Books and their makers during the Middle Ages : $b A study of the conditions of the production and distribution of literature from the fall of the Roman Empire to the close of the seventeenth century, Vol. IPutnam, George Haven
History
Books and their makers during the Middle Ages : $b A study of the conditions of the production and distribution of literature from the fall of the Roman Empire to the close of the seventeenth century, Vol. I
Putnam, George Haven
Books -- History -- 400-1450; Copyright; Freedom of the press -- History -- To 1500; Manuscripts; Printers
After 1456, under the enactment of the congregation of the university,
each manuscript dealer and paper dealer was called upon to pay to the
Rector of the university at the time of his acceptance and license a
_scutum_ of gold.
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.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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