The English provincial printers, stationers and bookbinders to 1557Duff, E. Gordon (Edward Gordon)
History
The English provincial printers, stationers and bookbinders to 1557
Duff, E. Gordon (Edward Gordon)
Book industries and trade -- Great Britain; Printing -- Great Britain -- History
Siberch’s fifth book, _Erasmus De conscribendis epistolis_, was issued
in October 1521. This is a more important book in point of size than
any which preceded it, containing eighty leaves, whereas the largest of
the others only ran to twenty. It also shows certain marks of advance.
We find for the first time a frequent use of fine initial letters,
and it is the first book for which the printer obtained a privilege,
unfortunately not printed in full. Four copies of this book are known,
two in the British Museum, and two in Cambridge College Libraries, St
John’s and Corpus. The last copy has the additional interest of being
bound by a contemporary Cambridge stationer, Nicholas Speryng, and
bears his mark and initials on the binding.
The Erasmus was followed by Galen _De Temperamentis_, translated from
the Greek by Linacre. This is the commonest of Siberch’s books, at
least twelve copies being known, but some of these show important
variations. The first intention seems to have been to issue the _De
Temperamentis_ alone, and it was so printed off on sixty-six leaves,
with the signatures A⁴, Q⁶. Later it was determined to add another
small treatise _De inequali intemperie_, so the last two leaves of
the first issue, containing the end of the _De Temperamentis_ were
cancelled, and two new sheets R⁴ and S⁶ added. Finally a preliminary
quire of eight leaves was printed, making the complete book consist
of seventy-four leaves. One copy of the first state is known, first
noticed by Mr Bowes in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, in 1894.
On the verso of the penultimate leaf is a woodcut of the Adoration
of the Shepherds and the colophon, on the verso of the last leaf the
small block of the Royal arms and the date 1521. A transitional copy,
containing the first issue with the end uncancelled, but the additional
sheets added, is in the library of the Royal College of Physicians.
All the remaining copies are of the revised issue. In it the last two
leaves are mainly occupied with a list of the errata which had been
found in the _De Temperamentis_, and on the verso of the last leaf is
the device of the Royal arms. The woodcut of the Shepherds found in
the early copies has not as yet been traced to an earlier source. It
is apparently Low Country work of the fifteenth century; Sir Martin
Conway ascribes it to about the year 1485.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account