Collections by Individuals.
—Among the laity (outside, at least, of Italy) it was particularly the kings who from time to time interested themselves in collecting books. Pepin received from Pope Paul I., at his own urgent request, a collection of books which included certain Greek manuscripts. The latter could, however, hardly have been of any particular service either to the King or to any members of his Court.[249]
The collection formed by Charlemagne has already been referred to, and also the provision of his will, under which, after his death, the books were to be sold and the proceeds given to the poor. Charles the Bald, with whose name it is not easy to associate intellectual activity, appears to have been a great collector of books. After his death his library was, under his directions, divided between St. Denis, Compiègne, and his son.[250] It is recorded of William the Great of Aquitaine, who died in 1030, and who was the father of the Empress Agnes, that “he had many books and read zealously therein.”[251] Count Baldwin of Guines, who died in 1205, brought together a collection of books which he had translated into the Romance tongue. Louis IX. of France was interested in the idea of bringing together a collection of devout books, and, although he did not live to carry out his plan, the manuscripts which were left by him served for the scholar Vincennes of Beauvais in the preparation of his great encyclopedia.
Louis heard, during his crusade, of some sultan who had caused to be prepared transcripts of all the noted works of philosophy. This example incited the zeal of Louis, who gave directions that all the “authentic, useful, and devout books” which were to be found within his realm were to be transcribed, and the transcripts placed in the Royal Library. The collection was, however, not allowed to remain complete, as in his will Louis directed that the books should be divided between the preacher monks and the Minorites of Paris, the Abbey Royaumont, and the Dominican monks of Compiègne.[252]
John, Duke of Berry, son of the Good King John, and brother of King Charles V., found opportunity, even during the troublous times which culminated with the battle of Poitiers and the imprisonment of his father, to bring together a noteworthy collection of books. It was this collection that made the beginning of the library of the Louvre, instituted by Charles V., a library for which Gilles Mallet prepared in 1373 a very complete catalogue. Barrois published in 1830, in Paris, a work devoted entirely to a description of the books collected by Prince John and his brother Charles.
David Aubert, whose translation of the History of the Emperors was published[253] in 1457, makes, in the preface to this history, special mention of the literary tastes of Philip, Duke of Burgundy. He says that Philip made a daily practice of having read to him ancient histories and that he kept employed a great number of skilled translators, learned historians, and capable scribes who were busied in adding to his great library. This collection of Philip appears later to have been scattered as there is no record of its preservation.
The Duke of Bedford found time, between his frequent campaigns, to interest himself in the collection of manuscripts, and more particularly of works which were beautifully illuminated. He purchased, for 1200 francs, a portion of the library of Charles V., which had been captured, and, these books being taken to Oxford, finally found place in the Bodleian collection.
Philip of Cleves, who died in 1528 and who was connected with the Burgundy House, shared the passion of his relatives for magnificent manuscripts.
An inventory of Margaret, Duchess of Brittany, contains the descriptive titles of eleven books of devotion and four romances, “all bound in satin.”[254]
The name of Anne of Brittany, the wife of King Charles VIII., and later of Louis XII., has long been famous in connection with her fondness for books of devotion and with the great collection which she succeeded in making of these. An inventory of 1498 gives the titles of 1140 books as belonging to Anne’s collection.[255]
In Italy, it was not until the time of Petrarch that there came to be any general interest in the collection of books. This interest was naturally associated with the great Humanistic movement of which it may be considered as partly the cause and partly the effect. The development of literary interests in Italy during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries will be considered in the chapter on the Renaissance.
In Germany, the collections outside of the monasteries appear to have been less important than in Burgundy and in France, the difference being probably in part due to the narrower cultivation of the German noblemen, and probably also in part to their smaller resources. In fact, the more important collections do not appear to have been in the possession of the nobility at all, but to have come into existence through the public spirit of citizens of lower degree. The library of two hundred volumes brought together as early as 1260 by Hugo Trimberg, a schoolmaster of St. Gangolf, has already been referred to.
Duke Ludwig of Brieg is described as having had as early as 1360 a considerable collection of books, and as having had written, in 1353, by some scribe whose name has not been preserved, the Hedwig legends.
The Electors of the Palatinate interested themselves in the formation of libraries, having possibly been influenced to some extent by their relations with their neighbours on the other side of the Rhine. Authors such as Matthias of Kemnat and Michel Behaim worked at the instance of the Electors and under pay from them. The books of Kemnat and Behaim were either originally written in German, or were promptly translated into German for the use of the Electors and of their wives. A number of books in this series are also ornamented with pictures, but, according to the descriptions, the art work in these illustrations was much inferior to that done at the same time in Burgundy.
The most important group of the Heidelberg manuscripts was collected by Ludwig III., who died in 1437.[256] His daughter Mechthild, whose first husband was the Count Ludwig of Wurtemberg, and whose second, the Archduke Albrich, retained in her widowhood in her castle at Rotenburg a collection of ninety-four volumes of the mediæval poets, whose works were written in the vernacular.[257] Ulbrich of Rappoldstein kept two scribes engaged for five years in transcribing the Parsival, and the cost of the work amounted to £200.
