The new Greek press, thus furnished, was in due time settled in London, at the King’s Printing House in Blackfriars, and from its types was printed, in 1637, Patrick Young’s Catena on Job,[250] “in as curious a letter,” says Bagford, “as any book extant.” In this interesting work, from which we here give a facsimile, two Greek founts are used, the larger being a handsome Double Pica,[251] not dissimilar to that in which Estienne’s great folio Greek Testament was printed in Paris. The smaller fount, a Great Primer, bears so close a resemblance to the fount used in the Eton Chrysostom, that it is probable it may have been cast abroad from the same matrices. The Double Pica Roman and Italic used in the work are the same as those employed by Day in the preface to the Ælfredi in 1574; the matrices having apparently been secured by the Archbishop for the use of the Royal press.
Although Laud’s project for the establishment of a Greek press at Oxford, similar to that in London, was not fully realised, his efforts on behalf of the University and its press continued unabated. In 1635 he presented his fine collection of Oriental Manuscripts, and established a Chair of Arabic, which greatly encouraged and promoted the study and printing of works in that and other Eastern languages. This favour he followed up with a gift of Oriental types, which is alluded to in a letter from John Greaves to Dr. Peter Turner, dated 1637.[252] Greaves approves of the bargain formed by the proctor’s brother, Mr. Browne, for the purchase at Leyden[253] of some printing types, of probably an {145} Eastern language. The only danger is that some are wanting. Mr. Bedwell, when he bought Raphelengius’s Arabic press, found some characters defective, which he was never able to get supplied. The writer hopes that, “now that Archbishop Laud has taken such care for furnishing the University with all sorts of types, and procuring so many choice MSS. of the Oriental languages, that some will endeavour to make true use of his noble intentions, and publish some of those incomparable pieces of the East, not inferior to the best of the Greeks or Latins.”[254]
In a letter addressed May 5, 1637, to the Vice-Chancellor, the Archbishop himself refers to these recent acquisitions in the following terms:—
“You are now upon a very good way towards the setting up of a learned press; and I like your proposal well to keep your matrices and your letters you have gotten, safe, and in the mean time to provide all other necessaries, that so you may be ready for that work.”[255]
One of the last recorded services of Laud to the Oxford press was the recovery, in 1639, of the Savile Greek Types, which had been clandestinely abstracted by Turner, the University printer. His letter on the subject is characteristic of the fatherly care which he exercised over the interests of the Oxford Press:
“I am informed,” he says, “that under pretence of printing a Greek Chronologer . . . Turner, the printer . . . got into his hands all Sir H. Savil’s Greek letters amounting to a great number, some of them scarce worn. It was in Dr. Pink’s time. I pray speak with the Dr. about it and call Turner to an account before the heads what’s become of them. I doubt Turner’s poverty and knavery together hath made avoidance of them.” Oct. 18, 1639.
“Feb 13th. Turner brought back the Greek letters, and delivered them by weight as he received them: there were not any wanting. He came very unwillingly to it.”[256]
This celebrated Greek fount does not appear to have been much used after this, and no trace of it now remains at the University press.[257]
Unfortunately for the cause of learning at Oxford, as elsewhere, the political troubles of the following years abruptly terminated Laud’s services in that {146} direction, and suspended for a time all further progress in the development of the press.[258]
A revival took place during the Commonwealth, on the appointment, in 1658, of Dr. Samuel Clarke, the learned Orientalist (who a short time previously had assisted in the correction of Walton’s Polyglot), as Archi-Typographus. This responsible functionary was “a person,” so the University Statute ordained, “set over the printers, who shall be well skilled in the Greek and Latin tongues, and in philological studies, . . whose office is to supervise and look after the business of Printing, and to provide at the University expence, all paper, presses, types, etc., to prescribe the module of the letter, the quality of the paper, and the size of the margins, when any book is printed at the cost of the University, and also to correct the errors of the press.”[259] This office was, by the same Statute, annexed to that of superior law bedel, as having less business than the rest.
After the Restoration, printing at Oxford made still greater advances, chiefly through the instrumentality and munificence of Dr. John Fell.