On February 15, 1530, immediately after Pynson’s death, Berthelet was appointed Printer to the King with an annuity of four pounds. Just a few days before he had issued an edition of Paynell’s translation of the Regimen sanitatis Salerni which is very interesting as illustrating a point I have several times referred to. The book is dated February, 1530, and Berthelet is not spoken of as King’s Printer, a fact he emphasized very particularly as soon as he had risen to that position. We may conclude therefore that in this colophon February 1530 does not mean February 1531 and that therefore Berthelet calculated his year as beginning on January 1.
After the Royal appointment Berthelet’s press started on an active career, and the first book issued, naturally one on the political question then engaging the attention of Europe, was an important work on the subject of the royal divorce. This was the first edition, in Latin, of the Determinations of the most famous Universities, written and collected for the purpose of strengthening the King’s position. It was issued in April and an English translation appeared in the following November. In June two proclamations were issued, one for the punishing of “vagabondes and sturdy beggars,” the other for “dampning” erroneous books and heresies, and prohibiting the translation of Scripture. The first of these is printed on one sheet of paper, the second on a sheet and a half, and the printer was paid for 1600 of the two £8. 6s. 8d., that is, one penny each for the single sheet and a penny halfpenny for the sheet and a half. In each penny the cost of the paper represented one-fifth, for “paper royall” which was then used for printing cost six and eightpence a ream, the remaining four-fifths representing all the cost of printing and the profit.
The number of proclamations printed by Berthelet now in existence is very large, but nothing to compare with the number which he must really have printed. Looking at such documents as his three year’s accounts which have been preserved, and casual entries in records, it is clear that not a tithe is represented by existing specimens, though we are more lucky in his case than in Pynson’s, almost every one of whose productions in this class has been destroyed.
In 1531 Berthelet issued the first edition of Sir Thomas Elyot’s Book named the Governour, a work he frequently reprinted, and he seems to have published all Elyot’s works, which with their various editions amount to a considerable number. In 1533 he issued the Dialogue betwixte two englyshe men, wherof one was called Salem and the other Bizance. This work written by Christopher St Germain was an answer to Sir Thomas More’s Apology, which in its turn was an attack upon St Germain’s Division of the Spiritualty and Temporalty.
More’s answer to the first mentioned book was printed by William Rastell in the same year and entitled The Debellacyon of Salem and Bizance.
Among the many beautiful borders which Berthelet used for his books there is one about which a word of warning should be said. It has engraved upon it the date 1534, and as it was in use for several years it has given rise to great confusion in the dating of books.
In 1537 was issued the celebrated Institution of a Christian Man, called the Bishops’ Book in contradistinction to the Necessary Doctrine and Erudition for any Christian Man, or King’s book, issued in 1543. Both are versions of the same work, but the first has a Preface of the Prelates to Henry VIII, the second has an introduction by the King.
In 1542 Sir Thomas Elyot published his Latin dictionary, and he appears to have issued or intended to issue a copy on vellum, for in the Bodleian are five leaves so printed, consisting of the title, the prologue to Henry VIII in English, an address to the reader in Latin, and the table of errata. In 1542 he printed another book upon vellum, Lily’s Introduction of the Eight Parts of Speech.
In 1540 a work by Nicholas Borbonius was issued at Basle in which there is a Latin poem addressed by the learned author to Berthelet and worded in a most laudatory style. There is no doubt that Berthelet’s printing and beautiful type were alone in England able to rival the work of the foreign printers.
On the accession of Edward VI in 1547, Berthelet lost his position as King’s Printer, and a new one, Richard Grafton, was appointed, a custom now for the first time introduced, as hitherto the appointment had been for life. For the succeeding eight years of his life we lose the familiar “Regius Impressor” of his colophons, and this helps in a small degree in the dating of undated books. He seems, however, to have become much less active after the loss of his privilege and probably left much of the printing business in the hands of his nephew Thomas Powell, who succeeded him, and his servants. The various purchases of land which he made from time to time point to his having built up a considerable fortune, and apart from his purchases in or about London he had estates in Hereford.