No More Learning

Previous to 1561, books are entered merely as licensed by the
company, without any reference to censorship, but, from the March
of that year, books are occasionally noted as authorised by the
bishop of London, and, in a few cases, by the archbishop of
Canterbury. Twenty years later, when John Aylmer had become
bishop of London, and was taking a lively interest in the sub-
jection of the press to authority, his name very frequently appears
as licenser of all kinds of books, and even trifles like ballads
receive his imprimatur. The elevation of the rigorous disci-
plinarian Whitgift to the see of Canterbury in 1583, and the
promulgation of the Star chamber decree of 1586, mark further
steps in the progress of control. By 1588, it had become the
,
practice to enter the name of the licenser and that of one or both
of the wardens of the company, and, in the same year, Whitgift,
whose interest in the censorship was receiving a stimulus from the
activity of his Marprelate opponents, appointed twelve persons
to license books to be printed. The most active among these
twelve were Abraham Hartwell, the younger, secretary to Whitgift,
and Dr Stallard. Another of them was Robert Crowley, author
and formerly printer, from whose press came three editions of
Piers Plowman in 1550. After sojourning abroad during queen
Mary's reign, he renewed his connection with printing, being
adınitted a freeman of the Stationers' company in 1578. Among
prominent censors in succeeding years were Richard Bancroft,
chaplain to Whitgift and afterwards his successor, to whose activity
was largely due the unearthing of the Marprelate press ; William
Barlow, also chaplain to Whitgift and, later, bishop of Lincoln;
Richard Mocket, the reputed author of the tract God and the
King (1615), which was ordered to be bought by every house-
holder in England and Scotland ; and Daniel Featley, controver-
sialist and Westminster assembly divine.
Besides these censors by ecclesiastical warrant, various secular
authorities sometimes authorised the printing of books, such as
Sir Francis Walsingham, the lord treasurer's secretary, or even
lord Burghley himself. Occasionally, the countenance of the privy
council was obtained, and, at other times, a book is passed by the
lord mayor or the city recorder. In certain cases, professional
aid was invoked, as in 1589, when a medical book was entered


## p. 383 (#405) ############################################

Trade Discipline
383
under the hands of both the wardens and three Chirurgyans
appointed to peruse this boke. ' In the beginning of the seven-
teenth century, the drama received special attention, and plays
were licensed by the master of the revels; an office filled by
Sir George Buck from about 1608 to 1622, his immediate successors
being Sir John Ashley, and Sir Henry Herbert, a brother of the
poet. But all these, with the exception of the plays, were rather
in the nature of occasional instances, and the vast majority of
books were licensed either by the archbishop or bishop, or by his
chaplain or secretary. Such was the narrow and hazardous
channel through which the impetuous stream of English literature
in Elizabethan days had to force its way before being allowed to
reach the world of letters.
By their charter, the Stationers were empowered to search the
premises of any printer or stationer to see that nothing was printed
contrary to regulations, and, accordingly, searchers were appointed
to make weekly visits to printing houses, their instructions being
to ascertain how many presses every printer possessed; what every
printer printed, the number of each impression and for whom
they were printed; how many workmen and apprentices every
printer employed, and whether he had on his premises any un-
authorised person. These inquisitorial visits resulted in frequent
seizures of illegally printed books, and, in the records of the
company, there are many instances of such books being brought
into the hall and there either burned or damasked.
But the attentions of the company were not confined to illegal
productions ; the brethren themselves were well looked after, and
the accounts of fines received for breaking of orders and other
offences show that a rigorous supervision was maintained. In
1559, John King is fined two shillings and sixpence for printing
The Nutbrowne Mayde without licence, and William Jones is
mulcted in twenty pence 'for that he solde a Communion boke
of Kynge Edwardes for one of the newe. ' In 1595, Abel Jeffes,
having printed 'lewde ballades and thinges verye offensive,' it was
ordered by the court of the company that his press, type and
other printing stuff, which had been seized and brought into the
hall, should be defaced and made unserviceable for printing.
Penalties were also imposed for printing other men's copies, that
is, infringing copyright, and for disorderly' printing, which
evidently included carelessly, as well as wrongfully, printed books.
These are mostly individual cases, but, occasionally, a wholesale


## p. 384 (#406) ############################################

384 The Book-Trade, 1557–1625
raid is made, as in 1562—3, when William Powell was fined for
printing the prognostication of Nostradamus, and nineteen other
booksellers were fined for selling the book. In 1594, several
stationers were heavily penalised for selling 'psalmes disorderly
printed'; and, in 1603, thirteen booksellers got into trouble for
being concerned in an unauthorised edition of Basilicon doron,
which had been first printed at Edinburgh in 1599, in a private
edition of only seven copies. This second edition was printed
by Edward Allde, and a bookseller, Edward White, who had sold
500 copies which, therefore, could not be forfeited, was condemned
to imprisonment but respited to the further order of the company.
Cases are not wanting in which contumacious offenders were
actually committed to prison. Even in those early days, the soul
of the bookseller was vexed by the intrusion of other trades upon
his domain, and Thomas Purfoot was fined for selling Primers
to the haberdashers. Fines for keeping open shop on Sundays
and festival days are not infrequent in the sixteenth century, and
the keeping of an apprentice without presenting him was a common
offence.
A cause of much dissension and frequent dispute among the
printers was the number of printing monopolies granted during
the reign of Elizabeth. These privileges were not only for the
exclusive right of printing a definite book, but frequently covered
a whole class of books. Thus, in 1559, the printing of law books
was confirmed to Richard Tottel, for his lifetime. William Seres,
who, in queen Mary's reign, had been deprived of his privilege
of printing Primers and books of private prayers and had suffered
imprisonment, succeeded in recovering his patent with reversion to
his son and the addition of Psalters to his monopoly. Christopher
Barker, successor in 1577 of Richard Jugge in the office of queen's
printer, had the privilege of printing Bibles, the Book of Common
Prayer, statutes and proclamations. Through the influence of
the earl of Leicester, John Day had been given the monopoly
of printing the Psalms in metre and the ABC and Catechism.
The printing of dictionaries and chronicles was granted to Henry
Bynneman. Richard Watkins and James Roberts had a patent
for twenty-one years for almanacs and prognostications, and in
1603 this valuable privilege was conferred by king James I
upon the Stationers' company for ever. Thomas Marshe's patent
included a number of the most usual school books in Latin.
'Master Birde and Master Tallis of her Majesty's Chappel have
all music books and also ruled paper for music. There are


## p. 385 (#407) ############################################

Privileges
385
also instances of a monopoly being granted for a term of years
for a specified book, a privilege which corresponds to our present
copyright.
It will be noticed that these privileges were mainly for books
of a stereotyped kind for which there was a constant demand, and
the production of works of real literature was scarcely, if at all,
affected by them. But this concentration of the best paying work
in a few hands bred much discontent in the trade, and, together
with scarcity of employment, led to frequent complaints by those
who felt the pinch.
The forces thus brought into conflict were, on the one side,
the possessors of profitable privileges or valuable copyrights
which formed the backbone of their business; these were the
leading members of the trade, men of influence in the affairs of
the company. On the other side, forming a natural opposition,
were ranged the unprivileged men, who, possessed of small means
and being, to some extent, outsiders, were driven to a more
speculative class of business, and picked up-no great matter
how-copy which was likely to appeal to the popular taste, such
as plays, poems, ballads, or any other unconsidered trifles out of
which they might turn a penny. Notwithstanding the specious
argument of the monopolists that
privileges are a means whereby many books are now printed which are more
beneficial to the commonwealth than profitable to the printer, for the patentee
being benefited by books of profitable sale is content to bestowe part of his
gain in other books, which though very beneficial to the commonwealth will
not repay the tenth part of his charge,
it is, as a matter of fact, to the unprivileged printers that we owe
the preservation in print of the greater part of the poetical,
dramatic and popular literature of the time. But, though the
names of these men have become known to us mainly in connection
with this literature, it is not necessary to credit them with either
great literary taste or a consciousness of the part they were playing
in this cause; it merely means that necessity and keen com-
petition for business had given them a shrewd eye as to what was
likely to find a good market.
This clashing of interests led to various efforts on the part
of the lesser men to obtain redress of their grievances, and a few
adventurous spirits took matters into their own hands and pro-
ceeded to pirate some of the smaller books for which there was
a large and steady sale. Besides being quickly printed, these
sinall publications possessed the advantage of being easily
E. L. IV.
25
CH. XVIII.


