CHAPTER VI
PROVINCIAL PRESSES OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY[8]
n the first half of the sixteenth century, before the incorporation of the Stationers' Company and the subsequent restriction of printing to London and the Universities, there were ten places in England where the art was carried on. Taking them chronologically, the earliest was the city of York. Mr. Davies, in his Memoirs of the York Press, claims that Frederick Freez, a book-printer, was at work there in 1497; but Mr. Allnutt has clearly shown that there is no evidence in support of this, no specimen of his printing being in existence. The first printer in the city of York who can be traced with certainty was Hugo Goez, said to have been the son of Matthias van der Goez, an Antwerp printer. Two school-books, a Donatus Minor and an Accidence, as well as the Directorium Sacerdotum, dated in the colophon February 18th, 1509, were printed by him, and it is believed that he was for a time in partnership in London with a bookseller named Henry Watson (E. G. Duff, Early Printed Books). Ames, in his Typographical Antiquities, mentions a broadside 'containing a wooden cut of a man on horseback with a spear in his right hand, and a shield of the arms of France in his left. "Emprynted at Beverley in the Hyegate by me Hewe Goes," with his mark, or rebus, of a great H and a goose.' But this cannot now be traced.
Another printer in York, of whom it is possible to speak with certainty, was Ursyn Milner, who printed a Festum visitationis Beate Marie Virginis, without date, and a Latin syntax by Robert Whitinton, entitled Editio de concinnitate grammatices et constructione noviter impressa, with the date December 20th, 1516, and a woodcut that had belonged to Wynkyn de Worde.
The second Oxford press began about 1517. In that year there appeared, Tractatus expositorius super libros posteriorum Aristotelis, by Walter Burley, bearing the date December 4th, 1517, without printer's name, but ascribed from the appearance of the types to the press of John Scolar, whose name is found in some of the similar tracts that appeared the following year. These included Questiones moralissime super libros ethicorum, by John Dedicus, dated May 15, 1518. On June 5th was issued Compendium questionum de luce et lumine, on June 7th Walter Burley's Tractatus perbrevis de materia et forma, on June 27th Whitinton's De Heteroclitis nominibus. The latest book, dated 5th February 1519, Compotus manualis ad usum Oxoniensium, bore the name of Charles Kyrfoth, but nothing further is known of any such printer.
No more is heard of a press at Oxford until nearly the close of the sixteenth century, a gap of nearly seventy years, and a strange and unaccountable interval. At any rate, the next Oxford printed book, so far as is at present known, was John Case's Speculum Moralium quaestionum in universam ethicen Aristotelis, with the colophon, 'Oxoniæ ex officina typographica Josephi Barnesii Celeberrimae Academiae Oxoniensis Typographi. Anno 1585.'
Joseph Barnes, the printer, had been admitted a bookseller in 1573, and on August 15th, 1584, the University lent him £100 with which to start a press. During the time that he remained printer to the University, his press was actively employed, no less than three hundred books, many of them in Greek and Latin, being traced to it. In 1595 appeared the first Welsh book printed at the University, a translation into Welsh by Hugh Lewis of O. Wermueller's Spiritual and Most Precious Pearl, and in 1596 two founts of Hebrew letter were used by Barnes, but the stock of this letter was small.
In 1528, John Scolar, no doubt the same with the Oxford printer, is found at Abingdon, where he printed a Breviary for the use of the abbey there; only one copy has survived, and is now at Emmanuel College, Cambridge.
Fig. 25.—Device of Joseph Barnes.
The first Cambridge printer was John Siberch, whose history, like that of so many other early printers, is totally unknown. Nine specimens of his printing during the years 1521-22 are extant. The first is the Oratio of Henry Bullock, a tract of eight quarto leaves, with a dedication dated February 13, 1521, and the date of the imprint February 1521, so that it probably appeared between the 13th and 28th of that month. The type used was a new fount of Roman. The book had no ornamentation of any kind, neither device nor initial letters. A facsimile of this book, with an introduction and bibliographical study of Siberch's productions, was issued by the late Henry Bradshaw in 1886. The title-page of the second book, Cuiusdam fidelis Christiani epistola ad Christianos omnes, by Augustine, shows the title between two upright woodcuts, each containing scenes from the Last Judgment. The third book, an edition of Lucian, has a very ugly architectural border. The fifth book from Siberch's press, the Libellus de Conscribendis epistolis, autore D. Erasmo, printed between the 22nd and 31st of October 1521, contains the privilege which, it is believed, he obtained from Bishop Fisher.
