Chapter V: Part 5

Thus endeth this boke whiche Cristyne of Pyse made and drewe
out of the boke named Vegecius de Re Militari and out of th’
Arbre of Bataylles wyth many other thynges sett in to the
same requisite to werre and batailles. Whiche boke beyng in
Frenshe was delyuered to me William Caxton by the most crysten
kynge and redoubted prynce my natural and souerayn lord kyng
Henry the VII, kyng of Englond and of Fraunce in his palais
of Westmestre the xxiii day of Ianyuere the iiii yere of his
regne and desired and wylled me to translate this said boke and
reduce it in to our English and natural tonge, and to put it
in enprynte to thende that euery gentylman born to armes and
all manere men of werre, captayns, souldiours, vytayllers and
all other, shold haue knowlege how they ought to behaue theym
in the fayttes of warre and of bataylles, and so delyuered me
the said book thenne, my lord th’ Erle of Oxenford awayting on
his said grace, Whyche volume conteynyng four bokes I receyued
of his said grace and according to his desire, whiche to me I
repute a comandement, and verili glad to obeye, and after the
lityl connyng that God hath lente me I haue endeuoyrd me to the
vtterest of my power to fulfylle and accomplisshe his desire
and comaundement, as wel to reduce it in to englyshe as to put
it in enprinte, to thende that it may come to the sight and
knowlege of euery gentylman and man of warre. And for certayn
in myn oppinyon it is as necessary a boke and as requisite as
ony may be for euery estate hye and lowe that entende to the
fayttes of werre, whether it be in bataylles, sieges, rescowse,
and all other fayttes, subtyltees and remedyes for meschieues.
Whiche translacyon was finysshed the viii day of Iuyll the
sayd yere and enprynted the xiiii day of Iuyll next folowyng
and ful fynyshyd. Thenne syth I haue obeyed his most dredeful
comaundement I humbly byseche his most exellent and bounteuous
hyenes to pardone me of this symple and rude translacion, where
in be no curyous ne gaye termes of rethoryk, but I hope to
almighti God that it shal be entendyble and vnderstanden to
euery man and also that it shal not moche varye in sentence
fro the copye receyued of my said souerayn lord. And where as
I haue erryd or made defaulte I beseche them that fynde suche
to correcte it and so dooyng I shal praye for them, and yf
ther be ony thyng therin to his pleasir I am glad and thinke
my labour wel enployed for to haue the name to be one of the
litel seruantes to the hiest and most cristen kyng and prince
of the world, whom I byseche almyghty God to preserue kepe and
contynue in his noble and most redoubted enterpryses, as wel in
Bretayn, Flaundres and other placis, that he may haue victorie,
honour and renommee to his perpetual glorye. For I haue not
herd ne redde that ony prynce hath subdued his subgettis with
lasse hurte &c and also holpen his neighbours and frendis out
of this londe, In whyche hye enterprises I byseche almyghty God
that he may remayne alleway vyctoryous And dayly encreace fro
vertu to vertue, and fro better to better to his laude & honour
in this present lyf, that after thys short and transitorye lyf
he may atteyne to euerlastyng lyf in heuen, whiche God graunte
to hym and to alle his lyege peple Amen.

Passing now from authors and semi-authors (if we may invent such a class to do honor to Caxton) to editors of a more ordinary stamp, we shall find that they, or the printers who hired them, in their anxiety to magnify their achievements, have frequent recourse to the opportunities offered by colophons. For unflinching and pretentious self-advertisement the palm, as far as my experience reaches, must be given to Bartolommeo Cepolla, who collected and edited the “consilia,” or counsel’s opinions, of Paulus de Castro, a celebrated jurist:

Si quis rerum omnium naturas inspexerit: vnamquamque non minus
suo ordine quam partibus constare facile intelliget. Nec qui
pro construendis edibus structori materiam parat sed qui pro
consummati operis expeditione dispositam artificiose connectit
domum edificare perhibetur: eique iure optimo architecti dum
taxat nomen indidimus. Nemo namque sane mentis plineturgos
aut cementarios edificatores merito nuncupabit, hi licet
coctilia ac reliquia pro ceteris conglutinandis particulis
administrent: hominem neque progenuisse naturam iudicaremus si
hominis crura vertebris vero ac inguinibus caput et humeros
addidisset, quando quidem et si nullius portiuncule integritate
caruisset solius tamen situs incongruitate monstruosa res non
rationis particeps animal diceretur. Cum itaque clarissimi ac
excellentissimi iureconsulti Pauli Castrensis dilapsa undique
neque in unum corpus redacta consilia cernerentur non ea fuisse
edita seu composita dici posse videbant[ur], ac deperiisse
potius tantum opus tamque elegantissimum quam in lucem
peruenisse merito arbitraretur, communi studentium utilitati
parens, quibus maxima pro eorum beniuolentia summisque in
eum benemeritis seipsum debere fatetur, insignis eques et
comes ac iuris ciuilis et pontificii interpres famosissimus
Bartholomeus Cepolla Veronensis, aduocatus consistorialis,
in florentissimo gymnasio Patauino ordinariam iuris ciuilis
de mane publice legens, singula queque ab eo clarissimo uiro
hinc inde consulta colligere elaborauit: fieri etiam unum
reintegratum volumen (quod merito Repertorium Pauli Castrensis
appellamus) ad faciliorem doctrinam capescendam curauit ac
omnibus eius professionis imposterum accomodatum patere
studuit. Idque impressoria arte Nurnberge de mense Octobris
M.cccc.lxxxv Indictione tercia: per Anthonium Koburger actum
est et diligentia completum.

