[500] Aüsseres bucher-wesen. Savigny, iii. 532.
[501] Hist. Litt. de la France, ix. 142.
[502] Du Cange, in voc.
[503] The librarii were properly those who transcribed new books; the Antiquarii old ones. This distinction is as old as Cassiodorus; but doubtless it was not strictly observed in later times. Muratori, Dissert. 43. Du Cange.
[504] Crevier, ii. 66, 130, et alibi. Du Cange, in voc. Stationarii, Librarii. Savigny, iii. 532-548. Chevillier, 302. Eichhorn, ii. 531. Meiners, Vergleich der Sitten, ii. 539. Greswell’s Parisian Press, p. 8.
The parliament of Paris, on the petition of the copyists, ordered some of the first printed books to be seized. Lambinet calls this superstition; it was more probably false compassion, and regard for existing interests, combined with dislike of all innovation. Louis XI., however, who had the merit of esteeming literature, evoked the process to the counsel of state, who restored the books. Lambinet, Hist. de l’Imprimerie, p. 172.
Books sold by printers. 145. The first printers were always booksellers, and sold their own impressions. These occupations were not divided till the early part of the sixteenth century.[505] But the risks of sale, at a time when learning was by no means general, combined with the great cost of production, paper and other materials being very dear, rendered this a hazardous trade. We have a curious petition of Sweynheim and Pannartz to Sixtus IV., in 1472, wherein they complain of their poverty, brought on by printing so many works, which they had not been able to sell. They state the number of impressions of each edition. Of the classical authors they had generally printed 275; of Virgil and the philosophical works of Cicero, twice that number. In theological publications the usual number of copies had also been 550. The whole number of copies printed was 12,475.[506] It is possible that experience made other printers more discreet in their estimation of the public demand. Notwithstanding the casualties of three centuries, it seems from the great scarcity of these early editions, which has long existed, that the original circulation must have been much below the number of copies printed, as indeed the complaint of Sweynheim and Pannartz shows.[507]
[505] Conversations-Lexicon, art. Buchhandlung.
[506] Maittaire. Lambinet, p. 166. Beckmann, iii. 119, erroneously says that this was the number of volumes remaining in their warehouses.
[507] Lambinet says, that the number of impressions did not generally exceed three hundred, p. 197. Even this seems large, compared with the present scarcity of books unlikely to have been destroyed by careless use.