In the far west of England a press was established in the monastery of Tavistock, in Devon, of which two curious examples are preserved. The first is The Boke of Comfort, called in laten Boetius de Consolatione philosophie. Translated into English tonge ... Enprented in the exempt monastery of Tauestock in Den̅shyre, By me Dan Thomas Rycharde, monke of the sayde monastery, To the instant desyre of the ryght worshypful esquyer Mayster Robert Langdon. Anno d.' M.Dxxv., 4to. The Bodleian Library at Oxford has two imperfect copies of this book, and a third, also imperfect, is in the library of Exeter College, Oxford. The latter college is also fortunate in possessing the only known copy of the second book, which has this title:—
Here foloweth the confirmation of the Charter perteynynge to all the tynners wythyn the Coūty of devonshyre, with there Statutes also made at Crockeryntorre.
Imprented at Tavystoke ye xx day of August the yere of the reygne off our souerayne Lord Kyng Henry ye viii the xxvi yere, i.e. 1534.
To this same year, 1534, belongs the first dated book of John Herford, the St. Albans printer. It seems probable that he was established there some years earlier, but this is the first certain date we have. In that year appeared a small quarto, with the title, Here begynnethe ye glorious lyfe and passion of Seint Albon prothomartyr of Englande, and also the lyfe and passion of Saint Amphabel, whiche conuerted saint Albon to the fayth of Christe, of which John Lydgate was the author. It was printed at the request of Robert Catton, abbot of the monastery, and it would seem as if Herford's press was situated within the abbey precincts. The next book, The confutacyon of the first parte of Frythes boke ... put forth by John Gwynneth clerk, 1536, 8vo, was the work of one of the monks of the abbey, who in the previous year had signed a petition to Sir Francis Brian on the state of the monastery (Letters and Papers, Henry VIII., vol. ix. p. 394). Another of the signatories to that petition was Richard Stevenage, who was at that time chamberer of the abbey, and was created abbot on the deprivation of Robert Catton in 1538. Of the three books which Herford printed in that year, two were expressly printed for Richard Stevenage. These were A Godly disputation betweene Justus and Peccator and Senex and Juvenis, and An Epistle agaynste the enemies of poore people, both octavos, of which no copies are now known. In some of Herford's books is a curious device with the letters R. S. intertwined on it, which undoubtedly stand for Richard Stevenage. His reign as abbot was a short one, for on 5th December 1539 he delivered the abbey over to Henry VIII's commissioners. Just before that event, on the 12th October, he wrote a letter to Cromwell in which the following passage occurs:—
'Sent John Pryntare to London with Harry Pepwell, Bonere and Tabbe, of Powlles churchyard stationers, to order him at your pleasure. Never heard of the little book of detestable heresies till the stationers showed it me.'—(Letters and Papers, Hen. VIII., Vol. xiv., Pt. 2, No. 315.)
The 'John Pryntare' can be none other than John Herford. 'Bonere' was a misreading for Bonham, and these three, Pepwell, Tab, and Bonham, all of them printers or booksellers in St. Paul's Churchyard, were evidently sent down especially to inquire into the matter.
We next hear of John Herford as in London in 1542, but meanwhile a modification of Stevenage's device was used by a London printer named Bourman. From the Letters and Papers of Henry VIII., vol. xv. pp. 115, etc., it appears that after his retirement from the abbey, Richard Stevenage went by the name of Boreman. He is invariably spoken of as 'Stevenage alias Boreman,' so that the Nicholas Bourman, the London printer, was perhaps a relative.
The Rev. S. Sayers in his Memoirs of Bristol, 1823, vol. ii. p. 228, states, on the authority of documents in the city archives, that a press was at work in the castle in the year 1546. Of this press, if it ever existed, not so much as a leaf remains.
