of

the methods of booksellers’ business.

If these examinations were carried out with any degree of thoroughness,

the booksellers of Venice must assuredly have been entitled to rank

with the scholars of the world. We find no such high standards enforced

in Paris, Leipzig, or in London, although in the two former publishing

centres at least, the standard of scholarly attainment and of general

knowledge of literature in the book-trade has always been high.

It is hardly necessary to remark that the application of any such

severe test to the booksellers of to-day would empty the bookshops of

nearly all of the trade centres of the world, leaving a dozen or more

exceptions among the older traders in the University towns of North

Germany.

The examinations for master-printers were also, if we may trust the

records, both comprehensive and thorough. We have already seen,

however, that notwithstanding examinations and regulations, the Guild

had not succeeded in keeping Venetian printing of the seventeenth

century up to the standard established by Aldus and his associates at

the beginning of the sixteenth. In the year 1767, the _Rifformatori_

turned their attention to the over-crowding and overproduction in the

book-trade, declaring it to be their intention to regulate the supply

through the demand. The first clause of the law of July 29th forbids

the articling of new apprentices for the ensuing fifteen years. Sons

and heirs are prohibited from entering the Guild during the lifetime

of their fathers or those whom they will succeed. No one may open a

shop or establish a press without first satisfying the magistracy that

there is room or need for such shop or press. Booksellers or printers

of the mainland who wish to enter the Guild in Venice, must close their

mainland shop or press before they can be admitted. The copyright in

new books, which, by the law of 1603, had been fixed at twenty years’

duration is now extended to thirty years, and for reissues it is

extended from ten to thirteen years. Venetian printers must reach the

market through Venetian book-sellers, and are forbidden to sell to

foreign booksellers or to dealers in Venice not members of the Guild.

Notwithstanding all this elaborate provision, the influence of the

Guild steadily declined, and the book-trade of Venice failed to regain

its old-time prosperity. In 1780, the _Rifformatori_ had before them

for consideration the treatment to be accorded to the bankrupt members

of the Guild. Insolvent members, while relieved from their Guild taxes,

were excluded from all active share in its management. In 1782, the

cashier of the Guild is empowered to advance money to poor members who

need funds to develop their plant and to put their presses in order. In

the same year, the Government fixed a standard of quality below which

no paper used by the printer must fall, under penalty of confiscation

of the edition in which the inferior paper was used.

The Guild survived the fall of the Republic in 1796, and in March,

1799, the Provisional Government undertook the direct control of the

Press, re-affirming its ancient provisions and regulations in the

matter of licensing books, of internal police, and of supervision.

Brown says that it is not clear whether the Guild was suppressed or

whether it died a natural death. The last document in the minute book

is dated 1806, and after that date our knowledge ceases. It was in

March, 1806, that Venice was formally annexed to the Kingdom of Italy,

as organised by Napoleon. It is probable that any independence of

action on the part of the organisation of Printers and Publishers was

found incompatible with the Napoleonic system of the control of the

Press.

In summing up the history of the operations of the book-trade of

Venice, Brown remarks upon the constant lamentation on the part of the

Government that the art of printing was decaying. He is inclined to

doubt, however, whether such dread was well founded. Unquestionably

it was the case that Venice no longer held a place of prominence for

the finest class of printing, and there were no adequate successors

to Jenson, John of Speyer, and Aldus Manutius, whose work would be

accepted by the book-lovers of Europe as a model of typography. There

was, however, a continued activity in printing as a trade, although

there might be less interest in printing as an art, and the demand for

cheap books, as well among Venetians as among the customers of Venice,

had very largely increased between the beginning of the seventeenth and

the end of the eighteenth century.

We find references from time to time to the rush of competitors to

republish a book the copyright of which had expired. The long series of

restrictions imposed by the ecclesiastics upon the printing of certain

classes of books, are in themselves evidence of the extent of the

dread felt by the Church concerning the influence to be exercised by

these books upon the general public, and we must infer that the public

demand for cheap books was steadily increasing, and that an effective

book-selling and distributing machinery had been organised. The Church

assuredly did all that was practicable to hamper the development of the

new art, and succeeded, at least to the extent of transferring from

Italy to Switzerland and to Germany the centre of literary production

and of publishing activity.

It is to be noted that throughout the entire series of Venetian laws

on copyright, there is no explicit statement that the property in a

work belongs to its author. Such a conclusion is fairly to be inferred

from the sense of many of the regulations, but it would appear that

it had been arrived at rather by implication or had been accepted as

something not necessary to define but in the nature of a truism or a

self-evident fact. If this view of the purport of Venetian law be

sound, it follows that, in Italy at least, literary property cannot be

considered to have been the creation of law. It is safe here to use the

term Italy, although the reference has been only to the law of Venice,

for the reason that, as far as the regulation of literary property

was concerned, Venetian legislation was much more comprehensive and

specific than that of any other Italian State.

