Caxton’s pedigree is quite unknown, no trace of any of his relatives, except a married daughter, having been discovered. The “William Caxton” who was buried in 1478, in the church of St. Margaret, Westminster, is asserted by some biographers to have been the father of our printer. This may be possible; but no relationship can be assumed from mere identity of name, for Caxtons, Caustons, or Cauxtons are to be found in many parts of England during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. William de Caxtone owned a house in the parish of St. Mary Abchurch, London, in 1311: a man of the same name paid his tax to the City authorities in 1441: and there was a family of Caxtons famous for centuries as merchants at Norwich, who used as their trade-mark three Cakes and a Tun. The will of Robert Caxton, alias Causton, is preserved at Canterbury; and at Sandwich, Tuxford, Newark, Beckenham, Westerham, and frequently in the early records of London does the name appear. The will of John Caxton, of Canterbury, likewise still exists: he was “of the parish of St. Alphage, Mercer,” and left to the church some wooden “deskys,” upon which the following device may still be seen. [Illustration: Device of John Caxton] When was Caxton born? To this question a more satisfactory answer can be given, for the date of his apprenticeship has fortunately been preserved in the records of the Mercers’ Company. It has generally been assumed that 1412 was the date of his birth, upon the sole ground that Caxton himself complained, in 1471, that he was growing old and weak, from which the inference has been drawn that he must then have seen at least sixty years. That this date, however, must be advanced is proved by the following extract from the earliest volume of the “Wardens’ Accounts” in the Archives of the Mercers’ Company. The entry occurs in a list of fees for the binding and enrolment of apprentices “pur lan deūnt passe cest assauoir des Fest de Saynt John Bap^{te} lan xvj du Roy Henr sisme;” that is, “for the year last passed that is to say from the Feast of St. John Baptist in the 16th year of King Henry VI [June 24, 1438],” and is literally as follows:-- Entres des Appñtices. Item John large, } les appñtices de Item Will’m Caxston, } Robert Large iiij s We have here recorded the interesting fact that in 1438 Caxton was apprenticed to Robert Large. It is the first genuine date in his life with which we are acquainted, and affords us a starting-point from which can be reckoned, with some degree of certainty, the date of his birth.