In 1547 Anthony Scoloker was established as a printer at Ipswich. In that year he printed The just reckenyng or accompt of the whole nomber of yeares, from the beginnynge of the world, vnto this present yeare of 1547. Translated out of Germaine tonge by Anthony Scoloker the 6 daye of July 1547. He was chiefly concerned with the movements of the Reformation, and his publications were mostly small octavos, the writings of Luther, Zwingli, and Ochino, printed in type of a German character and of no great merit. In 1548 he moved to London, where for a time he was in partnership with William Seres. The adjoining cut, the earliest English representation of a printing press, is taken from the Ordinarye of Christians, printed by Scoloker after he had settled in London.
Fig. 26.—From the Ordinarye of Christians, c. 1550.
A second printer in Ipswich is believed to have been John Overton, who in 1548 printed there two sheets of Bale's Illustrium maioris Britanniæ scriptorum summarium, the remainder of which was printed at Wesel. Nothing else of his appears to be known.
The third printer at Ipswich was John Oswen, who was also established there in 1548. Nine books can be traced to his press there. The first was The Mynde of the Godly and excellent lerned man M. Jhon Caluyne what a Faithful man, whiche is instructe in the Worde of God ought to do, dwellinge amongest the Papistes. Imprinted at Ippyswiche by me John Oswen. 8vo. This was followed by Calvin's Brief declaration of the fained sacrament commonly called the extreame unction. The remainder of his books were of a theological character. He left Ipswich about Christmas 1548, and is next found at Worcester, where, on the 30th January 1549, he printed A Consultarie for all Christians most godly and ernestly warnying al people to beware least they beare the name of Christians in vayne. Now first imprinted the xxx day of Januarie Anno M. D. xlix. At Worceter by John Oswen. Cum priuilegio Regali ad imprimendum solum. Per septennium. The privilege, which was dated January 6th, 1548-9, authorised Oswen to print all sorts of service or prayer-books and other works relating to the scriptures 'within our Principalitie of Wales and Marches of the same.'[9]
Oswen followed this by another edition of the Domestycal or Household Sermons of Christopher Hegendorff, which was printed on the last day of February 1549.
Then came his first important undertaking, a quarto edition of The boke of common praier. Imprinted the xxiv day of May Anno MDXLIX. The folio edition appeared in July of the same year. Two months later he printed an edition of the Psalter or Psalmes of David, 4to. On January 12, 1550, appeared a quarto edition of the New Testament, of which there is a copy in Balliol College Library, and this was followed in the same year by Zwingli's Short Pathwaye, translated by John Veron; by a translation by Edward Aglionby of Mathew Gribalde's Notable and marveilous epistle, and the Godly sayings of the old auncient fathers, compiled by John Veron. Two or three books of the same kind were issued in 1551, and in 1552 he issued another edition of the Book of Common Prayer. The last we hear of him is in 1553, when he printed an edition of the Statutes of 6th Edward VI., and An Homelye to read in the tyme of pestylence. What became of Oswen is not known. He very likely went abroad on the accession of Queen Mary.
In Kent there was a press at Canterbury, from which eleven books are known to have been printed between 1549 and 1556.
John Mychell, the printer of these, began work in London at the Long Shop in the Poultry, some time between the departure of Richard Banckes in 1539 and the tenancy of Richard Kele in 1542. In 1549 he appears to have moved to Canterbury, where he printed a quarto edition of the Psalms, with the colophon, 'Printed at Canterbury in Saynt Paules paryshe by John Mychell.' In 1552 he issued A Breuiat Cronicle contayninge all the Kynges from Brute to this daye, and in 1556, the Articles of Cardinal Pole's Visitation. He also issued several minor theological tracts without dates.
The Norwich press began about 1566, when Anthony de Solemne, or Solempne, set up a press among the refugees who had fled from the Netherlands and taken refuge in that city. Most of his books were printed in Dutch, and all of them are excessively rare. The earliest was:—
Der Siecken Troost, Onderwijsinghe on gewillichlick te steruen. Troostinghe | on den siecken totte rechten gheloue ende betrouwen in Christo te onderwijsen. Ghemeyn bekenisse der sonden | met | scoon gebeden. Ghedruct in Jaer ons Heeren. Anno 1566. The only known copy of the book is in Trinity College Library, Dublin.
