falsely said that although Gutenberg was the first inventor, he was the man who perfected the art. It seems that he must have told his friends many things about his pretended services which he was unwilling to print. In 1503, John Schœffer said in his first book that he was a descendant of the inventor of the almost divine art of printing. In 1509, he says in another book that his grandfather was the first inventor of printing. In 1515,[1] he printed this extraordinary statement:
The printing of this chronicle was completed in the year of our Lord 1515, in the vigil of the Virgin Margaret, in the noble and famous city of Mentz, where the art of printing was first developed, by John Schœffer, descendant of the honest man, John Fust, citizen of Mentz, and inventor of the before-mentioned art. It was in the year 1450, in the 13th indiction, under the reign of the very illustrious Roman Emperor Fredericii, the very reverend father in Christ, Lord Theodoric, grand cup-bearer of Erpach, prince elector, occupying the archiepiscopal chair in Mentz, that this John Fust began to devise, and finally invented, solely through his own genius, the art of printing. Aided by divine favor, in the year 1452, he had so far improved and developed his art, that he was able to print; in which work, however, he was indebted for many improvements to the ingenuity of Peter Schœffer of Gernszheim, his workman and his adopted son, to whom, in acknowledgment of his many services and his skill, he gave the hand of his daughter, Christina Fust. These two men, John Fust and Peter Schœffer, carefully retained to their own advantage the secrets of the art; and for this purpose, they demanded from their workmen and servants an oath that they should not in any way divulge the process. Notwithstanding this precaution, in the year 1462 the knowledge of the art was carried by their workmen to distant countries, and printing thereby secured a wide development.
- ↑ Ten years before, John Schœffer had conceded full justice to Gutenberg, and had told the story with more truth. In the dedication of an edition of Livy, printed by him in 1505, John Schœffer uses this language: "Will your Majesty [addressing the Emperor Maximilian] deign to accept this book, printed in Mentz, the city in which the admirable art of typography was invented, in the year 1450, by the ingenious John Gutenberg, and was afterward perfected at the cost and by the work of John Fust and of Peter Schœffer …" This acknowledgment did not prevent the Emperor from making a subsequent official declaration, in the privilege or copyright for a grand edition of Livy, published by the same printer, and dated December 9, 1518, that the grandfather of John Schœffer had invented printing [chalcographia]. So much for the strength of audacious falsehood! Bernard, De l'origine et des débuts, vol. i, p. 309.