## p. 386 (#408) ############################################

386
The Book-Trade, 1557–1625
dispersed, and many of them were sent into the country, where, as
imprints were also forged, there was little risk of their spurious
origin being detected. Legal proceedings naturally followed,
and, in 1582, John Day, one of the largest patentees, preferred
a complaint to the Star chamber against Roger Ward for printing,
and William Holmes for selling, pirated copies of the ABC with
the little catechism, a publication for which Day held a patent
of monopoly. In his answer to the charge, Ward makes a stout
defence, eked out with convenient lapses of memory, and pleads
that, a very small number of stationers having gotten all the best
books to be printed by themselves by privilege, have left little
or nothing for the rest of the printers to live upon. In the same
year, William Seres appealed to lord Burghley against the in-
fringement by certain stationers of his right of printing Primers
and Psalters, and the form in which his complaint is stated indi-
cates the existence of some more or less organised piracy by the
younger men of the company, .
The leader of this lawless band was John Wolfe, of the Fish-
mongers' company, a born agitator; he not only printed other
men's copies, but incited others to defy the constituted authorities.
A petition against him and his associates, addressed to the privy
council by the Stationers' company in 1583, relates that, on being
remonstrated with, Wolfe declared that he would print all their
books if he lacked work. Being admonished that he, being but
one so mean a man, should not presume to oppose her Highness's
government, 'Tush,' said he, ‘Luther was but one man, and re-
formed all the world for religion, and I am that one man that
must and will reforme the governement in this trade. ' However,
efforts made to compose the differences between the disputants
met with some success. The patentees surrendered a number of
their copyrights for the use of the poor of the company; and
Wolfe, it was reported,'acknowledged his error,' and was admitted
into the Stationers' company. It is amusing to discover Wolfe
and Francis Adams, a year or so later, appearing in a Star chamber
case righteously indignant at the lawless infringement of a print-
ing patent in which they had acquired a share; and Wolfe is
afterwards found taking an active part, as an official of the
company, in the search for secret presses.
About the year 1577, the number of printers and stationers,
journeymen and all, within the city of London was 175, besides
a large number of apprentices; and in a report on the printing
patents which he drew up in 1582, Christopher Barker, the queen’s


## p. 387 (#409) ############################################

Apprentices
387
printer, stated that there were about threescore journeymen con-
nected with the printing trade alone. He also says that there
were twenty-two printing houses in London, and expresses the
opinion that '8 or 10 at the most would suffise for all England,
yea and Scotland too. ' A not very liberal view, perhaps ; but
Barker was a patentee. In 1586, the number of master printers
had risen to twenty-five, and they had among them a total of
fifty-three presses; but, by the Star chamber decree of that year,
no further increase in the number of master printers or presses
was permitted, and there was little variation in this number, until,
under the stress of public affairs in 1640, the restrictions on
printing were relaxed, when there was a rapid increase, and, by
1649, there were in London upwards of sixty printing houses.
But, though the amount of work that could be provided by
the presses was thus strictly limited, there was no similar limit
to the supply of workmen, and, owing to the masters having taken
too many apprentices in past years, the number of journeymen
so increased that there was lack of work for them all and
consequent discontent and distress. Endeavours were made to
.
remedy this state of matters by limiting the number of appren-
tices; but, as a more immediate step for relieving the lack of
employment, the company, in 1587—8, made certain orders con-
cerning printing, which provided that no apprentice should be
employed in composing or working at the press if any competent
journeyman wanted work, and that no formes of type should be
kept standing to the prejudice of workmen. By these regulations,
also, the number of copies of one impression of a book was limited,
in ordinary cases, to 1250 or 1500 copies. The effect of this
restriction was to supply more work for compositors, inasmuch
as the type had to be reset for each impression. The operation
of some similar earlier trade regulation may, possibly, explain
the existence of such bibliographical puzzles as the appearance
in duplicate of the second edition of Tottel's Miscellany, a book
which achieved an immediate popularity. The first edition of this
is dated 5 June 1557, and the enlarged second edition, of which
there are two very similar variants, appeared as early as 31 July
in the same year.
The fact that, in all probability, the second
impression of a book would be set up from a copy of the first
edition may account for a close typographical similarity of appear-
ance between successive editions, which might easily cause copies
of them to be taken for variations of the same edition.
The term of apprenticeship varied from seven to eleven years,
25-2


## p. 388 (#410) ############################################

388
The Book-Trade, 1557—1625
80 arranged that the apprentice should reach at least the age of
twenty-four years before the expiration of his term. At the end
of his time, his master was bound to make him free of the company
‘if he have well and truely served'; but, as Arber has remarked,
hardly more than one-half of the apprentices ever attained to the
freedom of the company. On becoming a freeman, an ambitious
young printer would naturally turn his thoughts towards starting
in business for himself. As has been seen, the number of master
printers was, for a long period, limited to about 25, and the
prospect of a young man gaining admission to this small company
was very slender. The picturesque tradition of the industrious
apprentice marrying his master's daughter suggests itself in this
connection, but, as a matter of fact, it was much more often his
master's widow that he married, and cases are not uncommon of
the business and the widow being 'taken over' by two printers in
succession.
To embark on his career as a bookseller and publisher was a
simpler, if more hazardous, undertaking. If possessed of means,
the young bookseller might purchase a stock of saleable books,
and at once open a shop in some busy thoroughfare or take up
a point of vantage in one of the stalls or booths which crowded
round the walls of St Paul's, and there expose his wares for sale.
But, supposing him to have nothing save his native wit to aid
him, there was still a way by which he could set up for himself.
If he could procure the copy of some book, or pamphlet, or, may
be, even a ballad, which he could enter in the register as his
property, and then get printed by some friendly printer, he would
have made a modest beginning; and, if this first essay happened
to promise a fair sale, he might, by exchanging copies of it with
other publishers for their books, at once obtain a stock in trade.
This system of interchange seems to have been a common practice,
and books were sometimes entered in the register with the proviso
that the stationer 'shall not refuse to exchange these bookes with
the company for other good wares. ' The custom continued in
vogue throughout the seventeenth century, and it was in this way
that, in 1681, the celebrated John Dunton began his career as a
publisher; having ventured to print Doolittle's Sufferings of
Christ, he says, 'by exchanging it through the whole trade, it
furnished my shop with all sorts of books saleable at that
time. '
Besides publishing books brought to them by authors, stationers
often took the initiative and engaged writers to produce works for


## p. 389 (#411) ############################################

Readers, and Translators
389
them. Thus, it was at the instance and expense of Christopher
Barker that George Turbervile undertook the compilation of The
noble arte of venerie or hunting (1575), the publisher himself seek-
ing out and procuring works of foreign writers for the use of the
compiler. When William Fulke was at work upon his Confutation
of the Rhemish Testament, he and two of his men, with their
horses, were maintained in London for three-quarters of a year by
the publisher of the book, George Bishop, who also supplied Fulke
with such books as he required, and at the finish paid him forty
pounds for his work. The six revisers who went up to London to
make the final revision of the Authorised Version of the Bible,
each received thirty shillings a week for the nine months during
which they were engaged upon the task. For his Survey of
London, John Stow had £3 and 40 copies; and, ‘for his pains
in the Brief Chronicle,' he received twenty shillings and 50 copies.
Correcting and editing for the press afforded occupation for a
few scholars in the more important printing houses, and it is
probable that John Foxe, after his return from the continent,
worked in some such capacity in the office of John Day, as he had
previously done in the house of Oporinus at Basel. Christopher
Barker, in 1582, mentions the payment of ‘learned correctours' as
one of the expenses which printers had to bear; and, about 1630,
the king's printing-house was employing four correctors, all of
whom were masters of arts.
Translations, of which an extraordinary number were published
during this period, formed a large part of the work which hack
writers did for booksellers, and it was generally poorly paid work.
For the writing of an ordinary pamphlet, two pounds seems to
have been a customary payment, but oft-times, especially in the
case of translation, the writer had to content himself with receiv-
ing a certain number of copies to dispose of for his own benefit.
After 1622, when news sheets began to be issued, the translating
of these from foreign Corantos offered another means of earning a
pittance, and if there were dearth of news, or the supply of foreign
print failed, the resourcefulness of writers was, doubtless, quite
equal to that of Thomas Herbert and his companions who, some
twenty years later, sat themselves down at the sign of the Antelope
and there 'composed' Good Newes from Ireland, Bloudy Newes
and other equally reliable information, and then sold their fabri-
cations to the stationers for half-a-crown a-piece.
A humble form of literature, which provided occupation for
inferior writers and work for smaller printers, was the ballad,
3