The Psalms of David in Dutch appeared in 1568, and the New Testament in the same year.
He was also the printer of certain Tables concerning God's word, by Antonius Corranus, pastor of the Spanish Protestant congregation at Antwerp. It was printed in four languages, Latin, French, Dutch, and English.
The only known specimen of Solempne's printing in the English language is a broadside now in the Bodleian:—
Certayne versis | written by Thomas Brooke Gētleman | in the tyme of his imprysōment | the daye before his deathe | who sufferyd at Norwich the 30 of August 1570. Imprynted at Norwiche in the Paryshe of Saynct Andrewe | by Anthony de Solempne 1570.
In this year Solempne also printed Eenen Calendier Historiael | eewelick gheduerende, 8vo, a tract of eight leaves printed in black and red, of which there are copies in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, and the Bodleian.
There is then a gap of eight years in his work, the next book found being a sermon, printed in 1578, Het tweede boeck vande sermoenen des wel vermaerden Predicant B. Cornelis Adriaensen van Dordrecht minrebroeder tot Brugges. Of this there are two copies known, one in the library of Trinity College, Dublin.
The last book traced to Solempne's press is Chronyc. Historie der Nederlandtscher Oorlogen. Gedruct tot Norrtwitz na de copie van Basel, Anno 1579, 8vo, of which there remain copies in the Bodleian, University Library, Cambridge, and in the private collection of Lord Amherst.
In 1583, after an interval similar to that at Oxford, another press was started at Cambridge, when, on May 3rd of that year, Thomas Thomas was appointed University printer. His career was marked by many difficulties. The Company of Stationers at once seized his press as an infringement of their privileges, and this in the face of the fact that for many years the University had possessed the royal licence, though hitherto it had not been used. The Bishop of London, writing to Burghley, declared on hearsay evidence that Thomas was a man 'vtterlie ignoraunte in printinge.' The University protested, and as it was clearly shown that they held the royal privilege, the Company were obliged to submit, but they did the Cambridge printer all the injury they could by freely printing books that were his sole copyright (Arber's Transcripts, vol. ii. pp. 782, 813, 819-20). He printed for the use of scholars small editions of classical works. In 1585 he issued in octavo the Latin Grammar of Peter Ramus, and in 1587 the Latin Grammar of James Carmichael in quarto (Hazlitt, Collections and Notes, 3rd series, p. 17). He was also the compiler of a Dictionary, first printed about 1588, of which five editions were called for before the end of the century.
Thomas died in August 1588, and the University, on the 2nd November, appointed John Legate his successor, as 'he is reported to be skilful in the art of printing books.' On the 26th April 1589 he received as an apprentice Cantrell Legge, who afterwards succeeded him. From 1590 to 1609 he appears in the parish books of St. Mary the Great, Cambridge, as paying 5s. a year for the rent of a shop. He had the exclusive right of printing Thomas's Dictionary, and he printed most of the books of William Perkins. He subsequently left Cambridge and settled in London.
Fig. 27.—Device used by John Legate.
The books printed by these two Cambridge printers show that they had a good variety of Roman and Italic, very regularly cast, besides some neat ornaments and initials. Whether these founts belonged to the University, or to Thomas in the first place, is not clear. Nor do these books bear out the Bishop of London's statement as to Thomas being ignorant of printing; on the contrary, the presswork was such as could only have been done by a skilled workman.
In addition to the foregoing, there were several secret presses at work in various parts of the country during the second half of the century. The Cartwright controversy, which began in 1572 with the publication of a tract entitled An Admonition to the Parliament, was carried out by means of a secret press at which John Stroud is believed to have worked, and had as assistants two men named Lacy and Asplyn. The Stationers' Company employed Toy and Day to hunt it out, with the result that it was seized at Hempstead, probably Hemel Hempstead, Herts, or Hempstead near Saffron Walden, Essex. The type was handed over to Bynneman, who used it in printing an answer to Cartwright's book. It was in consequence of his action in this matter that John Day was in danger of being killed by Asplyn.