Any one who has examined the natures of things in general
will easily understand that each of them is the result quite
as much of its arrangement as of its parts. Nor is he who
makes ready the material for the mason to construct a dwelling
considered to be the builder of the house, but rather he who
skilfully combines the material available for the furtherance
of the complete work, and by the best right it is only to this
man that we have given the name of architect. For no one in
his right mind will entitle tilers and bricklayers builders,
although they furnish the bricks and what else is wanted
for cementing together the other parts, nor should we judge
nature to have given birth to a man if a man’s legs had been
added to his vertebræ and a head and shoulders to his middle,
since although every portion were there in its entirety, yet
merely from the incongruity of their position the result
would be called a monstrosity, not an animal partaking of
reason. So when of the most famous and excellent counsellor
Paulus Castrensis the Opinions were perceived to have been
scattered abroad and not brought together into one body, it
seemed impossible to speak of them as having been edited or
compiled, and it might justly be thought that this great and
most elegant work had rather utterly perished than been brought
to the light of day. Obeying therefore the convenience of
students, to whom he acknowledges himself indebted for their
great good will and many services to him, a noble knight and
count and very renowned exponent alike of civil and papal
law, Bartholomeus Cepolla of Verona, an advocate of the
consistorial court, who lectures publicly of a morning in the
most flourishing University of Padua on the ordinary course of
civil law, has taken the pains to gather from all sides all the
individual opinions given by that most distinguished man, and
has arranged, in order that his teaching may more easily be
understood, for the publication of a single renovated volume,
which we rightly call the Repertory of Paulus Castrensis, and
has made it his care that this should be available in future
for all of his profession, and this by the printer’s art has
been finished and diligently completed at Nuremberg in October,
1485, the third indiction, by Anton Koburger.

A more normal example of the custom of blaming previous printers and editors—and it must be owned that the accusations hurled at them are, as a rule, much better justified than the vituperator’s assertions of his own superiority—may be taken from another law-book, a lecture or commentary by Petrus de Ancharano, printed and, as he asserts, edited by Benedictus Hectoris at Bologna.

Opus pene diuinum celeberrimi vtriusque censure interpretis d.
Petri de Ancharano in materia statutorum super caput canonum
statuta de constitutionibus, quod prius Rome tum Bononie
Impressum fuerat, adeo corruptum atque inemendatum fuerat
vitio scriptorum et impressorum incuria vt vix tanti viri opus
obtenebratum foret: nunc vero per Benedictum Hectoris librarium
prius magna arte castigatum, demum originali proprio reperto
enucleatius emendatum, editum est, quo si vera fateri licet
et multa frustra addita detraxit et maiora detracta addidit
impressitque fideliter in eadem ciuitate Bononie. Anno Domini
M.cccc.lxxxxiij. tertio nonas Augusti.

The little less than divine work of the most famous interpreter
of both codes, Dom. Petrus de Ancharano, in the matter of the
statutes, on the chapter “Canonum statuta de constitutionibus,”
which first at Rome, afterwards at Bologna, had been printed,
by the fault of copyists and the carelessness of the printers,
so corruptly and with so little correction that the work of so
great a man was hardly shadowed out, now, on the other hand, by
Benedictus Hectoris, stationer, has first with great skill been
corrected and then by the discovery of the author’s original
more purely emended, and so published, whereby, if truth may
be told, he has both removed many vain additions and has added
more things that had been removed, and has faithfully printed
it in the same city of Bologna in the year of the Lord 1493, on
August 3d.

Legal works are usually crabbed reading in themselves, and in the fifteenth century were made infinitely more so by the multiplicity of contractions used in printing them. It might seem natural, therefore, that there should be a special difficulty in obtaining correctness in these texts. But, as a matter of fact, to whatever department of knowledge we turn, we shall still find the fifteenth-century editor exclaiming against the wickedness of his predecessors. Thus, if we go to divinity, we may find as loud complaints as any law lecturer could formulate in the colophon to the Hagenau edition of Gabriel Biel’s sermon on the Lord’s Passion.

Dominice passionis trium partium notabilium sermo preclarus
domini Gabrielis Biel supranotati. Qui olim negligenter: ex
mendoso exemplari: et sub falso titulo impressus, postea
emendatus ex originali et per prefatum Florentium diel
diligenter revisus: in laudem altissimi innovatus clariusque
interstinctus atque emendatus: non modo in sententiarum
quarundam defectibus: verum etiam in orthographia. Et in
imperiali opido hagenau impressus.

The excellent sermon of the above-mentioned Dom Gabriel Biel
on the three noteworthy parts of the Lord’s Passion, which
formerly was carelessly printed from a faulty copy and under
a wrong title, afterwards corrected from the original and
diligently revised by the aforesaid Florentinus Diel, unto
the glory of the Most High has been renovated, more clearly
divided, and emended, not only in the defects of certain
sentences but also in the spelling, and printed in the imperial
town of Hagenau.

To print a book (i) carelessly, (ii) from a faulty copy, and (iii) under a wrong title was really reprehensible, yet after all this detraction there is something quite pleasing in coming across a colophon like that to S. Augustine’s Exposition on the Psalms, in which Johann von Amerbach of Basel, instead of vilifying his predecessors, is content to appeal to the judgment of experts in matters of editing and textual criticism.

Post exactam diligentemque emendationem. Auctore deo:
perfectum est insigne atque preclarum hoc opus explanationis
psalmorum: Diui ac magni doctoris Augustini. Opus reuera maiori
commendatione se dignum exhibens legentibus, quam quibusvis
verbis explicari possit: vt ex prefatione et prologo ipsius
evidenter colligi potest. Quanto vero studio et accuratione
castigatum: emendatum: et ordinatum sit: hi iudicent qui illud
aliis similibus sibi: siue manuscriptis: siue ere impressis
litteris contulerint. Consummatum Basilee per magistrum Ioannem
de Amerbach Anno Domini M.cccc.lxxxix.

After exact and diligent revision, by the help of God, this
renowned and excellent work has been completed, the Explanation
of the Psalms of the divine and great doctor Augustine, a
work in very truth approving itself to its readers as worthy
of greater praise than can be unfolded in any words, as can
plainly be gathered from its preface and prologue. But with how
much study and accuracy it has been corrected, emended, and set
in order, let those judge who have compared it with other texts
like itself, whether in manuscript or in brass-printed letters.
Finished at Basel by Master Johann von Amerbach A.D. 1489.

Perhaps even more cheering than this pleasant and reasonable self-confidence is the mild shadow of an oath, a simple “Hercule,” with which Heinrich Quentell asseverates that his edition of the De Veritate of S. Thomas Aquinas truly rejoices in the true title of truth! We may note also the little arrangement by which the printer contrived to bring his work to an end on the very day of the saint’s festival.

Diui Thome aquinatis doctoris angelici illuminatissimi summa
de veritate, per theozophie professorem eximium, Magistrum
Theodericum de Susteren, insignis conuentus Coloniensis ordinis
fratrum Predicatorum regentem profundissimum, denuo peruigili
studio in luculentam erecta consonantiam, adeo hercule vt
vere vero veritatis titulo gaudeat. Impressa Agrippine
opera atque impensis prouidi viri Henrici Quentell, ciuis
eiusdem. Anno salutis humane nonagesimonono supra millesimum
quadringentesimum Ipso die celebritatis autoris cursu felici ad
finem vsque perducta.