## p. 390 (#412) ############################################

390
The Book-Trade, 1557–1625
which came forth from the press in thousands. Not the old
narrative ballads of oral tradition, but their debased descendants,
topical street ballads—sentimental ditties in amorous, moral, or
satirical vein ; story of horrid crime or monstrous birth ; relation
of disaster by fire or flood; or any other popular excitement of
the hour: in short, any peg upon which could be hung a jingling
rime or doleful ditty served for a ballad, and 'scarce a cat can
look out of a gutter,' it was said, “but presently a proper new
ballad of a strange sight is indited. Yet, in spite of the vast
number which were printed, these ephemeral sheets have perished
almost as completely as the names of their writers. Those who
bought them cared as little to know who wrote them, as do the
patrons of the popular songs of to-day. William Elderton was
responsible for a large number in his time, Thomas Deloney had
written some 50 by 1596, and Anthony Munday also contributed
his quota; but, as is only natural, ballads, with few exceptions,
are known only by their titles. Printers of them were as
numerous as writers; one of the earliest, John Awdeley, wrote as
well as printed them, as did also Thomas Nelson later in the
sixteenth century. Among the most active producers of these
sheets were Thomas Colwell of Fleet Street, Alexander Lacy of
Little Britain, William Pickering of London Bridge, Richard Jones
the publisher of several of Elderton's writing, who, in 1586, entered
in the Stationers' register no fewer than 123 at one time, and
Edward Allde and Henry Carr, who entered batches of 36 and 20
respectively in this same year.
To the professional writer, a patron, to whom he might dedicate
his book, was almost as essential as a publisher; and the com-
petition for the favour of distinguished persons who patronised
literature was very keen. Prominent among these were the earl
of Leicester, who befriended Spenser and Ascham; the earl of
Southampton, the friend, as well as patron, of Shakespeare;
Sir Philip Sidney and his sister the countess of Pembroke ; and
William Herbert, earl of Pembroke, the friend of Donne, who was
accustomed, on the first day of each new year, to send to Ben
Jonson a gift of £20 to buy books. No doubt it was an advantage
to a book to be launched under the approbation of some person of
mark, but the needy writer had also well in view the more
substantial reward which was invariably expected in return for the
flattering compliments, or often fulsome eulogy, of the dedication.
Occasionally, this desired recompense might be an appointment to
some office or other similar recognition, but, more generally, it
>


## p. 391 (#413) ############################################

6
Copyright
391
took the form of a gift of money, varying in amount with the
generosity of the patron or the persuasive importunity of the
author, though, sometimes, the mere acceptance of the dedication
must have been the only solatium. In the record of his literary
earnings which Richard Robinson, compiler and translator of a
number of dull religious works between 1576 and 1598, has left in
manuscript', we get a glimpse of what the ordinary occasional
dedication was worth. For a book dedicated to the master of the
Leathersellers, of which company he was a member, he received
28. 6d. from the master and 78. 6d. more from the company. In
1579, Sir Philip Sidney, to whom he had presented' a book, gave
him four angels, increased by a gift of 108. from Sir Henry Sidney.
But, for the third series of his Harmony of King Davids Harp
(1595), which he dedicated to queen Elizabeth and presented to
her highness as she was 'goyng to the Chappell in the morning,'
he received no gratification : in fact, the queen characteristically
told him that she had quite enough to do in paying and relieving
her needy soldiers, and that as she had not set him on the
work she did not intend to pay him any wages.
The only form of copyright recognised at this time was the
entry of a 'copy' in the Stationers' register by a member of the
company, and the right to print any work so entered became
vested in the stationer in whose name it stood So far as
the author was concerned, no rights existed; in a few cases,
it is true, a royal patent was granted to a particular individual
giving him a monopoly of his work for a specified period, but these
exceptions only serve to accentuate the general case. The author
was thus at the mercy of the stationer. He could, no doubt, take
his manuscript in his hand, and, making the round of the shops,
conclude a bargain with some bookseller whom he found willing to
undertake the publication of his work; but, except by agreement,
he could retain no control over his book : it would be entered
in the register in the stationer's name and become his property.
As for the author who allowed his writings to be circulated in
manuscript, as was often done in the case of poems and other
forms of polite literature, he was in a still more defenceless state,
for his manuscript was liable to be snapped up by any literary
scout who might scent a paying venture; and the first stationer
who could acquire it might forthwith proceed to Stationers' Hall
and secure the copyright of the work, leaving the hapless author
1 • Eupolemia' (British Museum, Royal MSS, 18 A. lxvi). See Gentleman's
Magazine, April 1906, pp. 277–284.
6


## p. 392 (#414) ############################################

392
The Book-Trade, 1557–1625
without recompense or redress, and without even the consolation
to his literary pride of correcting the errors of copyist and
printer. In such cases, the publisher frequently prefixed an
address from his own pen, dedicating the work to whom he would,
and taking credit to himself for presenting it to the reading
public. It was in this way that Sidney's Sonnets in 1591, Shake-
speare's Sonnets in 1609, and other worthy shelf-fellows first
attained the dignity of print, if that description may be applied
to such mean typographical productions.
John Minsheu, the lexicographer, indeed, took matters into his
own hands, and, in 1617, printed ‘at his owne charge, for the
publicke good,' his polyglot dictionary, Ductor in linguas ; but, as
stationers boycotted the book, he was forced to seek subscribers
for it himself, and the experiment does not seem to have been a
success. John Taylor, the Thames waterman, also resorted to
publication by subscription, and, in his case, his whimsical per-
sonality, added to the amusement afforded by the rough wit and
boisterous humour of his effusions, secured a large number of
patrons. Before starting on one of his eccentric journeys, he
would circulate a quantity of prospectuses or ‘Taylor's bills,' as he
called them, with the object of securing subscribers for the account
of his travels to be afterwards published. In this way, he obtained
more than sixteen hundred subscribers to The Pennyles Pil
grimage (1618), a record of his journey on foot into Scotland. On
the strength of this list, he had 4500 copies printed, but nearly
half the subscribers refused to pay, and he castigated the defaulters
in an amusing brochure entitled A Kicksey Winsey, or,
A Lerry
Come-Twang, which he issued in the following year. He also
worked off copies of his publications by 'presenting' them to
various people, not forgetting to call on the morrow for 'sweet
remuneration. ' Buty notwithstanding king James's dictum, as
reported by Ben Jonson, that he did not see ever any verses in
England equal to the Sculler's,' Taylor cannot be accounted as
anything more than a voluminous scribbler, possessed of irrepres-
sible assurance and facile wit of a coarse vein. He had, however,
the saving grace of acute observation of men and manners, and
this has given his productions a certain value for the student
of social history. The term 'literary bargee' befits him much
better than his own self-styled title 'the water-poet'; and his
unrelenting satirical persecution of Thomas Coryate shows him in
an unamiable light. In 1630, he gathered into one folio volume,
which he called All the Workes of John Taylor the Water-poet,
a


## p. 393 (#415) ############################################

The Shakespeare Stationers 393
sixty-three of his pieces in prose and verse ; but, before his
death, in 1653, the number of his publications had exceeded one
hundred and fifty.
It would appear that the dramatist was especially exposed to
the predatory habits of the piratical publisher. The playhouse
authorities, believing that the circulation of a play in print was
likely to detract from its financial success on the stage, gave no
encouragement to the publishing of plays. But a popular play
was sure of finding a ready sale, and a stationer on the look-out
for ‘vendible copy,' if he could obtain an acting copy of a favourite
play, or procure a shorthand writer to take notes during its
performance, would have little regard to the wishes of either
playwright or players.
The printers and publishers of the early Shakespeare quartos
belonged almost entirely to the class of unprivileged men, and,
though they were otherwise quite unimportant as stationers, their
association with the production of the plays makes them an in-
teresting group. Of the thirty-six plays contained in the first
folio (1623), sixteen had previously been issued in separate form.
The earliest in date is the Titus Andronicus of 1594, which was
printed by John Danter for Edward White and Thomas Milling-
ton. This Danter, who, three years later, issued the first edition of
Romeo and Juliet, was one of the least reputable members of
the trade, and was given to the printing of pirated works and
scurrilous pamphlets. Millington also published The First Part
of the Contention and The True Tragedie of Richard the Third,
which appeared in 1594 and 1595 respectively. In 1600, jointly
with John Busby, another publisher of plays, he issued the first
edition of Henry V; and, on 15 October 1595, he entered for his
copy in the Stationers' register The Norfolk gent his will and
Testament and howe he Commytted the keepinge of his Children
to his owne brother whoe delte moste wickedly with them and
howe God plagued him for it—a story which has since found a
briefer and more poetical title in The Babes in the Wood.
Next comes Andrew Wise, a small stationer in St Paul's
churchyard, who, in 1597, brought out the first issues of Richard II
and Richard III. The first two quartos (1598 and 1599) of
i Henry IV were also published by him. It was in conjunction
with Wise, that William Aspley, another stationer of St Paul's
churchyard, published the only known quartos of Much Ado about
Nothing and 2 Henry IV in 1600. In addition to issuing several
plays by Chapman, Dekker and other writers, Aspley was concerned