A few years later books by Jesuit authors were printed from a secret press which, from some notes written by F. Parsons in 1598, and now preserved in the library of Stonyhurst College, we know began work at Greenstreet House, East Ham, but was afterwards removed to Stonor Park. The overseer of this press was Stephen Brinckley, who had several men under him, and the most noted book issued from it was Campion's Rationes Decem, with the colophon, 'Cosmopoli 1581.'
Finally, there was the Marprelate press, of which Robert Waldegrave was the chief printer. He was the son of a Worcestershire yeoman, and put himself apprentice to William Griffith, from the 24th June 1568, for eight years. He was therefore out of his time in 1576, and in 1578 there is entered to him a book entitled A Castell for the Soul. His subsequent publications were of the same character, including, in 1581, The Confession and Declaration of John Knox, The Confession of the Protestants of Scotland, and a sermon of Luther's. It was not, however, until the 7th April 1588 that he got into trouble. In that year he printed a tract of John Udall's, entitled The State of the Church of England. His press was seized and his type defaced, but he succeeded in carrying off some of it to the house of a Mrs. Crane at East Molesey, where he printed another of Udall's tracts, and the first of the Marprelate series: O read over D. John Bridges for it is a worthye work. Printed oversea in Europe within two furlongs of a Bounsing Priest, at the cost and charges of M. Marprelate, gentleman.
From East Molesey the press was afterwards removed to Fawsley, near Daventry, and from thence to Coventry. But the hue and cry after the hidden press was so keen that another shift was made to Wolston Priory, the seat of Sir R. Knightley, and finally Waldegrave fled over sea, taking with him his black-letter type. He went first to Rochelle, and thence to Edinburgh, where in 1590 he was appointed King's printer.
The Marprelate press was afterwards carried on by Samuel Hoskins or Hodgkys, who had as his workmen Valentine Symmes and Arthur Thomlyn. The last of the Marprelate tracts, The Protestacyon of Martin Marprelate, was printed at Haseley, near Warwick, about September 1589.
PRINTING IN SCOTLAND AND IRELAND DURING THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY[10]
On the 15th September 1507, King James IV. of Scotland granted to his faithful subjects, Walter Chepman and Androw Myllar, burgesses of Edinburgh, leave to import a printing-press and letter, and gave them licence to print law books, breviaries, and so forth, more particularly the Breviary of William, Bishop of Aberdeen. Walter Chepman was a general merchant, and probably his chief part in the undertaking at the outset was of a financial character. Andrew Myllar had for some years carried on the business of a bookseller in Edinburgh, and books were printed for him in Rouen by Pierre Violette. There is, moreover, evidence that Myllar himself learnt the art of printing in that city.
The printing-house of the firm in Edinburgh was in the Southgait (now the Cowgate), and they lost no time in setting to work, devoting themselves chiefly to printing some of the popular metrical tales of England and Scotland. A volume containing eleven such pieces, most of them printed in 1508, is preserved in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh.
Among the pieces found in it are—Sir Eglamoure of Artoys, Maying or desport of Chaucer, Buke of Gude Counsale to the Kyng, Flytting of Dunbar & Kennedy, and Twa Marrit Wemen and the wedo.
Three founts of black letter, somewhat resembling in size and shape those of Wynkyn de Worde, were used in printing these books, and the devices of both men are found in them. That of Chepman was a copy of the device of the Paris printer, Pigouchet, while Myllar adopted the punning device of a windmill with a miller bearing sacks into the mill, with a small shield charged with three fleur-de-lys in each of the upper corners.
Fig. 28.—Device of Andrew Miller.
After printing the above-mentioned works, Myllar disappears, and the famous Breviarium Aberdonense, the work for which the King had mainly granted the license, was finished in 1509-10 by Chepman alone. It is an unpretentious little octavo, printed in double columns, in red and black, as became a breviary, but with no special marks of typographical beauty. Four copies of it are known to exist, but none of these are perfect. Chepman then disappears as mysteriously as his partner. In the Glamis copy of the Bremarium, Dr. David Laing discovered a single sheet of eight leaves of a book with the imprint: Impressū Edinburgi per Johane Story nomine & mandato Karoli Stule. Nothing more, however, is known of this John Story.