An act of the Venetian Senate passed on the 11th of March, 1780,

presents sufficient evidence that the Government understood the

ownership of a literary production to be vested in its author. This act

declares _il privilegio prima d’essere perpetuo per suo posseditore,

l’era per l’autore dell’ opera, qualunque egli fosse, come si è sempre

praticato_. In September, 1781, the Rifformatori of the University of

Padua, in the case of Pezzani, pronounced that _il privilegio accordato

alla stampa diventa dovuto premio all’ autore_.

A phrase in the decree of the _Rifformatori_ of 1780 might, if

taken alone, be construed as constituting or conferring a perpetual

decree, as the requirement for a _nuova licenza colle solite forme_

necessitated an application for renewal every five years, and unless

the licence could be renewed, the ownership in the literary property as

such would naturally lapse. In 1789, the question was more definitely

settled by one of the laws framed under the Provisional Government

(which succeeded the Republic), which re-enacted the provision of the

Act of 1603, whereby all books whose privileges (or copyrights) had

expired became public property.

A distinctive feature in all periods of the Press legislation of

Venice, was the apparent inefficiency of the law, in spite of its

constant interference and its many excellent provisions, to correct the

abuses at which it aimed. The difficulty was partly due to the lack

of adequate public opinion, and partly to the absence of any police

machinery. It was also the case that the legislation was probably too

paternal and unduly officious, so that the industry became checked

by a multiplicity of laws relating to every conceivable phase of its

existence. When, in addition to the legislation which was intended to

further the business of printing and publishing, was added the complex

series of ecclesiastical censorship restrictions, it is only surprising

that any wholesome vitality for the book-trade was possible at all.

=The Last Contest with Rome.=--In 1765, the Senate was again concerned

with the old subject of the deterioration of the Venetian Press. A

report was presented by the _Rifformatori_ of the University from which

it appears that the number of presses had fallen from seventy-seven in

1752 to fifty in 1765, and in which it was contended that the quality

of the printing done had suffered as much as the quantity. In former

years, said the report, the books called for by the Italian market

were printed in Venice, and the booksellers in other cities devoted

themselves principally to keeping depots for the sale of Venetian

editions. Now, however, Leghorn, Lucca, Parma, Modena, and Bologna

print their own books, and even refuse to accept Venetian editions in

exchange, but demand payment in money. Venice no longer fills the place

of mistress of the trade of book-production, but has become simply a

retailer.

The _Rifformatori_ concluded that the evil was partly due to the lack

of a sufficiently high standard of workmanship among the printers,

but that its chief cause was the lack of desirable new literature

with which to keep the presses occupied. The demand for reissues of

the classics had been in great part supplied, while the production

of original works had been seriously hampered and discouraged by the

continuous interference of the Church and the serious obstacles and

burdens imposed through the _Indexes_, the _Rules_, and the cumbersome

machinery of the ecclesiastical censorship.

The _Rifformatori_ recommended, among other measures, that the

_Concordat_ and the _Index_ of 1595 should again be published, if only

to prove that all works subsequently placed upon the _Index_ without

the consent of the Government were not prohibited in Venice but could

be freely printed, bought, and sold; that the name of Venice should be

printed on the title-pages of all Venetian productions; that printers

and publishers should be forbidden to seek the _testamur_ of the

Inquisitor for the reissue in Venice of books first printed abroad, but

that these works should be licensed directly by the Government after

an examination of them by certain faithful and learned persons. It was

evidently the object of the _Rifformatori_ to secure for the Venetian

Press the large business of supplying the markets of Italy with

editions of works by foreign authors, the literary activity of Italy

being at that time evidently insufficient to keep the printers occupied.

The recommendation of the _Rifformatori_ that the censorship privilege

heretofore exercised by the ecclesiastical Inquisitor should be brought

to an end was certain, if adopted, to bring the Republic into renewed

conflict with the Church.

This recommendation, however, together with all the others in the

report, were passed upon with approval by the local advisers of the

Senate. In August, 1765, the Senate issued a decree instructing the

_Rifformatori_ to publish and to circulate the _Index_ of Clement

and the _Concordat_, and also providing that the Rifformatori should

appoint an ecclesiastic, a subject of Venice, as an equal associate

with the Inquisitor, whose _testamur_ as to matters of faith and

doctrine should have equal weight with that of the Inquisitor. The

publication of this decree caused no little excitement in Rome,--and

a decree was at once issued by the Papal Court prohibiting the sale

or circulation of all books licensed by the newly-appointed Venetian

officers. Any such books found on the frontier of the Papal States were

to be seized and consigned to that part of the convent libraries known

as the “prison and hell of heretics.” In July, 1766, the Papal Nuncio

made a formal protest to the Government of the Republic and demanded

the withdrawal of the decree of 1765.

