Early Printed Books

by E. Gordon Duff

PAGE OF A “DOCTRINALE.”
(One of the so-called “Costeriana.”)

The close connection of all these types points to the books having been produced in one place; but where this one place was, cannot be determined. The account written by Junius, in 1568, of the invention of printing by Coster, mentions Haarlem as the place where he printed, and they have therefore been always ascribed to Haarlem by such writers as believe in the Costerian invention. Mr. Bradshaw, who refused to assign books to particular places without reason, said: ‘I am compelled to leave the Speculum at Utrecht until I know anything positive to the contrary; because it is at Utrecht that the cuts first appear, cut up into pieces in a book printed by Veldener at that place in 1481.’ This statement does not mean that the Costeriana were necessarily printed at Utrecht, but that the place where we find the materials as soon as they can be connected with any place, is Utrecht, and that therefore such little evidence as exists is in favour of these books having been printed there. One point which tells in favour of Utrecht, is the fact that one of the Costeriana is a Donatus in French, and Utrecht is one of the few places in the Netherlands where such a book is likely to have been produced.

There is no direct evidence in favour of Haarlem or Utrecht; and indirect evidence is not particularly in favour of Haarlem, unless it is considered that some belief may be placed in Junius’ wonderful narrative. It is certainly wiser to leave the matter open, or, with Bradshaw, place the books provisionally at Utrecht till we have a better reason for placing them elsewhere.

The more important question as to the date when these Costeriana were produced, seems still as far as ever from any satisfactory solution. Mr. Hessels takes them back to 1446 by the ingenious method of putting eighteen months between each edition. This method of working is based on no sound principle, and leads to no result of any value. Another argument of Mr. Hessels, and one that is hardly worthy of so learned a writer, is that since the Costeriana look older than the first Mainz books, therefore they are older. The foolishness of this reasoning is too apparent to need any explanation, for it amounts to the assertion that the same phase of development in different countries means the same date. But if the earliest dated books of the Low Countries are compared with the productions of Germany, it needs a prejudiced eye to see in the former any approach to the exquisite beauty and regularity of the German type and printing.

There is one point which seems to me to argue strongly against the early date ascribed to the Costeriana. They were produced by ordinary typographic processes, such as would be used for printing any book, and there is little or no improvement observable in the latest compared with the earliest. Yet, during the thirty years to which these books are ascribed, no work of any size or importance was produced from this press. It can hardly be assumed that during these years there was no demand for books, when we consider that immediately after 1473 books of all kinds were produced in great number. Nor can we reasonably suppose that the great demand for the Donatus and the Doctrinale ceased about 1473. The printing of school-books did not require to be ornamental, for they had to be produced as cheaply as possible, so that this class of work naturally soon fell into the hands of the poorer printers. We see many examples of this in studying the history of printing in other places, and find the finest and the rudest work being produced side by side. Block-books and xylographic Donatuses were printed in Germany up to the last years of the fifteenth century, as old in appearance as the productions of fifty years earlier. We may connect certain of these Costeriana with the years 1471-74, within which period printing presses were started at Utrecht and Alost; but why should all the rest be placed earlier? It is curious that, while we have no dates forcing us to fix them early, neither have we dates preventing us from fixing them late.

Because certain of these books were written by Pius II., who became Pope in 1458, Mr. Hessels seizes on 1458 as one of the dates we may take as relating to their printing, and groups the Costeriana round that date. He might equally well have grouped others round the fourth century, when Ælius Donatus lived, or round 1207, when Alexander de Villa Dei finished his Doctrinale. The only date as regards the printing of a book that can be derived from the authorship is a date before which the book cannot have been printed. M. Dziatzko mentions one point which he considers conclusive as giving a late date to the Costeriana. In them is wrongly used a particular form of the letter x, which is not found in Dutch manuscripts, and which was used at the first Mainz press for a special purpose.

Putting aside, then, the useless mass of conjecture and sophistry that obscures the subject, the case stands thus. The first printed date in the Low Countries is 1473, and there are a group of undated books which may perhaps be placed before or round this date; beyond this we have no information whatever.

Before leaving this subject, it is worth noticing that there is a simple explanation for the fact that almost all the Costeriana fragments are on vellum. They have in most cases been found in the bindings of books, and it was the almost invariable habit of Netherlandish binders to line the boards of their bindings with vellum. They used if possible clean vellum, or printed or written only on one side, the used side being pasted down and the clean side exposed. In this way many indulgences have been preserved.