Page:A dictionary of printers and printing.djvu/169

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160

HISTORY OF PRINTING.

Larer associated himself with Leonhard Pfiugcl, and these printed together till 1495. Larer was a native of Wurtzburg. John Schurener de Bopardia exercised the art about 1475. He was a printer of second-rate merit, on the score of beauty ; yet much preferable to Laver. Panzer notices probably a brother of this printer of the name of Conraid de Bopardia, who printed at Cologne in I486.— Beloe.

In what manner the invention of the art of typography was appreciated, is apparent from the high honour and mstinction to which its profes- sors were, in different places, advanced. Philip de Lignamine was of the equestrian order, and the favourite and confidential friend of the pope. Nicholas Jenson was made count Palatine of the Rhine. Sixtus Russinger was enobled by Fer- dinand, King of Naples. John Mentilus was enobled by the emperor Frederic III. John Gutenberg was likewise enobled by archbishop Adolphus, elector of Mentz. Aldus Manutius received the same honourable distinction and nu- merous other examples of the kind might be easily adduced. All of them of the nigher class, bore arms, and many individuals among them were distinguished by the peculiar marks of favour of the sovereigns in whose times they flourished.

1477. Printing introduced into the following cities and towns : —

Deventer, by Richard Paffroet.

Gouda, by Gerard Leu (or Leuw.)

Angers, by Joann. de Turre & Joan deMorelli.

Palermo, byAndrew de Warmatia.

Ascoli, by William de Linis.

Seville, by M. de la Talle, B. Segura and A. del Puerto.

Bartholomew Buyer introduced the art of printing into Lyons, and printed the New Testa- ment in French.

Titles and cyphers began to be employed about thisperiod. — Chevillier.

1 477. The Dictet and Sayinges ofPhilosophres. Wltich Bohe Utratulated out ofFremhe into Eng- lyssh hy the Noble and puissant lord Antoine Erie ofEyuyen lord of Scales and of the Jsle of Wyght, JDefendour and directour of the siege Apostoligue, 4-c. Emprynled by me William Caxton at West- minstre the yere of our lord m. cccc. Ixxvij, Folio.

This is the first book printed by Caxton with the year and place .specified. It was translated out of Latin into French by M. Jehan de Teon- ville, and from the French by earl Rivers. This nobleman had left out some strictures on women, which were in the original French ; these Caxton translated and adde<f as an appendix in three additional leaves ; of his reasons for doing so, he gives the following statement. Lord Rivers had desired him to look over the translation, and to correct it. Caxton observed that the Dietes of Socrates on Women was not there, and indulged in many comectures respecting the reason of the omission. He supposed that some fair lady had used her influence with his lordship, or that he was courting some fair lady at the time, or that he thought Socrates said more than was true, or

that these Dietes were not in his lordship's copy: " or else perad venture that the wind had blown over the leaf at the time of the translation." As, however, his lordship had given him permission to correct the translation, Caxton thought be should not be going beyond due limits if he ad- ded these Dietes. But, he tells us, " I did not presume to put and set them in my said lord's book, but in the end apart, in the rehearsal of the works, that lord Rivers, or any other per- son, if they be not pleased, may with a pen erase it, or else rend the leaf out of the book, humbly beseeching my said lord to take no displeasure on me so presuming." He then requests the reader to lay the blame on Socrates, not on him. From his insertion of these strictures on women, which are not the mqst courtly, it has been inferred that he was a womanhater ; but that he was not so, appears from some of his pro- logues, especially from that to the Knight of the Tower. This work he was requested to translate and print by " a noble lady, who had brought forth many noble and fair daughters, which were virtuously nourished and learned."

Oldys states, that the work opens with the sayings of Sedechias, and continues with those of^Homer, Solon, Hippocrates, Pythagoras, Dio- genes, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Alexander, Ptolemy, Seneca, St. Gregory, Galen, and others : each occupying one chapter. The con- cluding chapter comprehends the sayings of several persons.

" Thus endeth this book of the dyctes and no- table xayse sayetigis of the phyloiophers, late trans- lated and drawen out of Frensshe into our Eng- lishe tonge by my foresayde lord therle of Ryum and lord Scales, and by his commandemenl sette in forme, and emprinted in this manner, as ye may here in this booke see, which was fynisshed the xviii. day of the moneth of Novemhre, and the seventeeniti yere of the reign of kyng Etcd.

It appears that Caxton printed two editions of this work ; the one comprised in seventy-five leaves, and twenty-nine lines to a page, is con- sidered the most ancient; the second contains sixty-six leaves, with thirty-one lines in each page.

1477. The pages were first numbered in Ser- tnonibus, Leon de Ultino, in this year. These generally, as at present, were placed at the top of the page, though Thomas Anshelmus, in his edition ot Hesychius, published in 1521, placed the cyphers at the bottom, and recommended the practice in his preface. The custom of numbering the pages does not appear to have " become at all popular, for few books are found with tliis distinction before the end of this cen- tury. What was termed the Registrum Charta- rum was much more frequent. This custom was first introduced by Ulric Han and Simon de Laca, as early as in the Philippics of 1470. They occur, also, in the edition of Virgil, printed at Rome, 1473, a peculiarity which the accu- rate Audiflredi has not omitted to notice. The great convenience of this register wa.*, that it

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