The issue between the Republic and the Papacy was not whether heretical

publications should be repressed, for Venice declared itself as much

opposed as Rome to books destructive of sound doctrine. The contest

turned upon the selection of the authority that should decide what

was heretical or dangerous. The Republic had from the outset claimed

that all authority for censorship and for licensing must proceed from

the Church, and while it was prepared to make use of ecclesiastical

censors, these must be appointed by the civil government. The present

decree expressed, it was contended, merely a reaffirming of the

original policy. The Papacy, on the other hand, maintained that the

authority of the Holy Writ, of the Fathers, and of the Councils proved

that the duty of keeping the flock from poisonous food was entrusted to

the Church.

The Senate referred the demand of the Papacy to Pietro Francheschi for

counsel, and he prepared a report in which the case of the State was

forcibly stated. The position of Venice had, it was contended, not

changed at all from the time when, with the introduction of printing,

some system of Press supervision had been found to be necessary. She

still claims to be the faithful child of the Church, while maintaining

her right also to be _Principe libero in casa sua_.

The issue had thus been fairly presented on the part of the two

parties but no conclusion was reached, and it is probable that with

such different points of view, and with a lack of accord even upon

such primary terms as “dogma,” “heresy,” and “orthodoxy,” no agreement

that was both logical and equitable could have been reached, even if

more time had been available for the discussion. The decree of August,

1765, was never withdrawn, and the place of Inquisitor as censor of

books upon matters of faith was taken by persons appointed by the

_Rifformatori_ of the University. In the year 1794, the Commissioners

of Heresy (_Savii sopra l’Eresia_) requested an opinion from these

University censors upon the _Institutiones Theologicæ_ of De Montazet,

Archbishop of Lyons, which had been censured at Rome in 1792. As a

result of their report, the Government refused to sanction the decree

of the Congregation of the _Index_.

Such an instance can be accepted as evidence that the Press of

Venice had at last secured freedom from the censorship of Rome. The

revolutionary spirit which was agitating all Europe, and which in

France had for the time completely overthrown both Church and monarchy,

must have seriously weakened the control of the Papacy over the Italian

States, and doubtless exercised no little influence in this final

contest between the ecclesiastical censorship and the printing-press.

Venice did not long enjoy this freedom. In 1797, the Republic fell,

and with the establishment of French rule, the history of Venetian

legislation concerning literary property comes to an end.

This record of the Venetian Printing-Press, including its relations

with the Government, the Church, and the public, covers, as we have

seen, a period of about three centuries, from 1490 to 1797. It is,

as said, based upon, and in part abstracted from, the erudite and

comprehensive history of Brown. I have thought best to confine the

narrative to Venice on several grounds. Venice was the first city in

Italy, and practically the first in Europe, in which the printing

and publishing business became of importance. For the first century

of the period above referred to, it was the chief publishing centre

of the world. In Venice, came together skilled printers from Germany

and learned scholars from the ruins of the Eastern Empire, and the

development of the Venetian Press was encouraged and in part made

possible by the support of certain cultivated members of the Italian

nobility, a nobility which, during the fifteenth and sixteenth

centuries, probably possessed a greater measure of intellectual

refinement and scholarly taste than could be shown at the time by the

noble classes of any other country of Europe.

The comparatively secluded position of Venice preserved it from many

of the interruptions of foreign invasions and interstate strifes to

which nearly all the other cities of Italy were subject. All classes

of business were of necessity seriously interfered with, and often for

the time entirely destroyed by the desolating influence of war in the

form either of defensive campaigns against Germany, France, or Spain,

or of the many little contests of the cities with each other; while for

literary activity and for the production and distribution of books,

conditions of warfare were nearly fatal. It is surprising that during

the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it should have proved possible

to have carried on as much book business as was done in such cities as

Lucca, Florence, and Pisa.

During these centuries, however, Venice, protected by her lagoons,

never felt the foot of an invader, and while her trade through Italy

had to take its share of the interruptions caused by the many wars, her

traffic by sea was rarely interfered with. It was doubtless in part

also this position of independence which enabled Venice to withstand

the encroachments of the Papacy, and alone among Italian cities to

preserve in its own hands even a partial control of its Press. This

Press was, of course, very far from being free, the censorship on

the part of the State, and the ecclesiastical censorship exercised

either by authority of or in spite of the authority of the State,

being often severe, and always cumbersome, irritating, and expensive,

and interfering enormously with the value of literary production

as property. The Venetian Press possessed, however, a far greater

measure of freedom than had been secured by the printer-publishers of

any other Italian city, and this was probably the chief cause of its

long-continued preëminence.

The general course of the legislation in Venice for the supervision of

the Press and for the encouragement and protection of literary workers

and of publishers, was similar in character to that of the other

Italian cities in which attention was given to printing. The literary

legislation of Venice was, however, more comprehensive in its character

and more consistent in its purposes than that of other Italian States,

while the records of it are also among the most complete, and, thanks

to the scholarly diligence of Mr. Brown, are now accessible to the

unscholarly reader.

