Books and their makers during the Middle Ages

by George Haven Putnam

Issues concerning personal rights arising between the members of the university were decided before the tribunal or court of the Rector. Cases affecting realty, and all cases between the members and outsiders, were tried before the Conservateurs des Priviléges, an authority of necessity favourably disposed to the members of the university. The ground assigned for this privilege was that instructors and pupils, and those engaged in aiding their work (i. e. the makers of books), should not be exposed to loss of valuable time by being called away from their work to distant parts.[279] An edict of Philip Augustus, in 1200, confirmed by S. Louis in 1229, and by Philip the Fair in 1302, directed that the cases of university members be brought before the Bishop of Paris. The university found disadvantages in being under the jurisdiction of the Bishop (whose censorship later proved particularly troublesome for the publishers), and applications were made to replace the authority of the ecclesiastical courts with that of the royal courts. In 1334, letters-patent of Philip of Valois directed the provost of Paris, who was at that time conservateur of the royal privileges, to take the university under his special protection, and in 1341 the members of the university were forbidden to enter proceedings before any other authority. In 1361, under an edict of King John, the members of the university were again declared exempt from taxes and assessments of all kinds (portes, gabelles, impositions, aides, et subsides). The repetition from reign to reign of certain edicts and regulations such as the above does not imply that the earlier ones had been recalled, but that they had to some extent fallen into desuetude, or that attempts had been made to override them.

By letters-patent issued in 1369, Charles V. declared that all dealers in books and makers of books required for the use of “our scholars” should be exempt from all taxes, etc. The exemption included binders, illuminators, parchment-makers, etc. It appears that some abuses had crept in under this exemption, as in 1384 it was ordered that no book-dealers should be freed from taxes if they carried on for gain any other occupation.[280]

The policy of favouring the production and sale of books by freeing the publishers and dealers from taxes and other burdens was continued and even developed after the introduction of printing. The kings, impressed with the possibilities of this great discovery, recognised that it was for the interest of the realm to free books, printed or written, not only from octroi or city duties, but from customs or importation charges. Letters-patent of Henry II., dated 1553, read as follows: Avons ordonné et ordonnons lesdits livres, escrits ou imprimez, reliez ou non reliez, estre et demeurer exempts desdits droits de traicte foraine, Domaine forain et haut passage.[281] This was a more liberal policy than at that time prevailed in Italy or in England, or, in fact, than has as yet been accepted in the nineteenth century by the United States. In order to obtain the advantage of such exemption, the publishers had to secure from the Rector of the university a passport or certificate for their packages.

One of the earlier regulations of the university affecting the book-trade was that under which the supervision of the sale of parchment was left in the hands of the Rector. This sale was usually authorised only at the annual Lendit fair. The dealers, bringing their parchment, exposed this for inspection. Before any other purchases were permitted, the Rector selected the quantity needed for the university, for which payment was made at a price fixed in advance. He then received from the parchment-dealers, for the treasury of the university, or for the special fund of the book guild, a gratuity which amounted to from two thousand to three thousand francs.

In Paris, as in Bologna, during the whole of the thirteenth century and the first portion of the fourteenth, the principal work of the university book-dealers was not the selling but the renting of books. The regulations concerning the division of manuscripts into chapters or peciæ were, however, not carried out with the same precision in Paris as in the Italian universities, nor was it practicable to exercise in the larger city, or even within the confines of the Latin Quarter, as close a supervision as in Bologna or Padua over the rates for renting and over the stock of copies kept by the stationarii. The general purpose of the regulations was, however, the same, and the routine of renting prices and the general rate of commission on the books sold were, as said, matters of university regulation. With a community of students ranging in number from ten thousand to (in the most prosperous days of the university) as high as thirty thousand, the monopoly of supplying text-books, whether through sale or through renting, must have constituted an important business. It was not until some time after the introduction of printing that the importance and prospect of profit of publishing done outside of the university limits, and freed from a portion of the university restrictions, came to be sufficient to make it worth while for certain of the more enterprising of the printers to give up the trade in text-books and their privileges as libraires jurés and to establish themselves as independent dealers.