The Summa de Veritate (Epitome of Truth) of St. Thomas Aquinas,
the angelic and most illuminate doctor, by the distinguished
professor of divine learning Theoderic of Susteren, a regent
deeply versed of the famous Cologne Convent of the order of
Preaching Friars, newly by assiduous study restored to a
fruitful harmony, so by Hercules that it truly rejoices in the
true title of Truth, and printed at Cologne by the efforts and
at the expense of the prudent Heinrich Quentell, citizen of the
same, in the year of man’s salvation 1499, has been brought
with favorable course even unto completion on the very festival
of its author.

In all these books editors could have had no difficulties to deal with save those which arise when texts are copied and recopied with the inevitable introduction of small errors at every stage, and perhaps some even more dangerous attempts to correct those already made. But in one class of printing, that of liturgical books, in which absolute accuracy of text and punctuation was of supreme importance, the need for careful supervision was really very great,—so much so, indeed, that the great bulk of liturgical printing was entrusted to firms who made a specialty of it. It is not surprising, therefore, to find some special insistence on the editorial virtues of a missal-printer; and the colophon to the Salzburg Missal printed by Georg Stuchs at Nuremberg in 1498 is interesting for its detailed account of the system of punctuation.

Missale et de tempore et de sanctis non modo secundum notulam
metropolitane ecclesie Salisburgensis ordinatum, verum
etiam haud exigua opera adhibita, tum in quottis foliorum
locandis, tum in remissionis discreto numero tam circa
quamlibet lectionem vel prophetalem vel apostolicam quam
circa quodlibet euangelium alio in loco plenarie locatum,
situando reuisum. Deinde autem per cola et comata distinctum.
Simplici puncto in collectis secretis complendis lectionibus
epistolis et euangeliis locato colum indicante, gemino
uero puncto coma significante: sed in introitu graduali
alleluia sequentiis offertoris et communione puncto simplici
locato mediam distinctionem que comatis appellatione venit
presentante, gemino autem puncto subdistinctionem que colum
nuncupatur signante. Demum uero in officina Georii [_sic_]
Stöchs ex Sulczpach, ciuis Nurnbergensis, expensa Ioannis
Ryman impressum. Idibus Augusti anni ab incarnatione Messye
nonagesimi octaui supra millesimum quadragintesimum: finit.

A missal both for the seasons and saints’ days, not only
arranged according to the order of the metropolitan church of
Salzburg, but also revised with no small pains, both in setting
down the numbers of the leaves and in assigning a distinctly
numbered reference for every lesson, whether taken from the
books of the Prophets or of the Apostles, and also for every
gospel placed elsewhere in its full form: Distinguished,
moreover, by colons and commas: in the Collects, Secrets,
Post Communions, Lessons, Epistles and Gospels, the placing
of a single point denoting a colon, a double point signifying
a comma; but in the Introit, Gradual, Alleluia, Sequences,
Offertory and Communion the placing of a single point
indicating the middle distinction which goes by the name of a
comma, the double point the subdistinction which is called a
colon. Now at last printed in the workshop of Georg Stuchs of
Sulzbach, citizen of Nuremberg, at the expense of Johann Ryman,
and completed on the 13th August of the year from the Messiah’s
incarnation 1498.

In a Roman missal printed by G. Arrivabenus & P. de Paganinis at Venice in 1484 the colophon alludes to the common practice of correcting the text of a printed missal by hand, sometimes to bring it up to date, but also for the elimination of the printer’s errors. In this case the printers make bold to say that their text is so correct that any one who tampers with it rashly is as likely to turn right into wrong as wrong into right.

Explicit missale secundum morem romane ecclesie, summa cum
diligentia et fideli studio purgatum ab his erroribus quibus
uel ignorantia uel incuria librariorum adductis communis
abusus inualuit. Quocirca quicunque legerit obsecratum uelim
ne adhibeat manum precipitem ad corrigendam uel potius
corrumpendam libri rectitudinem magno partam labore, sed
multiplicato sincero examine postmodum exequatur quicquid recta
ratio et spiritus veritatis ingesserit. Ad laudem omnipotentis
dei et sanctissime uirginis matris eius, totiusque curie
celestis. Impressum Venetiis arte et impensis Georgii de
Riuabenis Mantuani et Paganini de Paganinis Brixiani sociorum:
sub Inclyto duce Ioanne Mocenico, quinto kalendas octobris.
M.cccclxxxiiii. Amen.

Here ends the Missal according to the custom of the Roman
Church, with the utmost diligence and faithful study purged
from the errors with which, introduced by the ignorance
and carelessness of copyists, the common perversion became
established. Wherefore I would pray whoever reads it not to
lay hasty hands to the correction, or rather corruption, of
the accuracy of the book, which was obtained only by great
labor; but let him examine it again and again with a single
heart and thereafter carry out whatever right reason and the
spirit of truth suggest. To the praise of Almighty God and
of the most holy Virgin his Mother, and of all the court of
heaven. Printed at Venice by the skill and at the charges of
Georgio di Arrivabene of Mantua and Paganino dei Paganini of
Brescia, partners, under the renowned doge Giovanni Mocenigo,
27 September, 1484. Amen.

Somewhat in the same spirit as the boast of the Venetian missal-printers, we find Koberger declaring—let us hope, after consulting ecclesiastical authorities—that his edition of the Revelations of S. Bridget is so complete that if any one produces additional revelations they may be dismissed as spurious.

Finit diuinum volumen omnium celestium Reuelationum preelecte
sponse christi sancte Birgitte de regno Suetie. A religiosis
patribus originalis monasterii sanctarum Marie et Brigitte in
Watzstenis, prematuro studio et exquisita diligentia, in hos
suprascriptos numerum et ordinem accuratius comportatum. Et
si forte alique alie reuelationes, sicut repertum est, beate
Brigitte per errorem aut temerarie a quoque quomodolibet
ascribantur, preter has que in hoc presenti volumine aut in
vita seu legenda sancte Birgitte maiori continentur, tanquam
false et erronee decernentur.

Insuper iam alterato per Anthonium Koberger ciuem
Nurembergensem impresse finiunt. Anno domini M.ccccc. xxi.
mensis Septembris. Laus omnipotenti deo. Amen.