## p. 394 (#416) ############################################

394
The Book-Trade, 1557–1625
in the publication of both the first and second Shakespeare folios,
and his name also appears on some copies of the first edition of
the Sonnets. Another Shakespeare publisher was Cuthbert Burby,
who, in 1598, first issued Love's Labour's Lost. Among other
plays which bear his name are John Lyly's Mother Bombie (1594
and 1598), the anonymous Taming of a Shrew (1594), and The
Raigre of King Edward the Third (1596 and 1599). He is also
known as the publisher of Francis Meres's Palladis Tamia, which
appeared in 1598, and joint publisher of Robert Allot's England's
Parnassus in 1600.
Among the plays associated with the press of James Roberts,
the almanac patentee, are the two issues of the Merchant of
Venice dated 1600, and one of A Midsummer Night's Dream also
dated 1600, and the Hamlet of 1604 and 16051. He succeeded
John Charlwood as printer of 'the players' bills,' or theatre
programmes, an office which passed to William Jaggard in 1615.
Among other stationers connected with the plays are John Smeth-
wick, who was one of the four at whose charges the first folio
was printed; Thomas Pavier, who published as Shakespeare's the
plays Sir John Oldcastle (1600) and the Yorkshire Tragedy (1608);
and Nathaniel Butter, who published the two issues of Lear in
1608, and also Chapman's Homer, but who is even more interesting
as a pioneer of newspaper publishers. He is said to have issued
a Courant, or Weekly Newes from Foreign Parts, as early as
October 1621; but his first entry of A Currant of Newes in the
registers is dated 7 June 1622, and this publication must very
shortly afterwards have assumed a regular periodical issue, for
'Number 24' is entered on 26 March 1623, and it seems thereafter
to have made a habitual weckly appearance.
The first two of Shakespeare's poems which passed through the
press, the Venus and Adonis of 1593 and the Lucrece of 1594,
were printed by Richard Field, who was a native of Stratford-on-
Avon and may, therefore, it is allowable to suppose, have been
personally acquainted with the author.
In 1609, a manuscript of Shakespeare's Sonnets having fallen
into the hands of Thomas Thorpe, a stationer who played the part
of a literary agent by the picking up of this kind of floating 'copy,'
he commissioned George Eld to print them for him, and, having
apparently no shop of his own, he employed two other stationers,
William Aspley and John Wright to sell the book for him. One of
1 The genuineness of the imprints of some of these has recently been questioned.
See The Library, 1908-9, and A. W. Pollard, Shakespeare Folios and Quartos, 1909.
a


## p. 395 (#417) ############################################

Edward Blount
395
Thorpe's earliest successes in this line was the publication in 1600
of Marlowe's translation of the first book of Lucan, and his
subsequent achievements include Healey's translation of Saint
Augustine’s Citie of God (1610), three plays by Chapman and
works by Ben Jonson and others.
In 1599, the unauthorised anthology entitled The Passionate
Pilgrime, by W. Shakespeare was issued by William Jaggard,
whose name is also well known'as one of the publishers of the
first collected edition of the plays, issued with the cooperation
of Shakespeare's friends in 1623. This monumental volume, which,
though a large undertaking, is by no means a remarkable piece of
printing, came from the press of Jaggard's son Isaac, and was
printed at the charge of four stationers, William Jaggard, Edward
Blount, John Smethwick and William Aspley. The chief share
in the enterprise appears to have been taken by Edward Blount,
who was something more than a mere trader in books and must
have possessed a nice and discriminating literary judgment,
fostered, doubtless, during his ten years' apprenticeship with
William Ponsonby. To the 1598 edition of Marlowe's Hero and
Leander, he wrote a preface, defending the dead poet against his
detractors. To him we are indebted for Florio's Italian dictionary
A Worlde of Wordes, which appeared in 1598, and for the same
writer's translation of Montaigne's Essays, first published in
1603. From 1609, he was, for a time, in partnership with William
Barret, and together they issued, in 1612, Shelton's translation
of the first part of Don Quixote, notable as being the first
translation of Cervantes's great novel into any language. In
1622, he brought out James Mabbe's rendering of Aleman's
The Rogue, or the life of Guzman de Alfarache; and to Earle's
Microcosmographie, which he published anonymously in 1628, he
wrote a preface.
Booksellers seem to have got the upper hand of printers as
well as of authors; and Christopher Barker, in his report of
1582, complains that booksellers were able to drive such good
bargains that printers were mostly but small gainers and oft-times
losers. George Wither cannot be cited as an impartial witness,
since his embittered controversy with the stationers, about the
privilege which he obtained in 1623 ordering his Hymns and
Songs of the Church to be appended to every copy of the Psalms
in metre, no doubt surcharged his ink with gall. He himself says
that he goes not about to lay a general imputation upon all
stationers, but there is no reason to question the general truth of,


## p. 396 (#418) ############################################

396
The Book-Trade, 1557–1625
the statement which he makes in his Schollers Purgatory, when
he says that
the Bookeseller hath not onely made the Printer, the Binder, and the Clasp-
maker a slave to him: but hath brought Authors, yea the whole Common-
wealth, and all the liberall Sciences into bondage.
:
:
And in his description of 'A meere Stationer' in the same work,
after castigating the printer and the bookbinder, he says of the
publishing bookseller that
He makes no scruple to put out the right Authors Name, and insert another
in the second edition of a Booke; And when the impression of some pamphlet
lyes upon his hands, to imprint new Titles for yt, (and so take mens moneyes
twice or thrice, for the same matter under diverse names) is no injury in his
opinion. If he get any written Coppy into his powre, likely to be vendible;
whether the Author be willing or no, he will publish it; And it shallbe con-
trived and named alsoe, according to his owne pleasure: which is the reason,
so many good Bookes come forth imperfect, and with foolish titles-
with much more in the same vein.
But the publisher of that day was not necessarily a mere profit
seeker, and many of the larger works published in the period
between the incorporation of the company and the establishment
of the Commonwealth must have involved substantial risk, and are
evidence of public spirit and some taste for letters in those who
undertook their production.
Among the earlier men, Richard Grafton holds a distinguished
place. In conjunction with Edward Whitchurch, he was concerned
in the publication of the English Bibles of 1537 and 1539, printed
at Antwerp and Paris respectively, and afterwards began printing
on his own account, his press being largely occupied with the
production of service books, for the printing of which he and
Whitchurch obtained an exclusive patent in 1544. In 1547, he
was appointed printer to king Edward VI, and several of the
issues of the Book of Common Prayer bear his imprint. On the
death of the king, miscalculating the drift of political events, he
printed the proclamation of lady Jane Grey and was deprived
of his office by queen Mary. Besides issuing John Hardyng's
Chronicle in 1543, and editions of Edward Hall's Union of
Lancaster and York in 1548 and 1550, Grafton himself compiled an
Abridgement of the Chronicles of England, which was published
by his son-in-law Richard Tottel in 1562, and A Chronicle at
Large, issued also by Tottel in 1569. Tottel's serious business
in life was the printing of law books, for which he received a
patent in 1552; but he is, perhaps, better known as the publisher