In 1541-2 another printer, Thomas Davidson, is found printing The New Actis and Constitutionis of Parliament maid Be the Rycht Excellent Prince James the Fift King of Scottis, 1540. Davidson's press, which was situated 'above the nether bow, on the north syde of the gait,' was also very short-lived, and very few examples of it are now in existence; one of these, a quarto of four leaves, with the title Ad Serenissimum Scotorum Regem Jacobum Quintum de suscepto Regni Regimine a diis feliciter ominato Strena, is the earliest instance of the use of Roman type in Scotland. His most important undertaking, besides the Acts of Parliament, was a Scottish history, printed about 1542.
The next printer we hear of is John Scot or Skot. There was a printer of this name in London between 1521 and 1537, but whether he is to be identified with this slightly later Scottish printer is not known. Between 1552 and 1571 Scot printed a great many books, most of them of a theological character. Among them was Ninian Winziet's Certane tractatis for Reformatioune of Doctryne and Maneris, a quarto, printed on the 21st May 1562, and the same author's Last Blast of the Trumpet. For these he was arrested and thrown into prison, and his printing materials were handed over to Thomas Bassandyne. In 1568 he was at liberty again and printed for Henry Charteris, The Warkes of the famous & vorthie Knicht Schir David Lyndesay; while among his numerous undated books is found Lyndsay's Ane Dialog betwix Experience and Ane Courtier, of which he printed two editions, the second containing several other poems by the same author.
Scot was succeeded by Robert Lekpreuik, who began to print, in 1561, his first dated book, a small black-letter octavo of twenty-four pages, called The Confessione of the fayght and doctrin beleued and professed by the Protestantes of the Realme of Scotland. Imprinted at Edinburgh be Robert Lekpreuik, Cum privilegio, 1561.
In the following year the Kirk lent him £200 with which to print the Psalms. The copy now in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh, bound with the Book of Common Order printed by Lekpreuik in the same year, probably belongs to this edition.
Two years later, in 1564-5, he obtained a license under the Privy Seal to print the Acts of Parliament of Queen Mary and the Psalms of David in Scottish metre. Of this edition of the Psalms there is a perfect copy in the library of Corpus Christi College, Oxford. Again, in 1567, Lekpreuik obtained the royal license as king's printer for twenty years, during which time he was to have the monopoly of printing Donatus pro pueris, Rudimentis of Pelisso, Acts of Parliament, Chronicles of the Realm, the book called Regia Majestas, the Psalms, the Homelies, and Rudimenta Artis Grammaticae.
Among his other work of that year may be noticed a ballad entitled The testament and tragedie of vmquhile King Henry Stewart of gude memory, a broadside of sixteen twelve-line stanzas, from the pen of Robert Sempil. A copy of this is in the British Museum (Cott. Caligula, C. i. fol. 17). In 1568 there was danger of plague in Edinburgh, and Lekpreuik printed a small octavo of twenty-four leaves, in Roman type, with the title, Ane breve description of the Pest, Quhair in the Cavsis signes and sum speciall preservatiovn and cvre thairof ar contenit. Set furth be Maister Gilbert Skeyne, Doctoure in Medicine.
In 1570 he printed for Henry Charteris a quarto edition of the Actis and Deides of Sir William Wallace, and in 1571 The Actis and Lyfe of Robert Bruce. This was printed early in the year, as on the 14th April Secretary Maitland made a raid upon Lekpreuik's premises, under the belief that he was the printer of Buchanan's Chameleon. The printer, however, had received timely warning and retired to Stirling, where, before the 6th of August, he printed Buchanan's Admonition, and also a letter from John Knox 'To his loving Brethren.' His sojourn there was very short, as on the 4th September Stirling was attacked and Lekpreuik thereupon withdrew to St. Andrews, where his press was active throughout the year 1572 and part of 1573. In the month of April 1573 Lekpreuik returned to Edinburgh and printed Sir William Drury's Regulations for the army under his command. But in January 1573-74 he was thrown into prison and his press and property confiscated. How long he remained a prisoner is not clear, but in all probability until after the execution of the Regent Morton in 1581. In that year he printed the following books—Patrick Adamson's Catechismus Latino Carmine Redditus et in libros quatuor digestus, a small octavo of forty leaves, printed in Roman type; Fowler's Answer to John Hamilton, a quarto of twenty-eight leaves; and a Declaration without place or printer's name, but attributed to his press: after this nothing more is heard of him.