Here ends the divine volume of all the heavenly Revelations of
the preëlect spouse of Christ, Saint Bridget of the kingdom
of Sweden. The religious fathers of the original monastery of
Saints Mary and Bridget in Wadstena, by most mature study and
extraordinary diligence, have reduced them more accurately
to the above number and arrangement. And if haply, as has
been found the case, other revelations are through error or
carelessness by any one or in any manner ascribed to the
blessed Bridget besides those contained in this present volume
or in the larger Life or Legend of Saint Bridget, they shall be
treated as false and erroneous.

Printed now for the second time by Anton Koberger, citizen of
Nuremberg, and brought to an end on September 21st, A.D. 1500.
Praise be to Almighty God. Amen.

Of the views of the editors of classical texts we have already had some specimens in some of the early Venetian colophons. That of Filippo da Lavagna to his edition of the Epistolae Familiares of Cicero (Milan, 1472) is, however, of considerable interest, and tells us, moreover, the number of copies printed, besides conveying a stray hint to the students of the day that the production of further editions of the same excellence would depend on the liberality of their support.

Epistolarum Familiarium M. Tull. Cic. multa uolumina in
diuersis Italiae locis hac noua impressorum arte transcripta
sunt, que si ut plurima numero ita etiam studio satis correcta
essent nouo hoc labore non fuisset opus. Sed tanto errorum
numero confunduntur ut non modo littere pro litteris et pro
uerbis uerba perturbatissime inuoluta, uerum etiam epistole
in epistolas, libri in libros, sic inueniantur confusi, ne
tam doctorum diligentia ad communem utilitatem confecta quam
auarissimorum hominum cupiditate lucri gratia festinando
conuoluta contorta contaminataque manifeste uideantur. Que
cum audirem ex uiris cum doctissimis tum etiam prudentissimis
ego Philippus Lauagna, ciuis Mediolanensis, ut pro uirili
mea aliqua ex parte meis ciuibus prodessem, nactus exemplar
correctissimum, studio diligentissimo hominum doctrina
prestantium, trecenta uolumina exscribenda curaui, opera
adhibita ut singule pagine antea quam imprimerentur ab aliquo
doctorum perlecte essent et castigate: quem ego laborem nisi
profudisse uidebor pleraque in futurum accuratissime ut
transcribantur laborabo non minori publice quam mee utilitatis
ratione seruata.

Barbara cum Marci uerbis admixta legebas:
Hunc lege quod verum est hoc Ciceronis opus.

Virgo decus coeli Christi sanctissime mater
Laus tibi cum nato sit sine fine tuo.

M.cccc.lxxii. viii kal. Apriles.

Of the Familiar Letters of M. Tullius Cicero many volumes have
been copied in different places of Italy by this new art of the
printers, and if these, as they are many in number, were also
zealously and sufficiently corrected, there had been no need
for this new work. But they are confused by so many errors that
not only are letters and words substituted for one another in
a most disorderly tangle, but also whole epistles and books
are found so confused with others that the result plainly
appears not so much a compilation by the diligence of learned
men for the common profit, as some tangled and contorted mass
of corruptions produced by the greed of the avaricious by
hurrying for the sake of gain. This when, by the report of most
learned and also prudent men, I, Philip Lavagna, a citizen
of Milan, understood, in the hope of doing a man’s part in
benefiting in some respect my fellow-citizens, I obtained
by the most diligent zeal a very correct copy with the help
of distinguished scholars, and made it my business to have
300 volumes written out, attention being paid that each page,
before it was printed off, should be read over and corrected by
one of the doctors. And unless I shall find that I have wasted
this labor, I will make it my business that many other texts
for the future shall be most accurately copied, the interests
of the public being as carefully preserved as my own.

With Tully’s words once phrases rude were twined:
Here uncorrupted Cicero you shall find.

Glory of heaven, Christ’s mother, holiest maid,
Ever to thee, with him, all praise be paid.

25 March, 1472.

Even better than this, however, is the colophon to the Brescia Lucretius, in which we see the editor dismayed at first by the obvious defects of his copy, but resolving at length to print it on the ground that his inability to find any other was the best proof of its rarity.

Titi Lucretii Cari finis. Lucretii unicum meas in manus cum
pervenisset exemplar de eo imprimendo hesitaui: quod erat
difficile unico de exemplo quae librarii essent praeterita
negligentia illa corrigere. Verum ubi alterum perquisitum
exemplar adinuenire non potui, hac ipsa motus difficultate
unico etiam de exemplari volui librum quam maxime rarum
communem multis facere studiosis: siquidem facilius erit
pauca loca uel aliunde altero exemplari extricato uel suo
studio castigare et diligentia: quam integro carere uolumine.
Presertim cum a fabulis quae uacuas (ut inquit poeta) delectant
mentes remotus Lucretius noster de rerum natura questiones
tractet acutissimas tanto ingenii acumine tantoque lepore
uerborum ut omnes qui illum secuti poete sunt: eum ita suis in
descriptionibus imitentur, et Virgilius presertim, poetarum
princeps, ut ipsis cum uerbis tria interdum et amplius metra
suscipiant. Thoma Ferando auctore.

The end of Titus Lucretius Carus. When a single copy of
Lucretius came into my hands I hesitated as to printing it,
because it was difficult from a single copy to correct the
slips due to the carelessness of the copyist. But when by
diligent search I could find no second copy, moved by this
very difficulty I was minded even from a single copy to make
a book of the greatest rarity common to many scholars, since
it will be easier to correct a few places, either by a second
copy unearthed from another quarter or by one’s own study and
diligence, than to lack a whole volume. Especially since, far
removed from the fables which (as the poet says) delight empty
minds, our Lucretius handles the keenest questions concerning
the nature of things with so much intellectual acumen and
verbal elegance that all the poets who have followed him
imitate him so in their descriptions, more especially Virgil,
the prince of poets, that with his very words they sometimes
make three lines and more. Thomas Ferrandus.