## p. 397 (#419) ############################################

John Day
397
of Tottel's Miscellany, first issued in 1557, and of which there were
at least seven other editions before the end of the century. He
was also a partner with John Cawood and John Walley in the
publication of the folio edition of Sir Thomas More's Works,
which bears the same date as the first edition of the Miscellany.
William Copland, probably a son of 'old Robert Copland'
printer and translator, was the printer of Gawin Douglas's transla-
tion of the Aeneid, which appeared in 1553, and of an undated
edition of the same writer's Palice of Honour. Among other
books which came from his press are editions of Caxton's Recuyell
of the Histories of Troy, The Four Sons of Aymon, Malory's
King Arthur, edited by the printer, and A boke of the properties
of Herbes, the compilation of which is also attributed to him.
Among all the stationers and printers of this period the most
prominent name is that of John Day, whose career, beginning
in 1546, extended into four reigns. His important patent for
printing the Psalms in metre and the ABC and Catechism has
already been referred to; but, in addition to this advantage, he
was fortunate in securing the support of those in authority and
especially of archbishop Parker, in whom he found a generous
patron. With Parker’s encouragement, he did much to set a high
standard of printing, and he had several new founts of type cut.
About 1567, he published the first book (Aelfric's Paschal Homily)
printed in Anglo-Saxon characters; and this Saxon type was also
used in the archbishop's edition of Asser's Aelfredi regis res gestae
of 1574, which is one of the finest specimens of Day's typographical
art. The purely literary interest of Day's press is by no means
commensurate with the important place which it holds in the
history of English printing. Most of the books which bear his
mprint are theological and ecclesiastical works of a strictly
orthodox character, but among them there stands out the first
English edition of Foxe's Actes and Monuments (1563). He also
issued many of the works of Thomas Becon and, in 1570, the first
authorised edition of Gorboduc and Ascham's Scholemaster.
William Seres, who printed with Day in the years 1546 to 1550,
produced some noteworthy translations, including Thomas Hoby's
English version of Castiglione's I Cortegiano, and Arthur Golding's
Caesar and Ovid. In 1569, he published An orthographie by
John Hart, Chester herald, which contains examples of phonetic
spelling.
From a literary point of view, one of the most notable of the
publishers was William Ponsonby, from whose house there issued


## p. 398 (#420) ############################################

398
The Book-Trade, 1557–1625
>
between 1577 and 1603, the year of his death, a number of
important books, among them being Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia
in 1590, and his works (Arcadia, etc. ), 1598, Bedingfield's translation
of Machiavelli's Florentine Historie, 1595, and Greene's Mamillia
(1582—93). But it is as the publisher of Spenser's works that he is
best known to fame. Beginning with The Faerie Queene (books 1-3)
in 1590, he issued all Spenser's works, with the exception of the
Shepheards Calender, which was published by Hugh Singleton in
1579. Simon Waterson, who, on Ponsonby's death, acquired some
of his copyrights, published many of Samuel Daniel's works, and
for some years acted as London bookseller for the university
printers of Oxford and Cambridge. The most influential man in the
trade, in the latter part of the sixteenth century, was Christopher
Barker, the queen's printer, who has already been mentioned.
His presses were largely occupied with the printing of Bibles and
official work, and, on his death in 1599, he was succeeded in the
office of royal printer by his son Robert, whose name is associated
with the issue of the royal version (the Authorised Version) of
the Bible in 1611. Among the other five hundred or more
stationers who printed or published books during this period
may be mentioned Thomas Marshe, who, between 1554 and 1587,
issued many other books besides the school books for which he
held a patent of monopoly; Henry Fetherstone, the publisher of
Purchas his Pilgrimes ; Ralph Newbery and George Bishop, two
of the partners in the issue of Holinshed's Chronicles and Hakluyt's
Voyages; and Nicholas Bourne, a prolific publisher of undis-
tinguished books, who had an interest in the Swedish Intelligencer
and other budgets of foreign news.
In London, the localities most favoured by the booksellers of
the Elizabethan period were St Paul's churchyard, Fleet street
and, towards the end of the century, Paternoster row; but St
Paul's was quite clearly the focus of the trade. The business
premises around the cathedral church were of two classes, the
houses which bordered the churchyard, and the less substantial
booths (or lock-up shops) and stalls which clustered round the walls
and at the doors of the building itself. Those stationers who
dwelt at any distance from St Paul's evidently felt the need of
getting into closer touch with this business centre, for some of
them are found also occupying stalls at the doors. One of these
was Henry Bynneman, a printer and stationer who lived at the
Mermaid in Knight Rider street and had also a shop at the north-
west door of Paul's. His publications include some of the Latin


## p. 399 (#421) ############################################

St Paul's Churchyard 399
works of Gabriel Harvey, and he printed for Richard Smith the
first acknowledged edition (1575) of Gascoigne's Posies, as well as
the previous issue which appeared about 1573 under the title of
A Hundreth sundrie Flowres; the 1577 edition of Holinshed's
Chronicles, and Stanyhurst's translation of the first four books of
the Aeneid, also came from his press, the latter in 1583, the year of
his death. When John Day found that his printing house in Alders-
gate was not well situated for the sale of his books, he, too, in
1572, secured a site in the churchyard as offering a better oppor-
tunity for the disposal of his large stock, and the description of the
little structure which he put up gives us a good idea of the
appearance of one of these churchyard shops.
He got framed a neat handsome shop. It was but little and low, and flat-
roofed, and leaded like a terrace, railed and posted, fit for men to stand upon
in any triumph or show.
And it cost him, we are told, forty or fifty pounds.
London Bridge did not attain its fame as a resort of booksellers
until the second half of the seventeenth century; but, as early as
1557, William Pickering, a bookseller, whose publications consisted
chiefly of ballads and other trivial things, had a shop there. In
the next year, he was 'dwellyng at Saynt Magnus Corner,' which,
if not actually on the bridge, was at least hard by, and at this
address the business continued for upwards of a century. As
might be expected from its situation at the port of London, many
nautical books were published here, and the seaman making his
preparations for a voyage would step into the well known shop
and purchase The Art of Navigation, or perhaps, if he were
thither bound, a Card or rutter of the sea lyenge betwene Holland
and Ffryseland, and, were he so minded, he might fortify himself
with The seamans sacred safetye or a praier booke for seamen.
English printing during the period under review cannot be said
to be conspicuous for typographical excellence. The general condi-
tions of the trade probably militated against any high standard being
attained or even aimed at. Most of the prominent printers were
those who possessed valuable monopolies, and, thus safeguarded
from competition, there was little inducement to them to incur the
expense of having new founts cut, or to bestow the pains required
to ensure good workmanship. The less fortunate printers possessed
neither the means, nor, perhaps, save in a few cases, the capacity,
for turning out good work, and many of their productions are
slovenly and illiterate to a degree surpassed only in the succeeding


## p. 400 (#422) ############################################

400
The Book-Trade, 1557—1625
era, when the endeavour to make men bring forth good works
completely obscured their ability to produce good work.
In the first part of this period, when some of the earlier tradi-
tions were retained, the artistic feeling shown in the arrangement
of the page and the setting of the type gives to many of the books,
in spite of the frequently worn condition of the type and cuts,
a repose and dignity, which disappeared under the incursion
of roman type, and which even recent efforts have not succeeded in
recovering. Even down to 1580, or, perhaps, later, there is often
a certain delicacy of perception and tasteful handling which gives
the book an organic character and conveys a feeling of craftsman-
ship-qualities which are quite lacking in the later books in which
effect is too often sought by the use of adventitious ornament or
the display of an incongruous variety of types. It is a little
difficult to draw a line between the good and the indifferent
printers, but among the better craftsmen may be named Thomas
Berthelet, printer to king Henry VIII, also noted as a bookbinder;
Richard Grafton; Reyner Wolfe; John Day, whose pre-eminence
has already been referred to; Richard Jugge, the printer of the
Bishops' Bible; Henry Denham, who produced some tasteful work
between 1564 and 1589; Thomas Vautrollier, the Huguenot printer,
and his successor Richard Field; Thomas East, the printer of music
books; William Stansby, who produced a very large number of
books in workmanlike fashion; John Norton, who worked the
Eton press; the two Barkers; and Felix Kingston.
The illustrations to be found in English books of the period
are greatly inferior to contemporary continental work. The wood-
cuts, when not the worn-out blocks which had seen service since
the days of Pynson and Wynkyn de Worde, were generally un-
skilful copies of foreign work, or, occasionally, still less successful
original designs. Woodcut illustrations of a pictorial character
are used in the Bishops' Bible (1568), Foxe's Book of Martyrs,
Holinshed's Chronicles and a few other books. The edition of
Barclay's Ship of Fools, printed by Cawood in 1570, was also
illustrated by a series of woodcuts, but these were only a resuscita-
tion of those which had appeared in Pynson's edition of 1509.
Woodcuts are also to be found in many books on practical subjects,
but the use of them for pictorial illustration of imaginative works
was not common. To John Day is due some improvement in the
art, and portraits of himself and of William Cunningham, the author
of The Cosmographical Glasse (1559), are among his more notable
examples.


