[68] In a book of notes, left with one Gerlach, and afterwards purchased by Johan Rot, the brother in all probability of Berthold Rot, the first printer at Basle, there occurs the following memorandum, in Schœffer’s own handwriting:--“Hic est finis omnium librorum tam veteris quam nove logice, completi per me Petrum de Gernszheim, alias Moguncia, anno M.CCCC.XLIX, in gloriosissima Universitate Parisiensi.”--(HUMPHREYS, p. 84.) His name, variously spelt as Schöffer, Schœffer, Schoiffer, and Schoiffher, and signifying in English, _Shepherd_, is sometimes printed in its Latin form, _Opilio_. [69] “Petrus autem memoratus Opilio ... homo ingeniosus et prudens, faciliorem modum fundendi caracteres excogitavit, et artem ut nunc est complevit.” [70] “John Schœffer says, at the conclusion of the _Historia Francorum_, printed in 1515, that the inventor did indeed commence the art of printing in 1450; but did not perfect and bring it to the stage when the use of the press was required until 1452.”--_vide_ WETTER, p. 350. Referring the date 1450 to the original contract with Faust, this statement shews that at least two years, possibly nearly three, were spent in the preparatory arrangements, casting and cutting the letters, &c. before a single page of the Latin Bible was printed. [71] Letters made of copper or tin alone would scarcely be hard enough to use as punches, except for plaster moulds; but a mixture of metals forming brass, of which several writers say the first cut metal types were made, would answer the purpose, and could be struck into blocks of soft copper or tin without the slightest difficulty. At a pinch, however, Benjamin Franklin has shewn that even with ordinary types, matrices of lead can be made and used with success: “Our printing house,” he writes, “often wanted sorts, and there was no letter-foundry in America; I had seen types cast at James’s in London, but without much of attention to the manner; however, I contrived a mould, and made use of the letters we had as puncheons, struck the matrices in lead, and thus supplied in a pretty tolerable way the deficiencies.” [72] The word _fount_, here used to indicate a complete set of types, was originally _fund_, and signified a casting or founding of type. Hence also the terms founder and foundry, derived, like the former, from the Latin _fundo_.