It is apparent from the preceding sketch that the development of literature and the circulation of books during the Middle Ages were considerable, notwithstanding the serious difficulties there were to contend with during the ten centuries between the fall of the Roman Empire of the West and the time of the invention of printing.
Under the “Peace of the World” secured by the imperial rule, there had come to be an active literary production and a development of literary interests throughout the community which called for a wide distribution and a general use of books. There was available for the use of publishers a great list of accepted classics, Greek and Latin, and there were also various epochs during which there came into existence works by contemporary writers of distinctive importance, many of which have been preserved as classics for future generations.
The publishers of this period had a convenient and inexpensive material to use for the making of books, and they had available for book production the labour of skilled and inexpensive scribes,—chiefly slaves. The well established means of communication throughout the Empire enabled the publishers of Rome and Massilia and other literary centres to keep open connections with cities in the farthest districts of the realm, and there is adequate evidence of a well organised trade in the distribution of books over almost the entire civilised world, a trade which continued active until the latter part of the fourth century.
With the fall of the Empire of the West and with the destruction of so much of the civilised organisation and machinery which had been dependent upon Roman rule, the book trade, or, at least, the trade outside of Italy, practically disappeared. There remained, however, with certain classes a knowledge of the classics and an interest in their preservation, and there remained also in the monasteries the knowledge and practice of writing and the collections of the works of the early Church Fathers, the multiplication of which, for the use of the increasing number of priests, called for continued labour on the part of the clerical scribes.
When the work of writing came to be instituted, particularly in the Benedictine Order, as a part of the regular routine of the life of a properly ordered monastery, and when such work came to be accepted as a part of the daily or weekly services rendered by the monks, the preservation of the art of writing and the preservation of the manuscripts, the existence of which depended upon this continued knowledge, were assured.
For centuries after 476, such literary vitality as there was depended practically upon these Benedictine monasteries. After the tenth century, we find a wider literary interest throughout the community, and in certain Courts and circles of nobility, literature began to be accepted as fashionable, and an interest in literature to be accepted as part of the proper outfit of a gentleman.
The second stage, therefore, in the development of the interest in books which secured the multiplication of enough copies of many of the older books to prevent them from passing out of existence, was in the formation of the collections by princes and nobles, collections which were, as we have noted, usually under the charge of clerical scribes.
The third and more important stage of development came with the recognition, on the part of the newly founded universities of Bologna, Paris, Prague, Heidelberg, and Oxford, of the fact that the work of higher education required the use of collections of books for the reference of instructors and for the direct use of the students. With the instituting in the universities of a class of scribes (stationarii, librarii) recognised as university officials, a recognition which carried with it certain privileges and protection, and which went far to offset the hampering restrictions of university and ecclesiastical supervision, the book production of Europe took a more assured form.
The fourth step in the extension of literary interests was taken by the towns-people, partly at the instance of priests who were themselves sprung from the people, and partly under the influence of students returning from university work to their native towns; and collections of books were made for the use of the towns-people, while libraries, originally planned only for the work of the monasteries and for the use of clerics, were thrown open to students generally. There appear to have been in the manuscript period and in the earlier ages of printing a larger number of such town libraries and a larger extent of literary interest among the citizen class in Germany than in either France or England.
In Italy, the development of literary interests and of literary production worked from an early date much more outside of church organisations than was the case either in Germany or in France.
In such centres of literary activity as Florence, Milan, Padua, Rome, and later, Venice, the production of the classics and the multiplying of the books of the Italian writers themselves was carried on at the instance and to a large extent with the money of the wealthier citizens, citizens who in many cases held no official positions whatever. The intellectual life of Italy was, however, from an early date, very largely influenced by the thought and the learning that came to it from the Greeks of Constantinople, an influence which was increasing in importance for a quarter of a century before the fall of the Greek Empire, and which, after 1453, was naturally still more extended and emphasised by the large immigration of Greek scholars flying from Turkish rule and bringing with them the literary treasures of the East. It was this invasion of Greek thought and the restoration of the knowledge of the poetry and philosophy of classic Greece, which gave the immediate impetus to the great intellectual movement known as the Renaissance.
As the Renaissance movement took hold of the imagination of Italian scholars, it found ready for its use the new invention of printing, and through the presses of Aldus and his associates, the thought of the Old World, reshaped with the knowledge of the fifteenth century, gave a fresh inspiration to the intellectual life of Europe.
In Germany, where the Renaissance movement also influenced the intellectual life of the time, a more important impetus to the intellectual activity came with the work of the Reformation. The printing-press made the teachings of Luther and his associates available for the widest popular distribution, and the towns-people and villagers who bought from the book peddlers the tracts containing the vigorous statements of the Reformers, and who bought also the answering arguments of the defenders of the Roman Church, were not merely wrestling with a religious or theological issue, but were furthering the general education of the community and were helping to lay the foundation of the book trade of the future. From the earliest date of the printing-press, it was the case that there was in Germany a larger distribution of books, printed in the vernacular, among what one may call (for purposes of classification) the lower orders of the community, than was the case in either Italy, France, or Germany. The development of the relation between literature and the community, which came after the establishment of the new art of printing, belongs, however, to a later chapter.
