The next book, finished on May 15, 1518, is Dedicus’ Questiones super libros Ethicorum Aristotelis. A very interesting fact about it is the statement on the last leaf that the printer had a privilege for it for seven years granted by the Chancellor. No one was to print it in the University or sell copies printed elsewhere under pain of confiscation of the books and a fine of five pounds sterling. The notice ends with the expressive Latin adage, “Cornicum oculos configere noli.”
This is the first privilege which I have found in an English printed book, the next, six months later, having been granted by the King for Cuthbert Tonstall’s Oratio in laudem matrimonii Mariæ et Francisci. This privilege prevented anyone either reprinting it in England or selling foreign printed copies for the space of two years. This may seem a short time, but the subject was only of passing interest. The rise, growth, and scope of these privileges, which are the foundations of copyright, form a subject which has hitherto received little or no attention even from writers on copyright, though I think it would go far to prove that the perpetual copyright, which later on was claimed by the stationers, was never legally recognised, but that the power granted them by the charter enabled them to impose and uphold arbitrary restrictions which were not legally binding.
On the title-page of this and the preceding work is John Scolar’s device, the shield of the University surmounted by a cap and supported by two angels. On the shield are the arms, the book with seven seals between the three crowns, but the motto on the book in place of the present “Dominus illuminatio mea” is “Veritas liberabit, bonitas regnavit.” Another woodcut containing the Royal arms and supporters is used in these books, which had been used previously by W. de Worde.
In June 1518 three books were printed: Questiones de luce et lumine, a tract of eight leaves, Burley’s Principia, also of eight leaves, and a Grammar of Whitinton. A new Oxford book from Scolar’s press was discovered recently in a volume of tracts in the British Museum. It is an edition of the Opus insolubilium, a text-book for the schools. It consisted originally of four leaves, but the last is unfortunately missing. On the first leaf is the woodcut of the University arms in fresh condition. This tract may perhaps be the first production of Scolar’s press.
The Questiones de luce et lumine has on the title-page a small rough woodcut depicting the visit of the Magi, belonging to a series made to illustrate a Book of Hours; and on the title of Burley’s Principia is a small neat woodcut, rather Italian in style, of a master seated before a desk with a pupil standing before him. At the end is a woodcut of the arms of England supported by the greyhound and dragon. Below are two portcullises, and above two angels hold ribbons bearing the motto
“Hec rosa virtutis de celo missa sereno
Eternum florens regia sceptra feret.”
This woodcut was part of the material obtained by the Oxford printer from W. de Worde, and which after the cessation of the press was returned to him. We find him using it in some of his later books, by which time it had become slightly damaged by wormholes.
We hear no more of Scolar in Oxford after 1518, when he probably left the city; but his place was taken by Charles Kyrfoth, who issued in February 1519 a Compotus manualis ad usum Oxoniensium, a little treatise of arithmetic illustrated by wood engravings of the open hand with values attached to each part. It is a small tract of eight leaves, and we learn from Dorne’s accounts that its price was one penny. In the colophon Kyrfoth gives his address, as did Scolar, as St John’s Street, and as he used the same device of the University Arms, we may conclude he had taken on Scolar’s business. On the title-page is a large and curious woodcut divided horizontally into three portions. In the upper is a row of seven books. In the centre a master in an embroidered robe and crowned with laurel is seated at a desk, while on either side of him are scholars taking notes. In the lower part are five men in gowns holding books. In the text are four diagrams of hands. The only copy known of this book is in the University Library. Beyond the occurrence of his name in this colophon we know nothing further of Kyrfoth. He probably left Oxford soon after the issue of this book, for his name is not found in the list of inhabitants in the Subsidy Rolls of 1524.
Scolar, as we said above, left Oxford in 1518, but we meet with him again ten years later; for in 1528 he printed a Breviary for the use of the Benedictine Monastery at Abingdon, which will be noticed hereafter.