This abstract of the history of the Venetian Printing-Press has,

therefore, been given as presenting a sketch of the history of literary

property in Italy for the three centuries covering the period from the

introduction of printing to the destruction of the Venetian Republic.

The enactments in Italy relating to literary property are not again of

any very distinctive importance until after the establishing, in 1859,

of the Italian Kingdom.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER II.

PRIVILEGES AND REGULATIONS IN GERMANY.

1450-1698.

FROM the time of the invention of printing, about 1450, to the end of

the fifteenth century, the works of living authors played practically

no part in the German book-trade, and the question of commercial

results for their writers did not call for consideration. The printers

and publishers of this period busied themselves almost exclusively

in putting into print the manuscripts of the earlier ages. In this

class of undertakings the principal task was to secure through the

collation of different manuscripts an authoritative and trustworthy

text, and the literary service required was not that of an author but

of an editor. It is the contention of Schurmann and of other German

historians that in the folio and quarto reprints of the fifteenth

century German printers took the lead, and that their preëminence was

hardly contested by the other printers of Europe until the time of the

Reformation. This view, however, fails to do justice to the importance

of the scholarly labours of Aldus of Venice, who was unquestionably

the leading publisher of the fifteenth and early sixteenth century. As

previously pointed out, Luther was probably the first German author to

draw attention to the iniquity of literary piracy, and to prophesy the

evils that must result to the development of German literature unless

legislation could be secured that would make a substantial recognition

of the property rights of literary producers. He took the ground

that such recognition could not be adequately given by the system of

privileges, the tendency of which was to narrow instead of to widen

the conception of literary property. He emphasised also the right of

the author to come into direct relations with his reader, and by means

of his personal control of all the editions circulated of his works to

preserve his text from corruption (_Text-Verfälschung_) and to have the

assurance that the words that came to the reader were the words that

had originally been written by the author.

Luther’s interest in this question of the correctness of the text was,

in fact, much keener than in regard to the remuneration of the author,

and he was even ready to give his aid to unauthorised issues of his

own writings by correcting the proofs of the same. The accuracy of

the text was, of course, of special importance in connection with the

vital subjects which Luther was presenting to the attention of his

readers, and was also the more difficult of attainment on account of

the material differences at that time existing between the dialects of

North and South Germany.

He writes in 1524: “_Des falschen Druckens und Bücherverderbens

fleissingen sich jetzt viele_.”[154] (There are many now busying

themselves with the spoiling of books through misprinting them.)

Literary piracy in Germany may be said to have begun almost at once

with the invention of printing. Before manuscript copies had been

replaced by printed books, the possession of a manuscript was held to

carry with it the right to make copies of the same _ad libitum_. As a

very natural, though hardly warranted consequence of this practice,

the possession of a printed copy of a work was for a considerable

time also believed to carry with it the right to make and to dispose

of further printed copies, and the first upholders of an author’s

“ancient precedent.”

Early in the history of the German book-trade, there arose a practice

among leading publishers of respecting each other’s undertakings,

irrespective of any privileges or other legal protection given to the

works in question. To this practice there were, of course, numerous

exceptions, but it exercised nevertheless, during the period previous

to the existence of national copyright systems, an important influence

in educating trade opinion and public opinion to a recognition of

and a respect for literary property. The many important publications

of Anthoni Koberger of Nuremberg, whose business activity dated from

1473, were issued entirely without privilege, and appear, with a few

exceptions, not to have been interfered with by rival publishers. He

took pains to protect himself by giving to those publishers whose

competition was most likely to be serious, shares in his more important

ventures. In 1495, for instance, he entered into a compact with

Nicholas Kessler, of Basel, under which each agreed not to interfere or

to compete in any way with works undertaken by the other.

The works of Albert Dürer, both in art and in literature, afford early

examples of the attempts of local governments to secure protection

for copyrights. In 1512, complaint was made to the Magistracy of

Nuremberg that a certain man was offering for sale some prints or

drawings which pretended to be the work of Dürer and which bore

Dürer’s signature, but that both the designs and the signatures were

counterfeits. Thausing[155] is of opinion that it was only the forgery

of the signatures that was complained of, but Schurmann appears to

believe that there had been an attempt also to imitate Dürer’s work.

The decision of the magistrates was that the sale of these prints must

be stopped, and that the copies remaining which bore the fraudulent

signature must be confiscated. In 1532, some time after the death

of Dürer, a certain Hans Guldemund re-engraved the _Triomph-wagen_,

and began to sell impressions from this unauthorised plate. The

magistrates, upon being appealed to by Dürer’s widow, promptly forbade

Guldemund to make any further sales. The latter evidently delayed

giving obedience to the order, and this was accordingly re-affirmed two

weeks later.