The name of Lucretius seldom appears in any of the medieval catalogues, and the number of manuscripts of his “De Rerum Natura” now extant is so small that his first printer’s plea may well be received. Even in comparatively modern books, indeed, a satisfactory text was not always to be obtained for the asking. Chaucer has had no more devout lover than William Caxton, and yet when Caxton printed the “Canterbury Tales” he only succeeded in obtaining a manuscript of the worst class to work from, and when a friend offered him a better text for his second edition the improvement was very slight. In the same way we find the anonymous Florentine editor of two tracts of Domenico Cavalca (we cannot be wrong in assuming that the same editor worked on both) apologizing for the bad text from which he printed the first few pages of the “Frutti della Lingua,” and telling how in the case of the “Specchio di Croce” he had to collate a number of copies in order to replace them by a good printed edition.

(i) Frutti della Lingua.

Impresso in Firenze con somma diligentia emendato e correcto,
excepto alcuni fogli del principio di decto tractato: e
tale defecto non da nostra inaduertentia, ma da una copia
o uero exemplo tutto corropto e falsificato, impresso per
lo adrieto in firenze per un altro non diligente impressore
procedette. Onde noi cio conoscendo, inuestigando altra copia
emendatissima, secondo quella, quanto ledebole forze del nostro
ingegno ci hanno porto, habbiamo imposto emendato fine al
presente tractato.

Printed in Florence, emended and corrected with the greatest
diligence, except for some leaves of the beginning of the
said tract, and such defect not through our inadvertence, but
from a copy or example wholly corrupt and falsified, printed
heretofore in Florence by another printer by no means diligent.
Whence we, on learning this, sought out another copy of the
greatest correctness, according to which, to the best of the
poor powers of our mind, we have put a revised ending to the
present tract.

(ii) Specchio di Croce.

Impresso in Firenze con somma diligentia correcti: nella quale
correptione non poco habbiamo insudato & affatichatoci: concio
sia che di moltissime copie, o vero exempli di questa utile
operetta, parte scripti in penna e parte impressi, nessuno
nhabbiamo trouato correcto, ma tutti aequalmente incorrecti.
Onde noi (benche insufficienti) con quel poco sapere che la
natura ci ha porto, habbiamo transcorrendo di molti corropti
facto uno quasi correpto: Si che preghiamo li lectori di
questa operetta da noi impressa se in epsa alcuna scorreptione
troueranno, non ci debbino biasimare, se di quella non pocha
faticha che spesa ci habbiamo laudare non ci vorranno: Solo in
dio regna perfectione.

Printed in Florence, corrected with the utmost diligence: in
the which correction we have sweated and wearied ourselves
more than a little; whereas of very many copies or examples of
the said useful booklet, some written with pen, some printed,
we have found not one correct, but all equally incorrect.
Whence we (though ill equipped), with such little skill as
nature has given us, have by much revision made out of many
corrupt copies one which may be taken as correct. So that we
pray the readers of this booklet printed by us, if they shall
find any incorrectness in it, not to reproach us therefor, if
they will not praise us for the great trouble which we have
expended. Perfection reigns only in God.

No doubt the early printers and the editors whom they employed made the most of all these difficulties; yet they must have been real enough, so that, despite the affected language in which it is phrased, the colophon of Nicolas Kessler of Basel to his edition of the “Homeliarius Doctorum” may well command our sympathy.

Preclarum Omeliarum opus plurimorum sanctorum aliorumue
famosissimorum doctorum super euangeliis de tempore et sanctis,
quibusdam eorundem adiunctis sermonibus, Tam verborum ornatu
limatum, tamque sententiarum grauitate vbertateque sparsim
plantatum, in mercuriali Nicolai Kessler officina Basilee
impressum (Imperante illustrissimo Maximiliano rege Romanorum
inuictissimo). Non igitur in factorem liuoris tractus aculeo
theonino dente correctionis insanias, Sed potius beneficii
non ingratus ad exhibita donaria discretionis oculos
adhibeas columbinos. Anno incarnationis dominice millesimo
quadringentesimo nonagesimo octauo decimo Nonas Augusti. Finit
feliciter.

An excellent book of Homilies of many saints and other most
famous teachers on the Gospels of the Seasons and the Saints,
with certain of their sermons added, polished with verbal
ornament and with weighty and fruitful sayings scattered all
over it: printed in the mercurial workshop of Nicolas Kessler
at Basel (the most illustrious Maximilian the Unconquered, King
of the Romans, being Emperor). Do not therefore, impelled by
the sting of malice, rage against the compiler with the small
satirist’s fang of correction; but rather, not ungrateful for a
benefit, turn to the offerings before you the dovelike eyes of
discretion. In the year of the Lord’s incarnation 1498, on the
tenth of the Nones of August, happily finished.

It is to be feared that the pay of a fifteenth-century “corrector,” when he was paid at all, was far from princely. It is pleasant, therefore, to find that at least one printer, the veteran Ulrich Zell, was so genuinely grateful to a friendly priest who had helped him in seeing Harderwyck’s “Commentaries on Logic” through the press as to make most handsome acknowledgment in his colophon and in verses added to it.

Commentarii in quatuor libros noue logice processum burse
Laurentiane famosissimi Agrippinensis Colonie gymnasii
continentes per honorabilem virum artium magistrum necnon
sacre theologie licentiatum Gerardum Herdarwiccensem
actu in eodem regentem, ex diuersis et potissimum Magni
Alberti comentarius collecti, et per Udalricum Zell prope
Lyskirchen impressoria artis in sancta Coloniensi ciuitate
protomagistrum fabre characterizati. Anno virginalis partu
Millesimo quadragintesimo super nonagesimum quarto in profesto
Conuersionis euangelice tube Pauli Apostoli ad finem optatum
sunt perducti, de quo sit deo uni et trino laus honor et gloria
per infinita seculorum secula. Amen. Ex quo in hoc tomorum
stromateo opere non paruo adiumento mihi fuit honorabilis
dominus diue memorie Iacobus Amsfordensis, artium liberalium
et sacrarum litterarum professor dum vitam in humanis ageret
profundissimus, Ecclesie sancti Iohannis Baptiste pastor,
mihi ut frater amicissimus, decreui in calce horum titulum
sepulcralem, trito sermone epitaphium appellatum, quem
prestantissimus et generosus dominus Rodolphus Langius, vir
omnium litterarum laude cumulatissimus, ecclesie Monasteriensis
Canonicus, in eundem defunctum, precibus amicorum impulsus,
exornauit subjungere, ut dum hunc quos ab errore salutari
exhortatione reuocauerit legerint apud altissimum pro anima
eius vitificum sacrificium offerant.