Contemporary with Lekpreuik was Thomas Bassandyne, who is believed to have worked both in Paris and Leyden before setting up as a printer in Edinburgh.
His first appearance, in 1568, was not a very creditable one. An order of the General Assembly, on the 1st July of that year, directs Bassandyne to call in a book entitled The Fall of the Roman Kirk, in which the king was called 'supreme head of the Primitive Church,' and also orders him to delete an obscene song called Welcome Fortune which he had printed at the end of a psalm-book. The Assembly appointed Mr. Alexander Arbuthnot to revise these things.
In 1574 Bassandyne printed a quarto edition of Sir David Lindsay's Works, of which he had 510 copies in stock at the time of his death.
Fig. 29.—Device of Alexander Arbuthnot.
On the 7th March 1574-75, in partnership with Alexander Arbuthnot (who was not the same as the Alexander Arbuthnot who had been appointed to exercise a supervision of Bassandyne's books in 1568), Bassandyne laid proposals before the General Assembly for printing an edition of the Bible, the first ever printed in Scotland. The General Assembly gave him hearty support, and required every parish to provide itself with one of the new Bibles as soon as they were printed. On the other hand, the printers were to deliver a certain number of copies before the last of March 1576, and the cost of it was to be £5. The terms of this agreement were not carried out by the printers. The New Testament only was completed and issued in 1576, with the name of Thomas Bassandyne as the printer. The whole Bible was not finished until the close of the year 1579, and Bassandyne did not live to see its completion, his death taking place on the 18th October 1577.
Like most of his predecessors, Bassandyne was a bookseller; and on pp. 292-304 of their work Annals of Scottish Printing, Messrs. Dickson and Edmond have printed the Inventory of the goods he possessed, including the whole of his stock of books, which is of the greatest interest and value. Unfortunately such inventories are not to be met with in the case of English printers.
Bassandyne used as his device a modification of the serpent and anchor mark of John Crespin of Geneva.
Arbuthnot was now left to carry on the business alone, and was made King's printer in 1579. But he was a slow, slovenly, and ignorant workman, and the General Assembly were so disgusted with the delivery of the Bible and the wretched appearance of his work, that, on the 13th February 1579-80, they decided to accept the offer of Thomas Vautrollier, a London printer, to establish a press in Edinburgh.
Arbuthnot died on September 1st, 1585. His device was a copy of that of Richard Jugge of London, and is believed to have been the work of a Flemish artist, Assuerus vol Londersel.
Another printer in Edinburgh between 1574-80 was John Ross. He worked chiefly for Henry Charteris, for whom he printed the Catechisme in 1574, and a metrical version of the Psalms in 1578. For the same bookseller he also printed a poem, The seuin Seages, Translatit out of prois in Scottis meter be Johne Rolland in Dalkeith, a quarto, now so rare that only one copy is now known, that in the Britwell Library.
In 1579 Ross printed Ad virulentum Archbaldi Hamiltonii Apostatæ dialogum, de confusione Calvinianæ Sectæ apud Scotos, impie conscriptum, orthodoxa responsio, Thoma Smetonio Scoto anctore, a quarto, printed in Roman letter, and followed it up with two editions of Buchanan's De Jure Regni apud Scotos dialogus.