Dürer’s _Instruction in Perspective_, first published in 1525,

appeared in Paris in a Latin translation in 1532, and copies of this

Paris edition shortly found their way into sale in Nuremberg and in

other German cities. Dürer’s widow, who had, in 1528, secured an

imperial privilege for her husband’s writings, made complaint of these

unauthorised sales, and, in October, 1532, the magistrates of Nuremberg

summoned all the booksellers of the town and cautioned them against

keeping in stock or selling any copies of the unauthorised editions.

On the same day, copies of this Nuremberg order were sent to the

magistrates of Strasburg, Frankfort, Leipzig, and Antwerp, with the

request that similar orders should be issued in those cities for the

protection of Dürer’s works. It does not appear for how long a term the

widow succeeded in protecting these copyrights either in Nuremberg or

elsewhere.

The last case in which the infringement of Dürer’s works came into

question presents an instance of a larger claim for the protection

of an author’s idea than would be accepted under modern copyright

law. Dürer’s treatise on _Proportion_ was being put into print in

Nuremberg by Hieronymus Andreä. It became known, however, that

Andreä, in conjunction with a painter named Beham, himself had in

preparation a work on the subject of _Proportion_, and in July, 1528,

the magistrates of Nuremberg issued an edict forbidding these two

authors from proceeding with the publication of their volume (which

must, he saw fit to assume, have been based upon the labours of Dürer)

until the publication of the authentic work (_das rechte Werk_) had

been completed. Beham protested that his volume was entirely original

and quite distinct in its plan from that of Dürer. The magistrates,

however, took the ground that the idea or plan of a treatise on

this subject had originated with Dürer, and that Dürer’s heirs were

entitled to be protected against any attempt to diminish (by means of

such advance competition) the commercial value of such plan. Beham

was obliged to content himself by publishing at this time that part

of his work only which had to do with the subject of _Proportion

in Horses_. His chapters on _Proportion in the Human Figure_ were

held in manuscript until 1546, when they were printed in book form

in Frankfort. The completion of his publication showed that he had

been entirely correct in his contention that he had not borrowed in

any way from the material left by Dürer. The magistrates themselves

do not appear to have adhered to their original charge that Andreä

and Beham were pirating Dürer’s work, or they would, instead of

simply prohibiting their publication until the Dürer book was in the

market, have enjoined its publication altogether as a plagiarism or

infringement. They seem simply to have convinced themselves that

Dürer’s wife and other heirs were entitled to the first fruits of any

profits that could be secured from the subject of _Proportion_, on

the ground that Dürer was the first author to give attention to this

subject.

In certain special instances, such as the above, local pride in an

author of fame, and personal interest on the part of the magistrates,

served to bring about a special protection for literary productions.

It appears, however, that German authors could not, as a rule, depend

upon securing even a local protection for their works simply on the

ground of prior publication, as it is from this time, namely the first

third of the sixteenth century, that special privileges begin to make

their appearance.

Under an order of the _Rath_ of the city of Basel, issued in October,

1531, printers of books in that city were enjoined from reprinting

or pirating the books of each other, for a term of three years after

the first publication of such books, under a penalty of one hundred

guldens. Schurmann understands that this and similar local ordinances

had no reference to the protection of new works by contemporary

writers, but were designed simply to prevent unprofitable competition

in connection with new editions of standard or classical works. If a

printer or publisher issued an edition of a book belonging to this

class, he was to be protected for a term of three years, within the

territory of the municipality, against the competition of other

editions (whether better or poorer, dearer or cheaper) of the same book.

As far as new and original works were concerned, it appears as if the

possession of a copy, or at least of a copy in manuscript form, was

held to carry with it the right to reproduce. This right there were

in any case, until the middle of the eighteenth century, practical

difficulties in the way of gainsaying for rival reproductions which

were not put into print within the same municipality. It was only with

the organisation of the book-trade in the middle of the eighteenth

century and the establishment in Frankfort and Leipzig of the

Book-Fairs with their systems of book-exchanges, that there began to be

any systematic efforts to protect literary and publishing undertakings

over the territory covered by the book-trade of the empire.

Until nearly the end of the eighteenth century, the protection of

literary property in Germany depended upon the system of privileges,

imperial or local; but these privileges were, for the most part,

concerned simply with the property interests of the publishers and

printers, only a small proportion of them having to do with modern

books or with the rights of living authors. Such privileges covered,

at the outset, three classes of literary undertakings: first, official

publications, a term including in the earlier times the service books

of the Church and school text-books as well as the authorised text

of government edicts, laws, and announcements; secondly, editions of

works taken from the body of the world’s literature (_literärisches

Gemeingut_), _i.e._, the first printing (_Vordrück_) of the same;

and third, new works presenting a first consideration of a specific

subject, more particularly of a subject of a scientific, technical, or

practical nature. For this last class of undertakings, the recipient of

the privilege claimed a control not only of the specific book which he

had produced or of which he was the owner, but a monopoly for the time

being, within the district covered by the privilege, of the subject

considered in such book.