## p. 401 (#423) ############################################

Engravings and Decoration
401
The use of copperplate engravings, first introduced into this
country in 1540 but not much employed until some years later,
doubtless contributed to the disuse of woodcuts, and most of the
more ambitious books relied on the new art for their adornment.
The first edition of the Bishops' Bible, printed by Jugge in 1568, con-
tains, besides woodcut illustrations, engraved portraits of the earl
of Leicester and lord Burghley printed in the text, and an elaborate
emblematic title-page which includes a portrait of the queen. Sir
John Harington's Orlando Furioso, issued by Field in 1591, is
illustrated with forty-six full-page engravings; Sir William Segar's
Honor Military and Civill (1602) has eight engraved portraits;
and Sandys’s Relation of a Journey, which appeared in 1615,
contains many engravings illustrative of scenes and costumes.
This art was also used for topographical illustrations in such works
as Camden’s Britannia (1607), Drayton's Poly-Olbion (1613) and
captain John Smith's General History of Virginia (1624).
For the decoration of their books, as apart from illustration,
the earlier printers relied chiefly on ornamental initial letters. A
border round the title-page was soon discovered to be an effective
adornment to a book, and in a few instances every page of the book
is thus treated. The designs of these borders took various forms,
such as scroll work, arabesques, or architectural framework, and
some contain the device of the printer. Occasionally, borders were
emblematic of the subject of the book, and these were afterwards
used quite indifferently for other works without relation to the
subject. One of the best of these specially designed borders is
that which is seen in the 1593 and 1598 editions of Sidney's Arcadia.
Another form of border, both graceful and effective, which has
been aptly called a lace border, is built up of small ornaments of
homogeneous character. When copper engraving had come into
use, a frequent form of embellishment was an engraved title-page
of emblematic or symbolic design, such as those in Drayton's
Poly-Olbion of 1613, and Bacon's Instauratio magna of 1620.
>
In the early days of printing in England, when the native press
produced but a very small proportion of the books in demand, the
foreign printer and stationer were so freely tolerated, if not actively
encouraged, that a large part of the trade fell into the hands of
strangers. But, by the beginning of the sixteenth century, the
pinch of competition began to be severely felt by the native crafts-
men, and, in the succeeding years, repeated efforts were made to
eliminate the alien element and reduce the importation of foreign-
26
E. L. IV.
CH. XVIII.


## p. 402 (#424) ############################################

402
The Book-Trade, 1557–1625
printed books. By an act passed in 1523, aliens were forbidden to
take any but English-born apprentices, and, in 1529, another act
prohibited any foreigner, not already established, from setting up
a house or shop for the exercise of any handicraft within the realm.
These enactments aimed at squeezing out the foreigner from the
home trade; and a further act in 1534, directed against competi-
tion from abroad, prohibited the importation for sale of books
ready bound, and also provided that no undenizened alien should
sell foreign-printed books within the kingdom except by wholesale.
This act protected the native bookbinder and the retail bookseller,
and, at the same time, helped to limit facilities for the dissemina-
tion of seditious literature.
These efforts ultimately rescued the home trade from the
domination of the foreigner; but, since the demand for books
could not be limited to those produced in the country-scholars,
especially, being dependent on continental presses for certain
classes of literature—there was necessarily a large and continuous
business in the legitimate importation of foreign books of various
kinds. In the first half of the sixteenth century, service books
represented no inconsiderable part of the books so brought into
the country, and François Regnault, who had shops both in Paris
and London, was one of the leading men in this particular traffic.
Other prominent foreigners engaged in importation were the
Birckmans, who had places of business in Cologne, Antwerp and
other towns, and whose connection with London extended over the
greater part of the sixteenth century. The books of Plantin, the
great printer-publisher of Antwerp, must also have found their way
here in large numbers, for, in 1567, he was negotiating for the
establishment of a branch in London, but the project fell through.
Of the many English books printed abroad from the middle of
the sixteenth century, by far the larger number were concerned
with the acrimonious politico-religious controversies of the day,
and were produced on foreign soil either because their authors
had sought safety there, or, possibly, because there was less chance
of the work being interrupted. Among the chief places of their
origin were Antwerp, Rouen, Louvain, Leyden and Dort; Amster-
dam, whence proceeded the 'Family of Love' books; Middel-
burg, chiefly from the press of Richard Schilders; Geneva and
Zurich, the protestant strongholds; and Douay and St Omer, the
Roman Catholic fortresses. Much interest centres round the early
editions of the English Bible, several of which were printed on the
continent, the first of them (Coverdale's version) at Zurich in 1535,


## p. 403 (#425) ############################################

Book-Fairs
403
and some editions of the Genevan version which bear an English
imprint were actually printed at Amsterdam or Dort. The first
(Latin) issue of Foxe's Book of Martyrs was printed at Basel in
1559; and the edition of William Turner's New herball printed by
Arnold Birckman at Cologne, in 1568, may be cited as an example
of a different class of English book for which we are indebted to
the foreign press.
The great international book exchange at this period was the
half-yearly fair held at Frankfort. To this mart came represen-
tatives of the book-trade from all parts of the continent—Froben
of Basel, Estienne of Geneva, Plantin of Antwerp and other
leading printers from the great centres, bringing supplies of
their recent books and, perhaps, specimen sheets of important fresh
undertakings; there, also, would be gathered booksellers from far
and near, some having in view the selling of copies of their own
ventures, but most of them eager to lay in a stock of the newest
literature most likely to suit the tastes of their patrons. At this
period, too, when catalogues were rare, and no journals existed
as a medium of regular literary information, a visit to the fair
afforded opportunity to writers, scholars, and keen book lovers
to see and become acquainted with the new literature.
The important place which this fair held, even in the English
book trade, is indicated by the agreement concluded between the
Stationers' company and the university of Cambridge in 1591, that
the Cambridge printers should, 'for the space of one month after
the return of every Frankfort mart,' have the choice of printing
any foreign books coming thence. Not many of the books
.
printed in England were likely to find a sale on the continent,
but several English booksellers either attended the mart or were
represented there. Early in the seventeenth century, Henry
Fetherstone, the stationer at the Rose in Paul's Churchyard,
harvested still further afield, and his results are to be seen in
the catalogue of books bought in Italy which he issued in 1628.
Perhaps the most notable of the regular English visitors to
the fair at this time was John Bill, the leading London stationer,
who numbered among his distinguished clients king James and
Sir Thomas Bodley. His business there and at other continental
centres must have been fairly extensive, for, in 1617, he thought
it worth while to begin the issue of a London edition of the
half-yearly Frankfort Mess- Katalog, which he continued for
about eleven years, and to which, from 1622 to 1626, was added
a supplement of Books printed in English. This supplement was
26-2


## p. 404 (#426) ############################################

404
The Book-Trade, i
1557—1625
not the first attempt at a catalogue of English books. The credit
for that enterprise is due to Andrew Maunsell, who, induced,
one must believe, by a love of books, deserted the calling of a
draper to become a bookseller and the earliest English biblio-
grapher. He had already published a number of books before
he brought out, in 1595, the first part of his Catalogue of English
Printed Bookes, which comprised works on divinity. In the same
year, he printed the second part of the catalogue, which deals
with the writers on arithmetic, music, navigation, war, and
physic, and contains some 320 titles. The completion of the last
part was prevented by failing health, followed by his death in
1596. This third and last part was, said Maunsell, to be of
Humanity, wherin I shall have occasion to shew, what wee have
in our owne tongue, of Gramer, Logick, Rethoricke, Lawe, Historie,
Poetrie, Policie, &c. which will for the most part concerne matters
of Delight and Pleasure. ' Maunsell's attempt to record the output
of the English press found no successor till the appearance of
John Bill's supplement in 1622; but from this time onwards several
other lists were published which fairly well bridge the period
to the beginning of the quarterly Term Catalogues in 1668.
The books which a stationer kept in stock for sale at his shop
might be either in sheets, or stitched, or ready bound. A large
number of books were sold in sheets, that is, merely folded, and
the binding was a separate transaction carried out according to
the taste and purse of the purchaser, either by the stationer who
sold the book, or by any binder whom the purchaser might choose
to employ. Pamphlets and books of an ephemeral nature were
generally stitched, that is, stabbed through with a bodkin or awl
and stitched with thread or a thin strip of leather, maybe with
a paper wrapper to keep the outside leaves clean, or, sometimes,
without any covering. By a regulation of the year 1586, it was
ordered that no books so stitched should exceed forty sheets if in
folio, twelve sheets in octavo, or six sheets in decimo sexto; any
books consisting of more sheets than these were to be sewn in
the regular manner upon a sewing press. The books kept in stock
ready bound would be those for which there was a steady demand.
These would be bound either in leather, sheep and calf being
commonly used; or in vellum, finished off with two silk ties to
keep the book closed; or they might be bound in paper boards.
In the first half of the sixteenth century, these commercial
leather bindings were frequently ornamented with panel stamps.
>


