15th Century Reading, Writing

Publication

Education: Path to the Top

1387 William Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester– Winchester College (open 1394)– New College, Oxford (open 1386)

Winchester College

Winchester College Chapel

Path to the Top

• Henry VI– 1440 Eton College (The King's College of Our Lady

of Eton besides Wyndsor)– education to 70 poor boys– 1441 King's College, Cambridge– Linked in 1443

Eton College Chapel

Wall Paintings, Eton College Chapel (1479-87; whitewashed 1560; restored 1923)

Writers

Followers of Chaucer• John Gower (1330-1408)• Thomas Hoccleve (1368-1426)• John Lydgate of Bury (c. 1370 – c. 1451)

Gower — Poetry

Mirroir de l'Omme (French)Vox Clamantis (Latin)– State of England

Confessio Amantis (English)– Morality approached through

tales of immorality

Hoccleve — Poems

• Moral and religious poetry• Regiment of Princes or De

Regimine Principum– Written for Henry V

Lydgate — Poems

1412 The Troy Book for Prince Henry

~1420 Siege of Thebes

Translations from French for Warwick, Salisbury and Alice Chaucer

Poems for illustrations or pageants

1431 The Fall of Princes for Duke Humphrey

Writers

Translators• William Caxton

Adaptation of French Tales• Thomas Malory

Drama• Mystery plays (York), morality plays (Castle of

Perseverance, Everyman)• Medwall

Sir Thomas Malory Le Morte Darthur, composed in Newgate Prison, London between March 1469 and March 1470, perhaps suspected of supporting Warwick against Edward IV

Malory earlier charged with extortion, theft, rape, cattle rustling, robbery of the local abbey, and deer stealing and enormous damage to property

The hoole booke of kyng Arthur & of his noble knyghtes of the rounde table,

Libraries: Oxford

1320’s Beginning of Bishop Cobham Library1444 Begin library to house ~280 books from Humphrey of Gloucester (finish 1488)

1598 Begin Bodleian after Reformation purge

Libraries: Oxford

1379 New College (William of Wyckham): 246 volumes1439 All Souls College (Henry Chichele, Archbishop of Canterbury): 370 volumes1458 Magdalen College (William Waynflete, Bishop of Winchester): 800 volumes by 1480s1814 Library of Congress (Jefferson): 6,487

Libraries: Cambridge

1440: 122 volumes, only one by a Roman, Lucan1473: 330 volumes including Ovid, the younger Seneca, Cicero, Josephus, and Petrarch

Chained Libraries

• Bequests specify books be chained

• 1412 Oxford forbids talking in the library

Hereford

1439 Oxford Library - Fines

“for the better custody of the said books every of them shall be priced appreciably beyond the true value, which value every one taking one of the books on loan shall, if he lose it, be bound to pay to the chest”

Pecia system

Originally devised at the University of Bologna

• Master edits, corrects, and submits text to a stationer

• Stationer copies from it an exemplar in peciae (individual sections)

• Submits it to the University for approval and pricing

• Stationer rents peciae to students• Students make their own copies

Pecia system features in Paris

• Text is written in double columns and is also heavily abbreviated

• Little decoration: chapter headings, initials, and paragraph marks in red and blue inks; main text in black ink.

• Pecia mark: letter ‘p’ or the complete word

Manuscript with pecia mark

Publication Industry

• Parchment makers: Guild at York• Scribes• Illuminators and rubricators• Binders (and repairers)• Stationers – sales

Money and Books

• Used as security for loans• Typical payments

Scribe: 1s/3000 words ~3000 words/dayIllumination/rubrication: from 6d for a text to over

£20 for an elaborate service bookBinder: 3s 3d per volume Parchment: ~ ½ the cost of the book

De Civitate Dei £1 to £2

Media

• Switch from wool to linen underwear• Waste from linen production• Rag paper

(Spain Italy France)• 1490 First paper mill in England

Book Ownership

This boke is myne, Eleanor Worcester

An I yt lose, and yow yt fynd I pray yow hartely to be so kynd That yow wel take a letil payne To se my boke is brothe home

agayneDuchess of Worcester, 1440

John Paston’s Books

Often several works bound togetherKing ArthurTranslation of Christine de Pizan’s Othea (stories

based on Greek and Roman mythology)Two copies of The Parliament of BirdsLife of St. ChristopherTwo books of Cicero (one w. illegible print)Books on knighthood and his own arms

Women and Books

• Because of their exclusion from scholarship and clerical life, women had an even greater need for the mental and spiritual nourishment offered by books than men did.