The writer who had, for instance, produced a book on the _Use of

Herbs_, or the publisher who had employed a writer to prepare such

a book (the subject not having been treated before, or at least not

recently) would consider himself aggrieved and would contend that his

rights had been infringed, if the publication within the same territory

of another book on herbs should be permitted. If the privilege covered

an edition of a Latin author, the holder believed himself authorised to

prevent the publication within the territory covered by his privilege

of any other edition of the same author, even although such competing

edition might, in respect to the revision of the text and to the

editorial work in the notes and commentaries, be entirely distinct from

his own.

Local privileges of this kind, which undertook to give to the

possessor an exclusive control for a certain term of a specific classic

text, were, of course, practically identical with the trade monopolies,

also characteristic of the age, which were conceded for the sale,

within certain territories, of articles of assured commercial value,

such as salt or wool. Such privileges can hardly be classed with

copyrights.

Local privileges came, before long, to be divided into two classes,

the one entitled privileges “for works” or “for books,” and the

other “for writers” or “for authors.” The Frankfort ordinance of

1660 distinguishes between _Bücher_ and _Autores_. The _Tractatus

de typographis_, _bibliopolis_, etc., of Fitsch, published in 1675,

speaks of privileges for _libros et scriptores_, and again for

_autores et libros_. The earliest German privilege of which there is

trustworthy record was issued in 1501 by the Imperial Council, not to

an individual, but to an association entitled the _Sodalitas Rhenana

Celtica_ (Rhenish Celtic Society) for the publication of an edition of

the dramas of Hroswitha of Gandersheim, which had been prepared for

the Press by Conrad Celtes. These dramas had been written about 985.

This Hroswitha privilege, while later than the early Venice privileges,

antedates by two years the first instance in France, and by seventeen

years, the first in England. After 1501, there is a long series of

imperial privileges issued directly by the Imperial Chancellor in the

name of the Emperor. One of the earlier of these was given for _Lectura

aurea semper Domini Abbatis antiqui super quinque libris decretalium_,

in 1510, a work printed by Johann Schott. In 1512, an imperial

privilege was issued to the historiographer, John Stadius, for all

that he should print, the first European privilege which was made to

cover more than a single work or which undertook to protect books not

yet published. I find no record in Germany of any privileges similar

to those cited in Venice, for a whole class of works, or for an entire

language.

An imperial patent of 1685 uses the terms (as if in antithesis to each

other) “A privileged book,” and “A book purchased from its author”

(_vom Authore mit Kösten erhandelten Buch_). Later, we find references

to “privileged” and “non-privileged” books, under the latter being

understood original works by contemporary writers. Pütter (who may

be called the father of the modern theory of property in literary

productions), writing in 1764, uses for the unprivileged books the

term _eigenthumlich_ (individual), and for the privileged the term

_nicht-eigenthumlich_ (non-individual).

It is to be inferred from such examples that it was customary to secure

privileges only for reissues of old books (which reissues might, of

course, and usually did, constitute the first publication for Germany),

or for a monopoly of some special subject. For original works by living

writers (except in connection with a claim to control the subject)

privileges were apparently not, as a rule, thought to be necessary

or to add materially to the protection of the author’s rights. The

practice in different States and in different cities, however,

evidently varied very considerably, and there must have been no little

uncertainty and confusion from the conflicting claims of authors,

publishers, and printers undertaking to control in several States the

sales of books for which privileges had been secured in but one.

Pütter is of opinion[156] that the purpose of authors in securing

privileges was at this time not so much to protect themselves from

piracy as to prevent or impede competition. In no other way, as he

contends, can well be explained the short terms (six, three, and even

two years) for which these privileges to authors were issued, as it is

evident that they could not have expected to sacrifice their authors’

rights or, as we should now say, their copyrights, at the expiration of

such terms.

Schurmann concludes that the system of privileges had, in fact, little

connection with the recognition or the protection of the rights of

authors as producers (such rights as English authors were about this

time beginning to claim under the common law). The advantage secured by

an author under a privilege was, on the one hand, a certain monopoly

(usually, of course, for a limited territory as well as for a limited

term), and on the other, a simpler and more effective method of

controlling or protecting his books than that afforded by the system of

proceedings under the law.

The possessor of an imperial privilege was, at least nominally, in a

position to enforce penalties against an unauthorised reprinter in any

portion of the empire, and without reference to the local authorities,

the principal limitation on such action being the difficulties not

infrequently placed in his way by local officials who happened not

to be well disposed towards the imperial authority. At the Frankfort

Fair, however, which soon came to be recognised as the central and

controlling organisation and exchange not only of the German but of the

European book-trade, an imperial privilege was usually accepted as of

valid and adequate authority.