## p. 405 (#427) ############################################

a
a
Bookbindings
405
often of beautiful design, in which the royal arms and the Tudor
rose frequently figured. The later panel stamps are much inferior
in design and interest; and, in course of time, this form of decora-
tion was to a large extent superseded by the roll, a tool which
applied the ornament in the form of a ribbon on which the design
was repeated. This method lent itself very readily to the decora-
tion of either a folio or smaller cover ; but the mechanical nature
of the use of this tool soon extended to the ornamentation itself,
which rapidly deteriorated both in the size of the roll and in the
character of the design, and this was followed by the practical
extinction of stamped work.
When books were bound in more luxurious fashion, they were
usually executed for wealthy collectors or royal personages, and
often represent the personal taste and predilection of the owner.
The use of gold tooling on bindings, which originated in Italy
towards the end of the fifteenth century, was introduced into
England in the reign of Henry VIII, probably by Thomas Ber-
thelet, printer and stationer to the king. In the bills for books
bound for, and supplied to, the king by Berthelet, in the years
1541—3, are several instances of this new style of binding; some
are described as “gorgiously gilted on the leather,' or 'bounde
after the Venecian fascion,' while others are covered with purple
velvet and written abowte with golde. ' The English gilt leather
bindings of this time, and throughout the sixteenth century, are
almost entirely imitations of foreign styles, in which French
influence predominates. Not only were a large number of the
binders actually foreigners, but even the English craftsmen did
little more than copy foreign designs.
One of the favourite styles of design in the latter half of the
century was an imitation of the Lyonese manner, in which the
sides were decorated with heavy gold centre and corner pieces,
enclosed within a plain or gilt border, the ground being either
left plain or, more generally, powdered with small ornaments.
This style continued in vogue into the reign of James I. Arch-
bishop Parker, whose catholic tastes included bookbinding,
employed a bookbinder in his own house, and the special copy
of his De antiquitate Britannicae ecclesiae, which he presented
to lord treasurer Burghley, and which was 'bound by my Man,
was done in this manner. On the other hand, the copy of this
book which he presented to the queen was in an elaborate and
beautirul embroidered binding, possibly in deference to the taste of
Elizabeth, whose preverence appears to have been for embroidered
7


## p. 406 (#428) ############################################

406
The Book-Trade, 1557–1625
bindings and for books bound in velvet, especially red, with
clasps of gold or silver. This taste was shared by her successor,
for whom, in 1609, Robert Barker, at that time printer and binder
to the king, bound books in 'crymson, purple, and greene velvet,'
and 'in taffity, with gold lace. ' James I, who was a lover of
sumptuous bindings, also had many books finely bound in leather,
and these usually bore the royal arms stamped in gold on the
side, the ground being powdered with fleurs-de-lis or other small
emblems. Another style which obtained in the sixteenth century
was a plain binding of leather or velvet, decorated with corners
and clasps of pierced silver work. The elaborate embroidered
bindings in which coloured silks, gold and silver thread, and oc-
casionally pearls were employed was an essentially English art.
Among the notable collectors who dressed their books in
distinctive coverings were Thomas Wotton, who adopted the style
and adapted the motto of Grolier, and Robert Dudley, earl of
Leicester, whose most characteristic style was a plain binding
having his well known badge, the bear and ragged staff, with his
initials stamped on the side. But there were book lovers as well
as book collectors, and one's heart warms much more towards
the scholarly library of archbishop Parker, or the plain brown
folios of Ben Jonson with their familiar inscription Sum Ben:
Jonsonij, and his motto 'Tanquam explorator.
In the early seventeenth century, there worked at Eton a
good binder, who commonly had ‘his hands full of worke, and
his head full of drinck'; at Oxford, Pinart and Milles bound
for Sir Thomas Bodley; and, from Cambridge, where good work
was being carried on, Nicholas Ferrar obtained the craftswoman
'that bound rarely,' and the result of her instruction is seen in the
bindings of that distinctive character which is associated with the
settlement at Little Gidding and the name of Mary Collet.
Notwithstanding the keen competition in the book trade and
the great number of works which were issued from the press,
books were by no means cheap. They were, it is true, no longer
a luxury for the rich alone, and it is quite probable that the
prices at which they were sold brought them fairly within the
reach of most of those who were able to use them. The prices
of those days multiplied by eight will, approximately, represent
present day values, and it should be noted that the cost mentioned
is often that of the book in sheets, the binding being an additional
expense.


## p. 407 (#429) ############################################

Prices
407
The prices of books published under official auspices were
sometimes limited by a special regulation; thus, the first
cdition of the Book of Common Prayer (1549), as appears by
the king's order printed at the end of the book, is not to be
sold above the price of 28. 2d. a piece, and bound in paste or
boards not above 38. 8d. Such a regulation was rendered the
more necessary by the fact that the right to print such books
was usually granted as a monopoly to some individual printer,
and they were not therefore subject to the healthy influence of
competition. A curious tract entitled Scintilla, or a Light broken
into darke Warehouses, published anonymously in 1641, throws
some interesting light on the doings of the monopolists and the
way in which they had raised the prices of the books which they
had gotten into their grasp. Church Bibles, which formerly cost
thirty shillings, are now, it is said, raised to two pounds, and large
folio Bibles in roman print, which used to sell at 128. 6d. , now
cost twenty shillings. The prices of other editions, before being
raised, were: the Cambridge quarto Bible, with Psalms, 78. , the
London quarto Bible, with notes and concordance, also 78. , and
Bibles in octavo, 38. 4d. Testaments in octavo cost 10d. , and in
duodecimo, 7d. ; the Book of Common Prayer, 38. in folio, and
18. 6d. in quarto. The Grammar of Oxford and Cambridge cost
5d. , and Camden's Greek Grammar, 8d. ; there was also an edition
of the latter printed in France which was sold at 41d.
In 1598, the Stationers' company, with a view to prevent the
excessive prices of books, made a general order that no new copies
without pictures should be sold at more than a penny for two
sheets if in pica, roman and italic, or in english with roman and
italic; and at a penny for one sheet and a half if in brevier or long
primer letter. A quarto volume of 360 pages in small type might
thus cost, in sheets, two shillings and sixpence, equal to about
one pound at the present day. At this rate, the first folio
Shakespeare, which contains nearly one thousand pages, should
have cost about fourteen shillings; an oft quoted statement that
the actual selling price was one pound appears to be based on
the insufficient evidence of a manuscript note in a copy not now
traceable. For a copy of Shakespeare's Sonnets, Alleyn the actor
paid fivepence in June 1609. Quarto plays and similar productions
were mostly issued at sixpence, and ephemeral pamphlets were
sold at twopence, threepence, or fourpence.
In 1576, the hall Bible at King's college, Cambridge, to be
read during meals, cost sixteen shillings; and, in 1585, New