• They were the primary teachers of the next generation.

• They played an important role in development of vernacular literature because of lack of Latin.

Gutenberg

Type Letter carved into hard metal punch.Pressed into copper and a mold made.

Type cast in lead

Ink lamp black and linseed oil, as well as walnut oil, turpentine oil, pine resin, cinnabar and other substances.Press Based on wine or paper press

Spread of Printing

1455 J. Gutenberg , 42-line Bible, Mainz.c.1460 J. Mentelin, started printing in Strassburg.c.1465 Printing in Cologne.1470 Printing in Paris.1476 Printing in England (Westminster).

William Caxton (1416-91)

~ 1430 Apprenticed to Mercers’ Company• Involved with the Merchant Adventurers'

Company, an association of merchants involved in the import–export trade.

1465 Governor for English in Bruges1471 In Cologne

William CaxtonMerchant, Translator, Publisher, Printer

Caxton

• Translation of Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye from French to English

• Association with Burgundian court for manuscripts or financial support

• 1472 Co-publisher with Veldener of Bartholomaeus Anglicus's De proprietatibus rerum

Margaret of YorkDuchess of Burgundy “ordered him to finish the translation and to improve his style,”

Print Shop

From the Danse macabre [Lyons: Mathias Huss], 18 Feb. 1499 [/1500?]. The British Library IB.41735

Caxton presents a book to Margaret of Burgundy

Preface, Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye

Caxton Publications in Bruges

1473 Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye1474 The Game and Playe of the ChessePublications in FrenchAfter 1476 Les Fais et Prouesses du noble et vaillant chevalier Jason

Possibly printed by Colard Mansion

1478 Game of Chess 1483

1475 Caxton in England

• Westminster The Canterbury Tales• 1477 Dictes or Sayengis of the Philosophres, first

dated book• Published and printed 18 of his own translations from

the French• Published and printed 68 works, often with prologues

and epilogues• Printed 10 works• Published some works printed abroad and printed

documents and indulgences

1st edition, Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales.William Caxton ~1377

British Library

ClerkThe Canterbury Tales1483, 2nd edition

Caxton 1485Malory Morte Darthur

Smudge of a mirrored I from Caxton’s page with wet ink

Dictes or Sayengis of the Philosophres“Anthony Rivers presenting his own book to Edward IV”

Chronicles of England

• Smaller type• Straight line endings• Printed in

signatures• Rubrications hand-

done to aid reader

Lyme Missal1487 Guillaume MaynyalPrinted for Caxton

Caxton’s Publications

• 68% English – No competition

• 28% Latin (~1/3 are single sheet)– Competition from books printed abroad

• 4% French• 106 works; at least 28 his own translations• 528 extant copies; 128 fragments

Changing Language

• Caxton noted that some had complained he:“could not be understood by the common people, and they wished me to use old and homely terms in my translations”

• But “certainly the language now used is very different from that which was used and spoken when I was born.”