Notwithstanding such recognition of imperial authority, the records of

German publishing during the last half of the seventeenth century and

the first portion of the eighteenth are full of complaints of piracies

and of contentions concerning the control of literary property.

The purpose and the effect of the imperial privilege system would not

be rightly estimated if we failed to remember that they were intended

to secure an imperial supervision of literary production no less than

an assured foundation for the business of publishing books. No works

could secure an imperial privilege that had not first received the

approval of the censors in charge of the district in which the book was

printed. In case the work concerned itself with political affairs,

the censorship was usually referred directly to certain imperial

councillors in Vienna (_Reichshofrath_). Sometimes the imperial censors

found it necessary to override the authority of the local examiners and

to revoke their authorisations. In 1777, the Berlin publisher Nicolai

secured a privilege for the publication of _The Life and Opinions of

Johann Burkels_. The year following, the privilege was cancelled from

Vienna, on the ground that it had been obtained surreptitiously and

with the connivance of certain Prussian censors who were in sympathy

with “the gross errors of the Arians and Socinians.” The circulation of

the work within the Holy Roman Empire was at the same time prohibited.

The grounds upon which the imperial authority claimed the right to

supervise the literary productions of the realm are not quite clear.

In an official document of 1780, occurs the phrase, “The regulation of

books (_das Bücher-regal_) which has for many years been within the

control of the Emperor.” In a memoir addressed to the Emperor, in 1762,

by the imperial _Hofrath_, the former is referred to as the tribunal in

which from the beginning of the sixteenth century have been vested the

control and supervision of the literature produced within the realm.

Schurmann is of opinion that the authority for the regulation of books

(_Bücher-regal_) was derived from or connected with the rights reserved

to the imperial authority under the Golden Bull. To these rights

belonged the control of the final judicial appeal, and the issue and

supervision of all claim of privileges. A century after the issue of

the Golden Bull, at the time of the invention of printing, the reserved

powers (_Reserva-rechte_) of the empire had become materially weakened,

and were being in large part exercised by local authorities, and the

attempt of the Emperor to enforce control over literary production and

distribution, now becoming of such extended importance, was from the

outset met by no little antagonism and protest on the part of princes

and municipal magistracies.

The contention of these latter that the control of this new department

of industry and production rested properly with them, was strengthened

by the fact that the business of book-publishing was of necessity

dependent upon the printing-presses, and the right to license and to

protect the presses had never been included in the imperial powers,

but had from the outset been exercised by the princes or magistrates.

An evidence of this local control of the presses is afforded by the

form (in use from the earliest times) of the oath which had to be

taken by all printers working under such local licenses. This oath,

while making due recognition of the local authority under which the

licence was issued, bound the printers also to an observance of the

imperial enactments. The requirement of the local licences was,

however, evidently not universal, for we hear of certain “corner

printing-offices” (_Winkel-drückereien_) which appear to have worked

outside of any local control.

The attempts of the imperial authority to secure an imperial

supervision over the literary output of the realm, were to some extent

confused and interfered with by the contention of the Church that

such supervision properly belonged to her. The Archbishop of Mayence,

who was also the Chancellor of the Empire, was especially active

in enforcing an ecclesiastical censorship over all the presses and

publishing concerns within his diocese, which happened to include the

most important of the earlier centres of publishing enterprise. His

example was followed by other bishops throughout the empire, and the

records show that such ecclesiastical censorship was exercised from the

several diocesan capitals and also from such Universities as those of

Cologne, Trèves (Trier), and Leipzig.[157]

The emperors were not likely to accept with patience this clerical

interference with a domain regarded as their own, and, in 1455,

Frederick III. appointed Doctor Jacob Össler to the post of imperial

supervisor of literature and superintendent of printing, an appointment

which was confirmed by Frederick’s successor, Maximilian I. Össler

was a jurist, but his censorship included the control of theological

literature, as if it were the intention of the Emperor to emphasise the

authority of the lay power as against the pretensions of the Church.

The headquarters of the imperial superintendent of literature were

placed in Strasburg, which was at the time the most important town in

the empire for printing and for bookselling.

In 1512, a so-called “privilege,” one of the earliest, was issued by

the Emperor Maximilian I. to Johann Stab in Lintz, “historiographer

and cartographer.” It covered “all works” which he “might cause to

be printed.” It is the understanding of Kapp, however, that this

authorisation is to be understood not as a privilege but as an

appointment to the office of “supervisor of books.” The records contain

the titles of a number of books, engravings, and charts as having

been issued under the authority and with the name (imprint?) of the

historiographer, with permissions or licences protecting them against

competition for the term of ten years. It appears, further, that he

had the power to shorten this term of protection, and to declare the

works open to reprinting within a shorter period than ten years. The

privileges thus controlled by Stab were for “books,” not for “authors,”

and can probably, therefore, be understood as having to do only with

material which was not the production of contemporary writers. There

is nothing to show what range of territory was covered by Stab’s

supervisorship, or whether this may be considered as having possessed

equal authority with that of Össler, or as having been subordinated to

this.

