Illustrated books -- Bibliography; Illustration of books; Printing -- History
One result of all this controversy is that the whole series of books and
fragments have been dubbed "Costeriana," and the convenience of having a
general name for them is so great that it has been generally adopted,
even by those who have no belief in the theory which it implies. All
that is known of Lourens Janszoon Coster is that he resided at Haarlem
from 1436 to 1483, and that contemporary references show him to have
been a chandler and innkeeper, without making any mention of his having
added printing to his other occupations.
It is difficult to claim more for the story told by Junius than that it
represents an unknown quantity of fact with various legendary additions.
It is difficult to dismiss it as less than a legend which must have had
some element of fact as its basis. In so far as it goes beyond the
statements of the Cologne Chronicle, it is supported only by the
evidence that Coster and the venerable bookbinder Cornelis existed, and
that the latter bound the account-books of Haarlem Cathedral. But no
indiscretion of Hadrianus Junius writing in 1568 can affect the credit
of the statements made in the Cologne Chronicle in 1499 on the
authority of Ulrich Zell, and we have now to mention an important piece
of evidence in favour of Zell's accuracy. This is the entry in the
diaries of Jean de Robert, Abbot of Saint Aubert, Cambrai, of the
purchase in 1446 and again in 1451 of a copy of the _Doctrinale_ of
Alexander Gallus, _jete en moule_, a phrase which, while far from
satisfactory as a description of a book printed from movable type,
cannot possibly refer to editions printed from woodblocks, even if these
existed. The _Doctrinale_, which was in verse, was a less popular
school-book than the _Donatus_. It is significant that among the
so-called "Costeriana" there are eight editions of the one against
twenty of the other. Where the _Doctrinale_ was used we may be sure that
the _Donatus_ would be used also, and in greater numbers, so that this
mention of a "mould-casted" _Doctrinale_ as purchased as early as 1446
is a real confirmation of Zell's assertion. We have no sufficient ground
for believing that any of the fragments, either of the one book or the
other, now in existence were produced as early as this. It is of the
nature of school-books to be destroyed, and every improvement in the
process of production would help to drive the earlier experiments out of
existence. But taking Zell's statement and the entries in the Abbot's
diaries together, it seems impossible to deny that there is evidence of
some kind of printing being practised in Holland not long after 1440.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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