## p. 408 (#430) ############################################

408
-
The Book-Trade, 1557–1625
college, Oxford, paid ten shillings for a copy of Estienne's edition
of Diodorus Siculus. Corpus Christi college, Oxford, a frequent
purchaser of books, in 1604 gave three shillings and sixpence for
the De idololatria ecclesiae Romanae of John Rainolds. The
college also bought Bacon's History of Henry VII for seven
shillings on its appearance in 1622, and paid £3. 88. 6d. for Purchas
his Pilgrimes, which appeared in four volumes in 1625. In 1621,
Dodoens's Niewe herball and Selden's Titles of Honour cost six
shillings and five shillings respectively. It is probable that, in all
these instances, the price included the binding of the book.
The methods employed by the bookseller and publisher for ad-
vertising his books are mainly a matter of surmise. Book buyers who
lived in the metropolis would, no doubt, frequent the stationers'
shops and there see and dip into new books; and the title-page of
the latest pamphlet, stuck up on the door post of the shop or any
other prominent place, would catch the eye of those eager to see
and read some new thing. Ballads may have been hawked in the
streets and at busy corners, but books were certainly not allowed
to be thus vended, for the Stationers' registers record the seizure of
certain books which were 'goynge hawkynge aboute the stretes
which ys contrary to the orders of the Cytie of London. ' Cata-
logues were not yet in fashion; occasionally, other works by the
same author are mentioned in the preface of a book, but it is not
till well into the seventeenth century that one now and again
meets with a paragraph telling the 'courteous reader' to expect
shortly from the press some new work by the same writer; and it
was still nearer the end of the century before the publisher hit
upon the expedient of impressing a spare leaf at the end of a book
into the service of announcing other books issued by him.
The provinces were supplied by stationers in the larger towns
and by the great periodical fairs, while popular literature was carried
into the remoter country districts in the pack of the travelling
merchant or chapman. Stationers carried on business in most of
the important towns, and sometimes published books, printed, of
course, in London; or joined with a London stationer in a similar
venture, the portion of the impression taken by the provincial
bookseller generally bearing his name in the imprint. At York,
there existed a company of stationers and bookbinders, who had a
new code of laws confirmed by the corporation in 1554. In the
east, Norwich, and, in the west, Chester and Exeter, were prominent
centres of the trade; at Shrewsbury, Roger Ward, the pirate


## p. 409 (#431) ############################################

Cambridge
409
printer of London, kept a shop, and thither he despatched a large
number of his illegally printed A BC and Catechism in 1582; and
John Norton had a shop in charge of his servant Edmond Wats, as
far away as Edinburgh. Among the principal provincial fairs were
those of Oxford, Bristol, Salisbury, Nottingham, Ely, Coventry,
and, chief of all, the renowned Sturbridge fair near Cambridge.
These marts played an important part in the internal trade of the
country, and were largely depended upon for the laying in of supplies
for the year. Stationers, both from London and the provinces,
attended them, and a large trade in books was one of the features
of the multifarious business transacted there; indeed, so far as the
provinces were concerned, new books were practically published at
these fairs, and the issue of books was frequently timed with a view
to the dates on which they were held.
In the first half of the sixteenth century, printing had been
carried on in the provinces at Oxford, St Albans, York, Cambridge,
Tavistock, Abingdon, Ipswich, Worcester and Canterbury. The
productions of these presses were mainly works of a theological,
liturgical, or grammatical character, and contributed little or
nothing to English literature, if we except a few books such as the
translation of Boethius's Boke of Comfort, printed at Tavistock
monastery in 1525, Lydgate's Lyfe and Passion of Seint Albon,
attributed to John Herford's press at St Albans in 1534, and the
undated edition of the same author's Churle and the Bird which
John Mychell may have printed at his Canterbury press.
By 1557, the year in which the Stationers' company was incor-
porated, all these presses had already ceased; and, until the revival
of the Cambridge press in 1583, the only printing carried on in
England, outside London, was that by Anthony de Solempne, who,
from 1568 to 1580, was printing Dutch books in Norwich for the
use of the refugees there, for which he seems to have obtained the
queen's authority. Although the monopoly conferred upon the
company did not contribute to the extinction of the provincial
presses, the opposition to the re-establishment of the Cambridge
press clearly indicates that any attempted revival would have been
promptly strangled.
The right to elect 'three stationers or printers or sellers of
books' had been granted to the university of Cambridge by
Henry VIII in 1534, but, though printers were regularly appointed
under this grant, no actual printing was done in Cambridge from
the cessation of John Siberch's press in 1522 until the appointment
in 1582 of Thomas Thomas as university printer. The Stationers'


## p. 410 (#432) ############################################

410
The Book-Trade, 1557–1625
a
company, having got wind of this intention to establish a university
press, scented dangerous competition and infringement of their
privileges, and the presse and furniture’ intended for Mr Thomas's
establishment, having been discovered by their searchers, were
seized and detained. In this action, the company was supported
by the bishop of London (John Aylmer), who, though professing
great concern for the interests of printing, was, no doubt, alarmed
at the power which this new press might place in the hands of the
puritan party in Cambridge. The university appealed to their
chancellor, lord Burghley, for the restoration of the press, and
succeeded in vindicating their claim to the privileges of the patent;
but a jealous struggle with the London company continued for
many years, with varying successes and reprisals on both sides, the
university, on the whole, steadily gaining ground and, in the end,
completely establishing its right to print.
Besides his work as university printer, Thomas, who was a
fellow of King's college, is known as the author of a Latin
dictionary, of which eight editions had been issued from the Cam-
bridge press by 1610. Thomas was succeeded on his death in
1588 by John Legate, who, in 1609, removed to London, and
was followed in the office by Cantrell Legge. Among the pro-
ductions of this press, books in divinity and scholastic subjects
naturally preponderate, and there is very little of literary interest.
Certain things such as The Returne from Parnassus (1606),
Tomkis's Albumazar (1615), and Ruggle’s Ignoramus (entered
18 April 1615), which, being university plays, one might very
well expect to find with a Cambridge imprint, were, nevertheless,
printed and published in London.
The revival of printing at Oxford, two years later, met with no
such stormy reception, though the university possessed no printing
patent similar to that of Cambridge. Its immunity from inter-
.
ference may have owed something to the protection of the earl of
Leicester, chancellor of the university, under whose auspices the
press was established. Anyhow, Joseph Barnes, the printer
appointed by the university, at once carried the attack into the
London camp, and, in the very year (1585) in which he began work,
reprinted one of their most vendible copies. John Wight, the
bookseller to whom the book (Parsons's Christian Exercise) had
been entered in the Stationers' register, on hearing of the piracy,
sent his son to Oxford, who there bought the impression and paid
Barnes ready money for it, Barnes making faithful promise that he
would never reprint the book. But, notwithstanding this promiso
>


## p. 411 (#433) ############################################

411
>
Oxford
and Wight's 'curteous dealinge' with him, Barnes, being thus
furnished with money, forthwith prints two other impressions of
the work; and, when the London printers in retaliation reprint
Thomas Bilson's Christian subjection and unchristian rebellion,
which Barnes had just published, they are stopped by the privy
council, their printing tools seized, and one of their number thrown
into prison. The Oxford press was officially recognised in 1586, by
a Star chamber ordinance allowing one press and one apprentice.
In 1586, Barnes brought out Chrysostom's Homilies printed in
Greek type, and, in 1595, his first Welsh book Perl mewn adfyd, a
translation from Otto Wermueller. Before his resignation in 1617,
Barnes had issued from his press a rendering into English verse of
ix poems of Theocritus (1588), Richard of Bury's Philobiblon
(1599) 'the first English edition of the first book on the love of
books,' two editions of John Davies's Microcosmos, captain John
Smith's Map and description of Virginia (1612), and works by
Nicholas Breton, Thomas Churchyard and Richard Hooker. Barnes
was succeeded by John Lichfield, who printed till 1635; the issue
of the first four editions (1621-32) of Burton's Anatomy of
Melancholy lends distinction to his press. Archbishop Laud, when
he became chancellor of the university in 1630, bestowed much
care in forwarding the interests of printing at Oxford, and one of
his earliest actions in this direction was to procure from king
Charles I a charter which conferred upon the university privileges
equal to those possessed by Cambridge.
In 1610–13, an edition of Chrysostom's works in Greek, in
eight volumes folio, was printed at Sir Henry Savile's press at
Eton college by John Norton, the king's printer in Latin, Greek,
and Hebrew. Five other books are known to have issued from the
Eton press before its cessation in 1615. The celebrated Greek
type, the ‘silver letter' as it was called, was afterwards presented
by Sir Henry Savile to the university of Oxford.
The rigorous enforcement of the policy of regulating printing
in the interests of church and state naturally drove the opponents
of the establishment, the papists on the one side and the puritans
on the other, to resort to secret printing, and several illicit presses
were at work during the latter part of the sixteenth century.