Books and their makers during the Middle Ages

by George Haven Putnam

The four taxatores, the officials charged with the supervision of the fees for the booksellers’ guild (usually the four senior or most important members of the guild), were also charged with the selection or approval of new members and with the supervision of the proper carrying out of the various regulations controlling the organisations of the guild. In the earlier period of the work, such censorship as was found necessary concerning the books to be published was exercised through these four taxators. They were also the official representative body of the university guild.

In case any member of the guild suffered injury from unauthorised competition, the guild had the power to suspend the business operation with the person charged with committing the injury, until the complaint could be passed upon. In case the rules of the corporation had been broken, the corporation appears to have had the power, at least up to the beginning of the fifteenth century, of withdrawing the trade privilege or license.

The taxators or principales jurati, as they were sometimes called, had power to proceed not only to supervise the business undertaking of the members of the guild, but were also authorised to take measures against the outside or unlicensed booksellers and to proceed, if necessary, even to the point of seizure and confiscation of their goods. In carrying out such measures, they were empowered to call upon the university bedels for co-operation.

These unlicensed dealers or book pedlars, as they increased in numbers, naturally attempted to withdraw themselves from the jurisdiction and supervision of the university authorities. An ordinance of Charles VI., dated June 20, 1411, confirms specifically the right of control over the entire book-trade, and prohibits pedlars, dealers, hucksters, etc., from taking part in the selling of manuscripts, “of which business they could have no understanding.” The edict went on to specify that the carrying on of the book business by ignorant and irresponsible dealers not only caused injury to the licensed book-dealers, but was a wrong upon the public, in that it furthered the circulation of incorrect, incomplete, and fraudulent manuscripts. This ordinance was doubtless issued at the instance of the book-dealers’ guild, but it is evident that it was not strictly carried out, as from year to year there are renewed complaints of the competition of these ignorant and irresponsible book pedlars.

It was considered important, in order to insure the proper control by the university over the book-trade and the interests of the scholars who depended upon the book-dealers for their text-books, that the trade in the materials used in the manifolding of books should also be strictly supervised. The special purpose of the university authorities was to prevent any “cornering of the market” in parchment, and to insure that the supply of this should be regular and uniform in price.

Under the ordinance of 1291, the dealers in parchment were forbidden to keep any secret stores of the same, but were obliged to keep on file with the managers of the book guild the record of the stock carried by them from month to month. The parchment-dealers licensed to do business in Paris were forbidden to sell parchment to dealers from outside of Paris. On the first day of the Trade Fair, when foreign dealers brought parchment to Paris for sale, the Parisian dealers were forbidden themselves to make purchases, this day being reserved for such purchases as the university officials might desire to make. In case, after the first day of the Fair, a foreign dealer in parchment had before him more applications for his stock than could be supplied, and among the applicants there should be one representing the university, the latter was to be served first. Outside of the time of the official Fair, the Paris dealers in parchment were allowed to make purchases of their material only in the monastery of S. Mathurin.

In case between the times of the Fair a foreign dealer or manufacturer of parchment came to Paris, he was obliged to place his stock in this same monastery and to give information concerning this deposit to the Rector of the university. The Rector sent a representative to examine and to schedule the parchment, and the stock was priced by four of the licensed parchment-dealers associated with the university. The university authorities had then for twenty-four hours the first privilege of purchase. This regulation was applied also to the parchment-trade carried on at the Fair of St. Germain.

It is evident from the many renewed edicts and ordinances referring to this trade that it was not easy to carry out such regulations effectively, and that much friction and dissatisfaction was produced by them. It seems probable also that, with the trade in parchment as in other trades, the attempt to secure uniformity of price, irrespective of the conditions of manufacture or of the market, had the effect not infrequently of lessening the supply and of causing sales to be made surreptitiously at increased prices.

After the use of parchment had in large part been replaced by paper made of linen, the supplies of Paris came principally from Lombardy. Later, however, paper-mills were erected in France, the first being at Troyes and Esson. These earlier paper manufacturers were, like the book-dealers in Paris, made free from tax. This exemption was contested from time to time by the farmers of the taxes and had to be renewed by successive ordinances. Later, the university associated with its body, in the same manner as had been done with the parchment-dealers, the manufacturers and dealers in paper, and confirmed them in the possession of the privileges previously enjoyed by the librarii and stationarii. The privileges of the paper manufacturers extended, however, outside of Paris, which was, of course, not the case with the librarii.

While, in connection with the requirements of the university and the special privileges secured through university membership, the book-trade of Paris and the trades associated with it secured a larger measure of importance as compared with the trade of the provinces than was the case in either Italy or Germany, there came into existence as early as the middle of the fourteenth century a considerable trade in manuscripts in various provincial centres.