Ross used a device showing Truth with an open book in her right hand, a lighted candle in her left, surrounded with the motto 'Vincet tandem veritas.' This device was afterwards used by both Charteris and Waldegrave. Ross died in 1580, when his stock passed into the hands of Henry Charteris, who began printing in the following year. As we have seen, he employed Scot, Lekpreuik, and Ross to print for him. Up to 1581 he confined himself to bookselling. His printing was confined to various editions of Sir David Lindsay's Works and theological tracts. He used two devices, that of Ross, and another emblematical of Justice and Religion, with his initials. He died on the 9th August 1599.
In 1580, at the express invitation of the General Assembly, Thomas Vautrollier visited Edinburgh, and set up as a bookseller, no doubt with the view of seeing what scope there was likely to be for a printer with a good stock of type. The Treasurer's accounts for this period show that he received royal patronage.
On his second visit, a year or two later, he went armed with a letter to George Buchanan from Daniel Rodgers, and set up a press in Edinburgh. But in spite of the support of the Assembly and the patronage that an introduction to Buchanan must have brought him, he evidently soon found there was not enough business in Edinburgh to support a printer, for he remained there little more than a year, when he again returned to London. During his short career as a printer in Edinburgh he printed at least eight books, of which the most important were Henry Balnave's Confession of Faith, 1584, 8vo, and King James's Essayes of a Prentice in the Divine Art of Poesie, 4to.
Scotland's next important printer was Robert Waldegrave, who, after his adventures as a secret printer in England, set up a press in Edinburgh in 1590, and continued printing there till the close of the century.
One of his first works was a quarto in Roman type entitled The Confession of Faith, Subscribed by the Kingis Maiestie and his householde: Togither with the Copie of the Bande, maid touching the maintenaunce of the true Religion. Among his other work, which was chiefly theological, may be mentioned King James's Demonologie, 1597, 4to, and the first edition of the Basilikon Doron, in quarto, of which it is said only seven copies were printed.
Contemporary with him was a Robert Smyth, who married the widow of Thomas Bassandyne, and who in 1599 received license to print the following books:—'The double and single catechism, the plane Donet, the haill four pairtes of grammar according to Sebastian, the Dialauges of Corderius, the celect and familiar Epistles of Cicero, the buik callit Sevin Seages, the Ballat buik, the Secund rudimentis of Dunbar, the Psalmes of Buchanan and Psalme buik.'
The only known copy of Smyth's edition of Holland's Seven Sages is that in the British Museum.
The last of the Scottish printers of the sixteenth century was Robert Charteris, the son and successor of Henry Charteris, but he did not succeed to the business until 1599, and his work lies chiefly in the succeeding century.
It may safely be said that the earliest press in Ireland of which there is any authentic notice was that of Humphrey Powell, of which there is the following note in the Act Books of the Privy Council (New Series, vol. iii. p. 84), under date 18th July 1550:—
'A warrant to ——, to deliver xxli unto Powell the printer, given him by the Kinges Majestie towarde his setting up in Ireland.'
Nothing is known of Humphrey Powell's work in England beyond several small theological works issued between 1548 and 1549 from a shop in Holborn above the Conduit.
On his arrival in Ireland he set up his press in Dublin, and printed there the Prayer Book of Edward VI. with the colophon:—
'Imprinted by Humphrey Powell, printer to the Kynges Maieste, in his Highnesse realme of Ireland dwellynge in the citie of Dublin in the great toure by the Crane Cum Privelegio ad imprimendum solum. Anno Domini, M.D.L.I.'
Timperley, in his Encyclopædia (p. 314), says that Powell continued printing in Dublin for fifteen years, and removed to the southern side of the river to St. Nicholas Street.
In 1571 the first fount of Irish type was presented by Queen Elizabeth to John O'Kearney, treasurer of St. Patrick's, to print the Catechism which appeared in that year from the press of John Franckton. (Reed, Old English Letter Foundries, pp. 75, 186-7.) It was not a Pure Irish character, but a hybrid fount consisting for the most part of Roman and Italic letters, with the seven distinctly Irish sorts added. A copy of the Catechism is exhibited in the King's Library, British Museum, and in the Library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, is a copy of a broadside Poem on the last Judgement, sent over to the Archbishop of Canterbury as a specimen.
This type was afterwards used to print William O'Donnell's, or Daniel's, Irish Testament in 1602.