malignant innuendo: Bertius does not hesitate, as Junius did, to name Fust as the false workman who stole Coster's tools.
Peter Scriverius thought it necessary, in 1628, to enlarge and embellish the story of Junius. He wrote a new version of the invention, which appeared with a curious poem called the Laurecrans.[1] This, says Scriverius, was the manner of it: In the year 1428, Laurens Coster, then a sheriff of Haarlem, strolled in the Haarlem wood. He took up the branch of an oak-tree, cut a few letters in relief on the wood, and after a while wrapped them up in paper. He then fell asleep, but while he slept, rain descended and soaked the paper. Awakened by a clap of thunder, he took up the sheet, and, to his astonishment, discovered that the rain had transferred to it the impress of the letters. Here was the suggestion of xylography, which he at once followed to a successful conclusion. He printed a great many block-books and a Donatus, but finding to his surprise that letters cut upon a solid block could not be used for other work, he thereupon invented typography. John Gutenberg, who had been employed as a workman, stole the tools and the secret. Disheartened with this misfortune, Coster abandoned printing and died. He proceeds:
It is my opinion that the art was first invented ten or twelve years before the year of our Lord 1440 (in which the most trustworthy authors agree), in Holland, at Haarlem. Junius has told its beginning and progress before us. And although he discovered some particulars about the invention, yet he has (I may be allowed to say it without disturbing his ashes) his errors, and may not be pronounced free from inadvertence. To-day (a. d. 1628) is just two centuries since the excel-
- ↑ Laurecrans voor Laurens Coster von Haarlem, eerste Vinder von de Boeckdruckery, etc. Haarlem, 1628. Reprinted in Dutch, with description in Latin, in Wolf's Monumenta Typographica, vol. i, pp. 209-451. The poetry of Scriverius is as whimsical as his prose. Here is his charge of theft against John Gutenberg:
Ah, rascal! ah, are you there? is it you Hans Gutenberger?
Why does this name become you? Yes, two-fold rascal, and worse!
Notorious by theft, oh shameless man!
This word is still too mild for your villainy.
Because you concealed Laurens' good and carried it away,
And stole it falsely: so hear we now speak
Of Goedenbergher's praise; however they disguise it,
By the Goeden-berg they betray the Guyten-(rogue)berg.