The notes on the four books of the new logic containing the
process of the Laurentian bursary of the most famous school of
Cologne, by an honorable man, master of arts and licentiate
of sacred theology, Gerard of Harderwyck, president at that
function, brought together from divers notes and specially
from those of Albertus Magnus, and by Ulrich Zell, near
the Lyskirche, chief practiser of the printer’s art in the
holy city of Cologne, skilfully set in type, in the year of
the Virgin Birth 1494, on the eve of the Conversion of the
Gospel-trumpet, the Apostle Paul, have been brought to their
wished-for end, for which to God the One and Three let there
be praise, honor, and glory through infinite ages of ages.
Amen. And because in this laying down of volumes I received no
small help from an honorable master of sacred memory, Jakob of
Amsfort, while he lived among men a most profound professor
of liberal arts and sacred literature, minister of the church
of Saint John Baptist, and to me as a most friendly brother,
I determined to subjoin at the end of all this a sepulchral
inscription, commonly called an epitaph, which the most
excellent and well-born Dom. Rudolph Lange, a man of great
distinction in every kind of literature, canon of the monastic
church, urged by the prayers of friends, furnished in honor of
the dead, that while those whom by his wholesome exhortation he
recalled from error read this, they may offer before the Most
High the life-giving sacrifice for his soul.

And the Epitaph duly follows, though it need not be quoted here.

VII

REPETITIONS, THEFTS, AND ADAPTATIONS

In our opening chapter it was suggested that if all early books were provided with colophons the work of bibliographers would be much simplified. Some qualifying epithet ought, however, to have been inserted; for there are some colophons which, instead of simplifying the task of assigning to every book its place, printer, and date, greatly aggravate the bibliographer’s troubles. Of deliberately untruthful colophons I can, indeed, only think of a single fifteenth-century example—that in the “Incunabulum of Brescia hitherto ascribed to Florence,” which the late Mr. R. C. Christie tracked down so neatly in the fourth volume of the Bibliographical Society’s Transactions. This occurs in a copy of some of the works of Politian, and reads:

Impressum Florentiae: et accuratissime castigatum opera et
impensa Leonardi de Arigis de Gesoriaco Die decimo Augusti
M.I.D.

Printed at Florence and most accurately corrected by the work
and at the cost of Leonardo dei Arigi of Gesoriaco, on the
tenth day of August, 1499.

As a matter of fact, the book, as Mr. Christie showed (and Mr. Proctor accepted his conclusions), was printed with the types of Bernardinus Misinta of Brescia, and the colophon which looks so simple and straightforward deceived bibliographers for some four centuries. Even the increased study of types would by itself hardly have sufficed to detect the fraud, but the fact that it was alluded to, though without mention of the name of the book, in the petition of Aldus to the Venetian Senate (17th October, 1502) put Mr. Christie on the track, and he ran it down with his accustomed neatness and precision. The fraud, of course, was the direct outcome of the first imperfect attempts to give the producers of books a reasonable copyright in them by means of privileges. As Brescia was subject to the Venetian Senate, Misinta, had he put his name in the colophon, could have been punished, and he therefore used a false imprint in order to divert suspicion. When restrictions, right and wrong, multiplied during the sixteenth century, false imprints became increasingly common, and they form a subject by themselves with which we must not here meddle farther. While Misinta’s “Politian” stands by itself, as far as I know, in deliberately trying to mislead purchasers as to its place of imprint, there are quite a considerable number of early books which reprint the colophons of previous editions, and thus tempt the unwary to mistake them for the originals which they copied. Since the decision in the case of Parry _v._ Moring and another, English publishers and those they employ are likely to be much more careful; but in the years immediately preceding it the carelessness with which one “editor” used the text of his predecessor to print from was often extraordinary, one reprint even including a number of duly initialled and copyright notes from another which had appeared only a year or two earlier. If this could be done in our own day, despite the existence of reviewers and the law courts, we may easily imagine that the smaller printers and publishers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, who could not afford to keep their own scholarly “corrector,” simply handed over existing texts to their workmen and printed them as they stood. In most cases, of course, they had the sense to stop when they came to the colophon; but they did not always do so, and, more especially, when the colophon was in verse an unlearned compositor might easily imagine that it formed an essential part of the book. Thus twelve Latin couplets from the Milan edition of the “Confessionale,” of Bartholomaeus de Chaimis, though they end with the clear statement that Christopher Valdarfer of Ratisbon came to the help of the Milanese and printed this book (October, 1474), were reprinted as they stood in several anonymous Strasburg editions, while Creusner at Nuremberg and Schoeffer at Mainz compromised by leaving out the last six lines, which contain Valdarfer’s name.

Occasionally this careless reprinting leads to a book possessing a double colophon, as in the 1478 Naples edition of the “De Officiis” and other works of Cicero, which uses for his “Letters to Atticus” Jenson’s text of 1470. The colophon begins exactly (save for differences in contractions, punctuation, etc.) as in the Jenson edition already quoted (Chapter III):

M. T. C. epistolae ad Atticum Brutum et Q. Fratrem cum ipsius
Attici uita foeliciter expliciunt. M.cccc.lxx

Attice, nunc totus Veneta diffunderis urbe,
Cum quondam fuerit copia rara tui.
Gallicus hoc Ienson Nicolaus muneris orbi
Attulit ingenio Daedalicaque manu.
Christophorus Mauro plenus bonitate fideque
Dux erat. Auctorem, lector, opusque tenes.

and then proceeds:

Principis Latine eloquentie M. T. C. liber quinque operum
intitulatus finit foeliciter. Impressus Neapoli sub pacifico
Ferdinando Sicilie rege anno salutis M.cccc.lxxviii. sedente
Xisto quarto Pontifice maximo.

The book of the five works of the prince of Latin eloquence,
Marcus Tullius Cicero, comes happily to an end. Printed at
Naples under Ferdinand the Peaceful, King of Sicily, in the
year of salvation 1478, Sixtus IV being Pope.

Such an instance as this shows clearly enough that colophons could be copied verbatim without any intention to make the purchaser believe that he was purchasing the original edition, though it must be owned that many printers took no pains to inform him that he was _not_ purchasing it. It is thus a matter of opinion as to whether they deserve the severest condemnation, or whether this should not rather be reserved for the pirates—for such they really were—who seized another printer’s book, colophon and all, merely substituting their own name for his, and thus claiming in some cases all the credit for the preparation of an original edition.

