[536] There were royal printers in various cities of France after the latter part of the sixteenth century; but the office was neither regularly instituted nor general in its scope. These printers seem to have had it specially in charge to print official documents in the provinces, which function conferred on them certain privileges, and sometimes caused difficulties with the local authorities, who also had their special printers. The first editions of the edicts, ordinances, etc., emanating from the central authority were afterwards placed in the hands of the royal printing-office in Paris. See what I have to say on this subject in my work on Les Estienne, p. 56.
In 1844 M. Le Roux de Lincy published in the Journal de l'Amateur de livres, and also had printed separately in an octavo pamphlet of 16 leaves, a compilation entitled: Catalogue chronologique des imprimeurs et libraires du roi, par le père Adry; but those shapeless memoranda were not originally intended for printing, and I have been unable to obtain the slightest particle of useful information from them.
[537] Archives, reg. KK, 99, fol. 116 verso. 'Librairie.—To maistre Jean de Sansay, libraire ordinaire to the King our Sire, the sum of two hundred forty livres tournoys, ordered [to be paid] to him by our said lord and his warrant, for his wages as libraire ordinaire to our said lord, [said office being held] by him during this present year beginning the first day of January a thousand five hundred twenty-eight [1529 n. s.], and ending the last day of December following, a thousand five hundred twenty-nine, of which sum this present clerk has made payment to the said Sansay by virtue of said warrant, as appears by his receipt signed at his request by Mᵉ Huault, notary and secretary to the King, the twenty-third day of January in the year a thousand five hundred twenty-nine now current. For the said sum of IIe XL l. t.'
[538] Brunet, Manuel de Libraire, 5th edit., vol. ii, col. 1672.
[539] Was this Jehan Estienne of the family of the great printers? I am unable to say. He is not mentioned in any of their genealogies, nor is the Gommer Estienne, whom I have referred to in my Les Estienne.
[540] The name is left blank at the beginning of the original document, and the signature is very doubtful. But the name Burgensis or Bourgeois, is very common at that period. François I had a physician called Louis Burgensis.
[541] La Renaissance des Arts, vol. i, p. 973.
[542] Ibid., p. 925.
[543] That is to say, to goffer.
[544] This volume is without date, but the license to print is dated February 23, 1539 (1540, n. s.).