In the University of Paris we find in use in the twelfth century, in addition to the terms librarii, stationarii, and petiarii, the term mangones. The word mango originally designated a merchant or dealer, but appears to have carried an implication of untrustworthiness or slipperiness. It is satisfactory, therefore, to understand that mangones very speedily went out of use as a name for dealers in books.[282] The petiarii are not mentioned in the statutes of the university, where they appear to be replaced by the parcheminii.[283]

Guérard interprets the term stationarius as standing first for a scribe with a fixed location (un écrivain sédentaire), as opposed to a copyist who was prepared to accept work in any place where it could be secured. Later, the term was understood to designate a master scribe who directed the work of a bureau of copyists; and still later, the stationarius, sometimes then called stationarius librorum, possessed a complete book-making establishment, where were employed, in addition to the copyists, the illuminators, binders, and other artisans. At this stage of his development, the stationarius has become the equivalent of the printer-publisher of a later generation. Guérard is inclined to limit the earlier use in Paris of the term librarius to the keeper of a shop in which books were kept for sale, but in which no book-production was carried on.[284] It is evident, however, that in France, as in Italy, there was no very definite or consistent use of the several terms, and that before the introduction of printing, librarius and stationarius were applied almost indifferently to dealers having to do either with the production or with the sale of books. Chassant is authority for the statement that at the time of the introduction of printing into France there were in the two cities of Paris and Orleans more than ten thousand individual scribes or copyists who gained their living with their pens.[285] It is not surprising that the first printers, whose diabolical invention took the bread away from these workers, had their lives threatened and their work interrupted.

The letters-patent of Charles V., dated November 5, 1368, specify fourteen libraires and eleven écrivains (employing stationarii) as at that time registered in Paris. No one was admitted to the profession of librarius or stationarius who was not a man of approved standing and character, and who had not also given evidence of an adequate and scholarly knowledge of manuscript interpretation and of the subject to which he proposed to give attention. The examination was made before the four chief publishers (les quatre grands libraires). Having secured the approval of the board of publishers, the applicant was obliged to secure also acceptance from the representatives of the Rector, and to submit certain guarantees for the satisfactory performance of his responsibilities. He was called upon to submit, for himself and heirs, all his property as well as his person to the control of the court of Paris as a pledge for the execution of his trust. As late as 1618, in the reign of Charles IX., the master printers (i. e., printer-publishers) were obliged to hold certificates from the Rector and the university, to the effect that they were skilled in the art of printing, and that they possessed full knowledge of Latin and of Greek.

The libraires jurés comprised two classes, the libraires grands (officium magni librariatus), and the libraires petits (officium parvi librariatus).[286] The immediate responsibility for the government of the body rested with the four chief libraires (les quatre grands libraires). It was they who fixed the prices for the sale or hire of manuscripts, and who supervised the examination of manuscripts with reference, first, as to their admission into the official list of the university texts, and, secondly, as to the completeness and accuracy of the particular parchment submitted. They also inspected the book-shops and the workrooms of the copyists, and verified from time to time the accuracy and the quality of the copies prepared from these accepted texts; they passed upon the qualifications of applicants for the position of libraire juré; and, finally, they exercised a general supervision over the enforcement of all the university regulations affecting the book-trade, and gave special attention to those prohibiting any interference with this trade by an outside dealer, one who was not a libraire juré. These four chief libraires were each under a bond or “caution” for the amount of 200 livres. In addition to the exemption from general taxes and guard duty conceded to all the libraires jurés, these four enjoyed from time to time certain special privileges. In October, 1418, by a regulation of Charles VI., the four chief libraires are exempted by name from certain special duties on wine, etc., which had been imposed for the purpose of securing funds pour la recouvrance de nos Villes et Chastel de Monstreau ou Faut-Yonne.[287] It was also necessary for him to find two responsible bondsmen for an amount of not less than 100 livres each.[288][289] In Bologna in 1400 the bond was also fixed at 200 livres, the equivalent of 5065 francs.[290]

The special obligations imposed upon and accepted by the librarii and stationarii, as specified in documents between the years 1250 and 1350, can be summarised as follows: