Books and their makers during the Middle Ages

by George Haven Putnam

Kirchhoff points out that the dealers of this time, among others Vespasiano himself, were sometimes termed chartularii, a term indicating that dealers in books were interested also in the sale of paper and probably of other writing materials. The Italian word cartolajo specifies a paper-dealer or perhaps more nearly a stationer in the modern signification of the term.

The influx of Greek scholars into Italy began some years before the fall of Constantinople. Some of these scholars came from towns in Asia Minor, which had fallen under the rule of the Turks before the capture of Constantinople. When the Turkish armies crossed the Bosphorus, a number of the Greeks seem to have lost hope at a comparatively early date of being able to defend the Byzantine territory, and had betaken themselves with such property as they could save to various places of refuge in the south of Europe, and particularly in Italy. As described in other chapters, many of these exiles brought with them Greek manuscripts, and in some cases these codices were not only important as being the first copies of the texts brought to the knowledge of European scholars, but were of distinctive interest and value as being the oldest examples of such texts in existence.

The larger number of the exiles who selected Italy as their place of refuge found homes and in many cases scholarly occupation, not in the university towns so much as in the great commercial centres, such as Venice and Florence. Many of these Greeks were accepted as instructors in the families of nobles or of wealthy merchants, while others made use of their manuscripts either through direct sale, through making transcripts for sale, or through the loan of the originals to the manuscript-dealers.

A little later these manuscripts served as material and as “copy” for the editions of the Greek classics issued by Aldus and his associates, the first thoroughly edited and carefully printed Greek books that the world had known. It was partly as a cause and partly as an effect of the presence of so many scholarly Greeks, that the study of Greek language, literature, and philosophy became fashionable among the so-called higher circles of Italian society during the last half of the fifteenth century.

The interest in Greek literature had, however, as pointed out, begun nearly twenty-five years earlier. As there came to be some knowledge of the extent of the literary treasures of classic Greece which had been preserved in the Byzantine cities, not a few of the more enterprising dealers in manuscripts, and many also of the wealthier and more enterprising of the scholarly noblemen and merchants, themselves sent emissaries to search the monasteries and cities of the East for further manuscripts which could be purchased.

One reason, apparently, for the preference given by the Greeks to Venice and Florence over Bologna and Padua was the fact that the two great universities were devoted, as we have seen, more particularly to the subjects of law, theology, and medicine, subjects in which the learning of the Greeks could be of little direct service.[333] The philosophy and the poetry which formed the texts of the lectures given by the Greek scholars attracted many zealous and earnest students, but these students came, as stated, largely outside of the university circles. The doctors of law and the doctors of theology were among the last of the Italian scholars to be interested in Homeric poetry or in the theories of the Greek metaphysicians.

Towards the middle of the fifteenth century and a few years before the introduction of printing, a new term came to be used for dealers in manuscripts. The scribes had in many cases naturally associated their business interests with those of the makers of paper,—cartolaji, and the latter name came to be applied not only to the paper manufacturers, but to the purchasers of the paper upon which books were inscribed. In some cases the paper-makers, or cartolaji, appear themselves to have organised staffs of scribes through whose labour their own raw material could be utilised, while the name of paper-maker,—cartolajo, came to be used to describe the entire concern.

After the introduction into Italy of printing, the association of the paper-makers with books became still more important, and not a few of the original printer-publishers were formerly paper manufacturers, and continued this branch of trade while adding to it the work of manufacturing books. Among such paper-making publishers is to be noted Francesco Cartolajo, who was in business in Florence in 1507, and whose surname was, of course, derived from the trade in which his family had for some generations been engaged. Bonaccorsi turned his paper-making establishment in Florence into a printing-office and book manufactory as early as 1472, and Montali, in Parma, took the same course in 1482; Di Sasso who, in 1481, came into association with the Brothers Brushi, united his printing-office with their paper factory.

Fillippo Giunta, one of the earlier publishers in Florence, calls himself librarius et cartolajus. It is possible that he reversed the business routine above referred to, and united a paper factory with his printing-office.

One result of the influx of Greek scholars, many of whom were themselves skilled scribes while others brought with them scribes, was the multiplying of the number of writers available for work and a corresponding reduction in the cost of such work.