In 1467 we find the colophon attributed by Maittaire to some copies of the “Sextus Decretalium” repeated (with the omission of Fust’s name) in the “Secunda Secundae” of S. Thomas Aquinas and the second edition of the Clementine Constitutions, and this became for some time Schoeffer’s normal colophon. In 1470, however, he varied it in his edition of S. Jerome’s Epistles in order to introduce a compliment paid by the saint to the city of Mainz, which made it peculiarly appropriate that his work should be popularized by a Mainz printer. This colophon runs:
[I]gitur Sophronii Eusebii Ieronimi orthodoxi, Ecclesie Christi propugnatoris clarissimi, Liber Ieronimianus, aut si mauis, quod et ipse velim, Liber Epistolaris explicit, ut dignitas nominis Ieronimiani egregio viro Johanni Andree permaneat, qui hoc ipsum zelo deuotionis erga virum sanctum affectus tempore prisco vulgauit in orbem. Est autem presens opus arte impressoria feliciter consummatum per Petrum schoiffer de Gernsshem in ciuitate nobili Moguntina. Cuius nobilitati vir beatus Ieronimus scribens ad Agerutiam de monogamia testimonium perhibet sempiternum multis milibus incolarum eiusdem in ecclesia pro fide catholica sanguine proprio laureatis.
Huic laudatori reddit moguntia vicem,
Tot sua scripta parans usibus ecclesie.
Anno domini M.cccc.lxx. Die septima mensis septembris que fuit vigilia natiuitatis Marie. Da gloriam Deo.
S. Jerome’s Epistles. Mainz: P. Schoeffer, 1470.
Thus of Sophronius Eusebius Hieronimus [i.e., S. Jerome], the Orthodox, the most renowned champion of the Church of Christ, there comes to an end the book called after him Hieronominian, or if you prefer it the Book of his Epistles, the title I myself should wish to give it in order that the honor of the title Hieronimian may be reserved for the illustrious Johannes Andreae, who in olden time published to the world this very work from the zeal of his devotion to the holy man. Now the present work by the printing art has been happily brought to completion by Peter Schoiffer of Gernsheim in the noble city of Mainz, as to whose nobility the blessed man Jerome, writing to Agerutia concerning monogamy, bears eternal witness to the many thousands of its inhabitants who with their own blood have won crowns of laurel in the church for the catholic faith.