A striking instance of piracy of this kind, with a curious after-story to it, is that of Conrad of Westphalia’s appropriation of Veldener’s edition of Maneken’s “Epistolarum Formulae,” and of the colophon attached to it. Though a wordy and dull composition, this colophon is certainly distinctive enough:

Si te forsan, amice dilecte, nouisse iuuabit quis huius
voluminis Impressorie artis productor fuerit atque magister,
Accipito huic artifici nomen esse magistro Iohanni Veldener,
cui quam certa manu insculpendi, celandi, intorculandi,
caracterandi [_sic_] assit industria: adde et figurandi
et effigiandi et si quid in arte secreti est quod tectius
oculitur: quamque etiam fidorum comitum perspicax diligentia,
ut omnium litterarum imagines splendeant ad gratiam ac etiam
cohesione congrua gratiaque congerie mendis castigatis
compendeant, tanta quidem concinnitate quod partes inter se et
suo congruant universo, ut quoque delectu materie splendoreque
forme lucida queque promineant, quo pictionis et connexionis
pulchre politure clarique nitoris ecrescat multa uenustas, sunt
oculi iudices. Idnam satis facies huius libelli demonstrat,
quem multiplicatum magni numeri globo sub placidis atramenti
lituris spreto calamo inchoauit, anni septuagesimi sexti
aprilis primus perfecitque dies ultimus! Quem artis memorate
magistrum si tibi hoc predicto aprili mense cure fuisset
querere, facile poteras eundem Louanii impressioni uacantem
in monte Calci inuenire. Hoc ideo dixisse uelim ne eius rei
inscius permanseris, si forsitan ambegeris. Ubi ars illi sua
census erit Ouidius inquit. Ubi et etiam uiuit sua sic sorte
et arte contentus, tam felicibus astris, tantaque fortune
clementia, ut non inducar credere quod eidem adhuc adesse
possit abeundi, ne cogitandi quidem, animi impulsio: id etiam
adiecerim quo tam quid poteris quam quid potuisses agnoscas.
Vale.

Dear friend, if perchance you would fain know who was the
producer and master of this volume of the printing art, learn
that the craftsman’s name is Master Jan Veldener. Your eyes
will tell you what industry he possesses, how sure his hand
in cutting, engraving, pressing and stamping, add also in
designing and fashioning and whatever secret in the art is more
closely hid; how keen-eyed, again, is the diligence of his
trusty comrades, so that the shapes of all the letters are
pleasantly clear and harmonious, hanging together, with all
faults corrected, in a delightful mass, and with such skilful
arrangement that the parts are in agreement both with each
other and with their whole, so that both by choice of material
and splendor of form everything is strikingly distinct, while
by his method of inking and joining the letters there is a
great increase in the charm of beautiful polish and shining
clearness. All this the appearance of the book sufficiently
shows, and the multiplying of this in a mass of great number
by the gentle spreading of ink, leaving the pen despised, the
first day of April, 1476, began, and the last completed. Should
you have been anxious to find this master of the commemorated
art in this aforesaid month of April, you could easily have
found him at Louvain, with leisure for printing, on Flint-hill.
This I am anxious to say lest, if haply you are in doubt, you
should remain ignorant of the fact. “Where he works there will
be his wealth,” says Ovid. There also he lives so content with
his lot and craft, under such happy auspices, and with so much
favor of fortune, that I cannot be induced to believe that any
impulse to depart, or even to think about it, can have come
to him. I would also add that by which you may recognize what
you will be able to do as well as what you could have done.
Farewell.

As Veldener’s device is here added, the meaning of the last cryptic sentence appears to be either that authors with books to print who had not found his shop in April might find it by its sign in May, or that readers would be able to recognize the printer’s handiwork in the future books they would have a chance of purchasing, as well as in those already sold out. What Conrad of Westphalia made of it is doubtful, since, without affixing his own mark, he cribbed this sentence with all the rest of the colophon, only substituting his own name and address (“in platea Sancti Quintini”—“in St. Quentin’s Street”) for Veldener’s, altering the date of the inception of the book from April to December, and saying nothing as to when it was completed. A more disgraceful trick for one printer to play another living in the same town can hardly be imagined, and Holtrop may be right in considering it a deliberate attempt to annoy Veldener and the cause of his leaving Louvain the next year. Strange to say, however, the history of the colophon does not stop here. M. Claudin has shown, in the first volume of his “Histoire de l’imprimerie en France,” that a copy of Maneken’s “Formulae” exists printed in the types of Guillaume Balsarin of Lyons, but with the name of the Paris printer Caesaris substituted for that of Veldener in the colophon. It is clear, therefore, that in an edition now lost to us Caesaris must have played Veldener the same trick as Conrad of Westphalia had already played him, and that this Paris edition must have been reprinted by Balsarin at Lyons without troubling to alter the colophon. Truly there are pitfalls for the unwary in dealing with early books!

Perhaps one reason why colophons were sometimes reprinted as they stood was that a printer without a scholarly “corrector” to aid him had a wholesome dread of plunging into the middle of a Latin sentence. Those who rushed in hastily sometimes left very obvious footprints in the wrong places. Thus Ulrich Han, in printing from one of Schoeffer’s editions of the “Liber sextus decretalium,” changed his well-known “Alma in urbe Maguntina inclyte nacionis germanice quam dei clemencia tam alti ingenii lumine donoque gratuito ceteris terrarum nacionibus preferre illustrareque dignatus est” (see Chapter II), into “Alma in urbe Roma Totius mundi regina et dignissima Imperatrix [_sic_] que sicut pre ceteris urbibus dignitate preest ita ingeniosis uiris est referta.”

To call Rome “the Queen and most worthy Empress of all the world, which, as it takes precedence of all other cities in dignity, so is it filled with men of wit,” was quite a pleasing variation on Schoeffer’s tune. Unluckily Han did not note that his Queen and Empress ought to be in the ablative, and thus printed “Imperatrix” instead of “Imperatrice.” So again, when we look at the colophon to the third and fourth parts of the “Speculum” of Durandus printed at Venice in 1488, we find reason for suspicion:

Explicit tertia et quarta pars Speculi Guilhelmi Duranti
cum additionibus Ioannis Andree et Baldi suis in locis
ubique positis. Impressa Venetiis per Magistrum Paganinum de
Paganinis Brixiensis, ac Georgium de Arriuabene de Caneto qui
salua omnium pace est inter ceteros amandus ac uenerandus
propter ipsius in hac arte curam in corrigendis operibus ac
in imprimendo charactere. Anno domini M.cccc.lxxxviii. vi die
Septembris.

