NOTE CONCERNING TORY'S VARIOUS DOMICILES IN PARIS.
The dedicatory epistle of Tory's edition of Pomponius Mela is dated Paris, December, 1507; but it mentions no place of abode.
The edition of the 'Cosmography' of Pope Pius II is dated at the Collège du Plessis, October 2, 1509. Tory was at the Collège du Plessis as late as May 10, 1510.[513]
On August 18, 1512, we find him installed at the Collège Coqueret; and a little later at the Collège de Bourgogne.[514]
About 1518, having joined the fraternity of booksellers, he went to live on rue Saint-Jacques, opposite the Écu de Bâle, which was then used as a sign by the famous printer Chrétien Wechel. The latter's establishment was on the right going up rue Saint-Jacques, near the church of Saint-Benoît.
About 1526 Tory established himself on the Petit-Pont, near Hôtel-Dieu, but did not give up his shop on rue Saint-Jacques, at the sign of the Pot Cassé.
Early in 1531, he changed his abode to rue de la Juiverie, the Halle aux Blés de Beauce, where he set up his printing-press and his bookstall. He retained his shop on rue Saint-Jacques for some time.[515] It was in his house on rue de la Juiverie that he died, in 1533.
V
OF THE FIRST USE BY PRINTERS, AND IN THE FRENCH LANGUAGE, OF THE APOSTROPHE, THE ACCENT, AND THE CEDILLA.
M. Francis Wey, in a report made by him to the Philological section of the Committee on the Language, History, and Arts of France, on June 9, 1856, and published in the 9th fascicle of volume three of that Committee's 'Bulletin' (page 437), seems to attribute to Jean Salomon, otherwise called Montflory, or Florimond, the first philological dissertation in which there is any mention of the accent, the apostrophe and the cedilla,—signs peculiar to the French language, which, as every one knows, was for many years content with the alphabet of the Latin tongue, from which it descended; more than that, he attributes to that author the first use of these signs in a printed book. In both respects the honour is due to Geofroy Tory. In truth, in his 'Champ fleury,'—which was not published until 1529, it is true, although begun in 1523, the license to print being dated September 5, 1526,—Tory proposed to introduce the accent, the apostrophe, and the cedilla into the French language; he did more than that; for, having become a printer, he was the first to introduce those signs into typography. They appeared for the first time in the last of the four editions of the 'Adolescence Clementine' (by Clement Marot), all four of which he published. This fourth edition appeared June 7, 1533, accompanied by an 'avis' in these words: 'With certain accents noted, to wit, on the é masculine, different from the feminine,[516] on letters joined by synalephe, and under the c when it is pronounced like s, the which for lack of counsel has never been done in the French language, albeit it was and is most essential.' This was the first work in which Tory applied his orthographic system, as may be seen by the inexperience of the compositors in his employ, who made several errors of omission and transposition in this very notice.