• “therefore, as a compromise, I have translated this book into an English which is neither too coarse nor too refined, but using phrases which are understandable, God willing”

Language

“Loo what should a man in these days now write [...] certainly it is hard to please every man because of diversity & change of language. For in these days every man that is any reputation in his country will utter his communication and matters in such manners & termes that few men shall understand then”

Caxton Patronage - York

Dedicate History of Jason to Edward, Prince of Wales, briefly Edward V)

1483 Part of the edition of the Legenda aurea for William FitzAlan, Earl of Arundel

1484 Translation of the Ordre of Chyvalry or Knyghthode dedicated to Richard III

Caxton Patronage - Tudor

1489 Translate & print a romance Blanchardyn and Eglantine for Margaret of Beaufort

1489 Christine de Pisan’s Faits d’armes et de chevalerie for Henry VII

1490 Printing the statutes enacted by the first three Parliaments of Henry VII (in English)

Blank indulgence filled in: Simon Mountford & wife, 1480

Punctuation

Inconsistently usedParagraph mark (¶)Punctus (.) long pauseVirgile (/) short pauseColon (:) syntactic pause

Other Publishers

• John Lettou (fl. 1475-83, Lithuania?) • William de Machlinia, (fl. 1482-90, Brabant)• Richard Pynson (1449, Normandy−1529)• William Paques, appointed King’s printer, 1504• Wynken de Worde (d. 1535), successor to

Caxton

Wynken de Worde

1490s Reprints of Caxton

1496 First use of English paper

Treatise of Love, translation of French devotional tracts; Chastising of God's Children, a guide for a woman religious by her spiritual adviser

Scala perfectionis, verse in rhyme royal stanzas

Moved press from Westminster to London

~1100 editions of religious, popular and educational books; English poetry

Malory Le Morte d’Arthur, Wynken de Worde, 1498

Pynson

1495 Hecra Terence1506 King’s printer1518 First copyright1521 Assertio septem sacramentorum, opposition to Martin Luther omposed in part by Henry VIII • Pagination, Roman type, two colors,

catchwords

18th century woodcut from unknown artist

Metal block device

English Publishing Status in the 15th Century

English Language Books

Book Production – Manuscripts and Printed[Printed Books 1501-50 ~2.8 million]

Buringh, Eltjo, and Jan Luiten Van Zanden. "Charting the “Rise of the West”: Manuscripts and Printed Books in Europe, a long-term Perspective from the Sixth through Eighteenth Centuries." The Journal of Economic History 69.02 (2009): 409-445.

Per capita annual manuscript production(per million) (15th century)

British Isles 485France 920Italy 1675Netherlands 2150Belgium 5721

Per capita consumption of printed books(per million) (1454-1500)

British Isles 485France 920Italy 1675Netherlands 2150Belgium 5721

Books and Education

• John Stanbridge Parvula– grammar for 1st and 2nd forms

~26 printings from 1496-1539• Stanbridge Vulgaria 1508+– Latin words and phrases for ordinary life

• Os, faces, mentum– Latin vocabulary: editions in Antwerp, Paris, Rouen

and London• Stanbridge Sum, es, fui 1509+– Grammar and exercises

Peruula John Stanhope How to Learn Latin

The Fox and the Grapes The Fox and the CatCaxton, The Fables of Aesop, 1484

Instruction outside of school for boys and girls

Touch not with meat salt in the cellar,Lest folk appoint you with uncunningnessDress it apart, upon a clean trencher Force not your mouth too full for wantonness Lean not upon the table, for that is rudeAnd if I shall to you plainly say,Over the table you shall not spit convey

Caxton - The Boke of Curtesye - 1477

Of Her that Eat the Eele and Plumed [plucked] her Pye [Magpie]

I shall tell to you an example of the fate of women that eat the good morsels behind their husbands’ [back].

Caxton - The Knight in the Tower, 1483

Books that parents are warned about (“open mans slaughter and bold bawdry”)

Pynson Guy of Warwick– An adventure tale

~1500

Meeting a Need of Readers: Spectaculum

Vlissengen, Netherlands

London

Consequences of the early press

• Foster a national identity as more people became aware of foreign ideas in translated works

• Increase in mass communications• Literacy acquires status

Consequences - Language

• Spelling was loose but became more and more fixed in printing while spoken English changed more rapidly

• Movement toward a nationwide standard based on the language of the London region

Political/Economic Consequences

• Statutes available in full and abridged forms• European cities with printing presses by 1500

had higher growth rates from 1500-1600– They were more likely to become Protestant