Dr. Jacob Spiegel, secretary to the Emperor, appears also to have

exercised, between the dates of 1515-1520, the functions of a

supervisor or censor of literature, and the stamp of his official

approval is found on several books of the time. On the _Germania_ of

Æneas Sylvius (afterwards Pius II.), originally issued in Italy in

1464, and printed for the first time in Germany in 1515, by R. Beck of

Strasburg, the form of approval or privilege is worded as follows: _Per

Cesarem. Ad Mandatum Cesaris Majest. proprium Jacob Spiegel._

The question has been raised as to why the decrees of the imperial

Diet contain no references to the imperial control of book-publishing.

Schurmann explains this omission on the ground that such control was

exercised as a personal right of the Emperor. In 1495, a time when

under the leadership of Berthold, Elector of Mayence, a concerted

effort was made on the part of the electors and princes to limit in

various respects the authority and privileges of the imperial Crown,

the contention saw made (quite in the spirit of the eighteenth century)

that the princes and those deputed by them for the task, were much

better able than the Emperor could be, to judge for their several

domains what books should be permitted and what should be forbidden.

Reference has already been made to the privilege issued in 1501, for an

edition of the dramas of the nun Hroswitha. Hroswitha, or Helena von

Rossow, was a nun of the Benedictine convent of Gandersheim, who had

died nearly six hundred years before. Her literary work is referred

to in an earlier chapter. The privilege to Celtes was, therefore, in

the nature of a monopoly for material which, in the absence of such

privilege, would have remained common property. This privilege is of

interest as indicating that at the time it was issued the imperial

authority over literary property was recognised by the States and

municipalities of Germany as extending only over the imperial

cities (_Reichsstädte_). Even to this control there was a noteworthy

exception, as Frankfort, which in connection with its Book-Fair

was becoming each year of greater importance as a centre of the

book-trade, was apparently not included in the territory covered by an

imperial privilege, and its magistracy had retained the right to issue

privileges on its own account. We find, therefore, that Celtes, in this

same year, 1501, secured a privilege for his book from the Magistracy

of Frankfort.

Schurmann draws a distinction between the imperial privileges which

emanated directly from Vienna, and those issued in Nuremberg and

elsewhere under the authority of the _Reichsregiment_, or imperial

Diet, and says that well authenticated instances of the former class

begin only with the year 1510, and that for the succeeding half century

the number issued was but inconsiderable.

It was only after 1569, when the imperial commission was appointed

to supervise the operations of the Book-Fair at Frankfort, that the

imperial privileges became numerous and important. The small part

taken by the imperial authority during this half century in the

supervision of literature appears to have been due to the fact that in

the particular districts where book-publishing was most active there

was the greater unwillingness to recognise that its control properly

belonged within the functions of the Emperor. Under the imperial

decrees of Nuremberg, in 1524, of Speyer, in 1529, and of Augsburg, in

1530, the contention of the Emperor to control as a personal function

of the Crown the whole business of printing and publishing, was

replaced by an arrangement under which the immediate supervision of

the printing-presses was left to the local or state governments, while

the imperial authority provided (through magistrates appointed for the

purpose) a final court of appeal.

After the battle of Mühlberg, in 1547, the claims of the Emperor to

the full control of nearly all divisions of government were asserted

with fresh vigour and persistency, and, in 1548, an imperial edict

was issued placing the presses of the empire under strict police

supervision, especially with reference to any publications which had to

do with ecclesiastical matters. There continued, however, to be more

or less confusion in connection with the exact bearing of the imperial

enactments concerning literary property, and these enactments were

very far from securing any general obedience. There was also no little

counterfeiting and falsification of the imperial privileges.

On this ground, Maximilian II., in 1569, called upon the Magistracy

of Frankfort to establish or to enforce better police regulations for

the protection of privileged books, and for the prevention of the

publication of books that had not been inspected and licensed. The

magistracy endeavoured to free the city from the responsibility of such

a task, and requested the Emperor to send to Frankfort some scholarly

commissioners to take charge of the proposed supervision. This request

was fulfilled, in 1579, by Rudolph II., who directed the clerk of the

imperial Court and the Dean of the Frankfort Convent to serve as the

first members of such commission.

This imperial commission, working in Frankfort, exercised an influence

over all the book-trade of which Frankfort was the centre. Its

operations were very largely controlled by the interests, real or

imaginary, of the Catholic Church, and the oppressive supervision

and arbitrary censorship which resulted had not a little to do with

the discouraging of literary undertakings in Frankfort and with

the transfer of publishing enterprise and of the business of book

distribution to Protestant Leipzig.

A case occurring in 1516 shows, however, that this policy speedily