Here ends the third and fourth part of the Speculum of
Gulielmus Durandus, with the additions of Joannes Andreae and
Baldus inserted everywhere in their proper places. Printed
at Venice by Master Paganinus de Paganinis of Brescia, and
Georgius de Arrivabene de Caneto, who, with due respect to
every one, is, among all others, to be loved and revered for
his care in this art both in correcting works and in printing
them in type. In the year of our Lord 1488, on September 6th.

The slip of “Brixiensis” for “Brixiensem” is not reproducible in English, but the reader who notes how the two partners are treated as singular instead of plural will easily see that this colophon could not have been written for them. It appears, indeed, to have been borrowed from Bernardinus de Tridino.

Sometimes the inaccuracies introduced are not of a merely verbal kind. Thus at the end of an edition of the “Fasciculus Temporum” printed by Heinrich Wirzburg at the Cluniac monastery at Rougemont in 1481 we have the following colophon:

Chronica que dicitur fasciculus temporum edita in alma
Universitate Colonie Agrippinae super Renum, a quodam deuoto
Cartusiensi finit feliciter. Sepius quidem iam impressa sed
negligentia Correctorum in diuersis locis a uero originali
minus iuste emendata. Nunc uero non sine magno labore ad
pristinum statum reducta cum quibusdam additionibus per humilem
uirum fratrem Heinricum Wirczburg de Vach, monachum in prioratu
Rubei Montis, ordinis cluniacensis, sub Lodouico Gruerie comite
magnifico anno domini M.cccc.lxxxi. Et anno precedenti fuerunt
aquarum inundationes maxime, ventusque [_sic_] horribiles multa
edificia subuertentes.

The Chronicle which is called Fasciculus Temporum, set forth
in the bountiful University of Cologne on the Rhine by a
certain devout Carthusian, ends happily. Often enough has it
been printed already, but by the carelessness of correctors
in various places it has not been amended as justly as it
ought from the true original. Now, however, not without great
labor, it has been restored to its pristine state, with certain
additions, by a humble brother, Heinrich Wirzburg of Vach, a
monk in the priory of Rougemont, of the Cluniac order, under
Count Lodovico Gruerie the Magnificent, in the year of the Lord
1481. And in the preceding year there were the greatest floods
and horrible winds, overthrowing many buildings.

Save that he substituted the address, “by the humble Bernhard Richel, citizen of Basel, in the year of the Lord 1482, on February 20,” this colophon was taken over in its entirety the following year by Richel. To us, until we compare it with the Rougemont version, there may seem no reason for suspicion. But if any one in those days remembered that the year of the great floods was 1480, and not 1481, his doubts may easily have been awakened. A Genevese printer was much more wise, for, while he doubtless kept the Rougemont colophon in his mind, he adapted its local coloring very skilfully, informing us that the book was:

Imprime a Genesue lan mille cccc.xcv auquel an fist si tres
grand vent le ix iour de ianuier qu’il fit remonter le Rosne
dedans le lac bien ung quart de lieue au-dedans de Geneue.

Printed at Geneva the year 1495, in which year there was so
great wind on January 9th that it made the Rhone mount back
into the lake a full quarter of a league above Geneva.

Even when a colophon was in verse it was not safe from emendation, for when Giovanni da Reno of Vicenza in 1478 reprinted the Valdarfer Boccaccio we find him substituting for the line and a half, “Christofal Valdarfer Indi minprese Che naque in Ratispona,” the variant, “Giovanne da Reno quindi minprese Cum mirabile stampa.”

For other instances of more than one printer following the same leader we may note how Koberger in 1496, and Pierre Levet in 1497, both adopt the colophon[11] of the 1485 Cologne edition of the “Destructorium Vitiorum,” with its curious phrase “ad laudem summe Monadis”; how Han in his editions of the Clementine Constitutions in 1473 and 1476, and Wenssler in those of 1476 and 1478, copy the colophon of Schoeffer’s editions, substituting the praises of Rome and Basel for those of Mainz; and how in editions of the Gregorian Decretals Paganinus de Paganinis in 1489, and Johann Hamann de Landoia in 1491, adopted the favorite tag of Jenson and John of Cologne:

Qui non tantum summam curam adhibuere ut sint hec et sua queque
sine uicio et menda, uerum etiam ut bene sint elaborata atque
iucundissimo litterarum caractere confecta: ut unicuique et
prodesse et oblectare possint.

Who not only have taken the greatest pains that these and all
their works may be free from fault and blot, but also that they
may be well finished off and composed with the most pleasing
type, so that they may at once profit and delight every one.

Not to be able to boast with originality is sad indeed, but to the students of early types and of the manners of the men who used them these traces of borrowing may at any point of an investigation prove useful. A printer who borrowed the wording of a colophon probably borrowed something else as well. In most cases this was the text, with which students of early printing seldom concern themselves as much as they should, but sometimes also typographical peculiarities which may be worth some attention.

VIII

DATES IN COLOPHONS

Dates form such an important feature in colophons that this essay cannot be brought to a close without some attempt to explain the difficulties which arise in connection with them. As regards the method of expressing the year there is very little to say. Theodoric Rood (see page 61) preferred to speak of 1485 as the 297th Olympiad from the birth of Christ, being under the impression that Olympiads consisted of five years instead of four. Other printers showed great ingenuity in finding elaborate synonyms for what we are now content to express in the two words “Anno Domini,” and among other phrases employed “Olympiades Dominicae” (see page 79), but without any attempt to introduce the intervals between the Olympic Games into the Christian reckoning.

As an additional method of dating we occasionally find a reference to the year of the indiction, a method of dating by cycles of fifteen years, instituted by the Emperor Constantine in 312. To find the indictional year, 312 must be subtracted from the year of the Lord (the same results will be obtained by adding 3), and then after dividing by 15, the remainder will give the number of the year in the indiction. Thus (1488-312)/15 or (1488+3)/15 in each case leaves a remainder of six, and A.D. 1488 was thus the sixth indiction.

According to different methods of reckoning, indictions began in September or October, at Christmas or on January 1st. In colophons, I believe, they are always used in conjunction with years of the Lord reckoned from January 1st, and they have only the effect of a chronological flourish.