“I, Conrad Homery, doctor, make known by this letter that his Highness my gracious and well-beloved Prince Adolph, Archbishop of Mayence, has graciously caused to be delivered to me the ‘forms,’ characters, tools, and other objects relating to printing, which Johann Gutenberg left at his death, and which belonged to me, and belong to me still; but for the honor and for the pleasure of his Highness, I have bound myself, and am so bound by this letter, never to use them in any other place than in Mayence; and moreover, only to sell them, in preference, to a citizen of this place, who shall offer an equal price with any other. In faith of which declaration, I have appended my seal to this present. Given in the year 1468, the Friday after the festival of St. Matthew (26th February.)” Thus ended the life of JOHN GUTENBERG; the first maker of separable metal TYPES; the inventor of the LETTER PRESS; the Founder of the TYPOGRAPHIC ART. His remains were interred at the church in the convent of the Franciscans near the house Zum Junghen, where, not long after, one of his kinsmen erected a tablet, the inscription on which ran as follows:-- D. O. M. S. IOANNI GENSZFLEISCH ARTIS IMPRESSORIE REPERTORI DE OMNI NATIONE ET LINGUA OPTIME MERITO IN NOMINIS SUI MEMORIAM IMMORTALEM ADAM GELTHUS POSUIT. OSSA EJUS IN ECCLESIA D. FRANCISCI MOGUNTINA FELICITER CUBANT. About forty years later, another tablet was set up at the house Zum Gutenberg, in the inner court of the College of Lawyers, by Ives of Witigen or Venza, doctor of laws, and professor of that University, on which was the following inscription:-- JO. GUTENBERGENSI MOGUNTINO QUI PRIMUS OMNIUM LITERAS AERE IMPRIMENDAS INVENIT, HAC ARTE DE ORBE TOTO BENE MERENTI IVO WITIGISIS HOC SAXUM PRO MONUMENTO POSUIT M.D.VIII. The learned Wimpheling, his contemporary, also commemorated his memory in the following eloquent epigram:-- “Fœlix _Ansicare_, per te Germania fœlix, Omnibus in terris prœmia laudis habet. Urbe Moguntina, divino fulte Joannes Ingenio, primus imprimis aere notas. Multum relligio, multum tibi Græca Sophia Et multum debet lingua Latina tibi.”[81] * * * * *