Part 10

An earlier author, Bonetus de Latis, when he came to the end of his “Annulus astronomicus siue de utilitate astrologiae” (Rome, Andreas Freitag, c. 1496; Hain 9926), dedicated to the Pope, had no complaints to make of his printer or of working after office hours, but used the colophon to ask for lenient criticism of any flaws in his Jewish Latin.

Hec sunt, Beatissime Pater, Anuli astronomici puncta peregregia una mecum ad S. tue pedes humillime oblata que positis superciliis hilari uultu, ut spes fovet, recipias. Nec mirum si grammatice methas qui hebreus sum latinitatis expers nonnunquam excesserim. Nolens utile per inutile viciari malui S. T. rosulas uili quam urticas loliumue in preciosa offerre sportula: ut que ad S. T. totiusque reipublice commodum omniumque rerum Opificis laudem utilia comperta sunt ob connexiones verborum enormes non obmitterentur, summa verum auctoritate tua interposita a cunctis patule agnoscerentur.

Parce precor rudibus que sunt errata latine: Lex hebraea mihi est: lingua latina minus.

These notable points of the Astronomical Ring are most humbly offered, most blessed Father, together with myself, at the feet of your Holiness. May you lay aside all disdain and receive them, as hope encourages, with a joyful countenance. Nor is it any wonder if a Hebrew such as I am, with no scholarship in Latin, should sometimes have overstepped the bounds of grammar. In my unwillingness that the useful should be made of no effect by the useless, I preferred to offer to your Holiness rosebuds in a cheap basket rather than nettles or tares in a precious one, so that such useful discoveries as have been made for the advantage of your Holiness and of the whole state, and to the praise of the Artificer of all things, should not be passed over on account of unusual collocations of words, but by the interposition of your authority should be plainly recognized by all.

Be lenient, you who find some Latin flaw: Not Latin I profess, but Hebrew law.

Jacobus Bergomensis, when he finishes his “Supplementum Chronicarum,” can boast proudly of promises performed, and gives not only the dates of its completion and printing, but his own age.

Hic igitur terminum ponam Supplementi historiarum: quam [_sic_] me promisi cum omni veritate traditurum. Nisus autem sum sine errore successiones regum principum et actus eorum: ac virorum in disciplinis excellentium et origines religionum: sicut ex libris hystoricorum descriptio continet. Hoc enim in exordio huius operis me facere compromisi. Perfectum autem per me opus fuit anno salutis nostre 1483. 3º Kalendas Iulii in ciuitate Bergomi: mihi vero a natiuitate quadragesimo nono. Impressum autem hoc opus in inclita Venetiarum ciuitate: per Bernardinum de Benaliis bergomensem eodem anno. die 23º Augusti.

Here, then, I will make an end of the Supplement of Histories, which I promised that I would relate with all truth. Now I have tried to set down without mistake the successions of kings and princes, and the activities of them and of the men who excelled in studies, and the origins of religions as they are embraced in the description taken from the books of the historians. For in the introduction of this work I pledged myself to do this. The work has been finished by me in the year of our salvation 1483, on June 29th, in the city of Bergamo, and as regards myself in the forty-ninth year from my birth. Now this book was printed in the renowned city of Venice by Bernardino dei Benali of Bergamo on August 23d of the same year.

When the “Supplementum Chronicarum” was reprinted in 1485-86, Bergomensis duly altered his statement as to his age to fifty-one and fifty-two. In the 1490 edition the author’s colophon still reads:

Perfectum autem est et denuo castigatum atque auctum per me opus fuit Idibus Octobris: anno a Natali Christiano M.cccc.lxxxvi, in ciuitate nostra Bergomi: mihi vero a natiuitate quinquagesimo secundo.

That of the printer, on the other hand, is duly brought up to date:

Impressum autem Venetiis per Bernardum Rizum de Nouaria anno a Natiuitate domini M.cccc.lxxxx. die decimo quinto Madii, regnante inclito duce Augustino Barbadico.

It is thus evident that with this and later editions Bergomensis, though he lived to be eighty-six, did not concern himself.

An author’s colophon must often have been omitted by the scribe or printer who was copying his book precisely because a double colophon seemed confusing, and the scribe or printer wished to have his own say. Nicolaus de Auximo in his Supplement to the Summa of Pisanella ingeniously forestalled any such tampering by linking his remarks to his exposition of the word “Zelus,” the last which he had to explain. After quoting from the Psalms the text “Zelus domus tue comedit me,” “The zeal of thy house has eaten me up,” he proceeds:

et hic zelus me fratrem Nicolaum de Ausmo, ordinis minorum indignum pro aliquali simpliciorum subsidio ad huius supplementi compilationem quod struente domino nostro Iesu Cristo, excepta tabula capitulorum et abbreuiaturarum et rubricarum expletum est apud nostrum locum prope Mediolanum sancte Marie de Angelis nuncupatum, et uulgariter Sancti Angeli, M.cccc.xliiii, nouembris xxviii, die Sabbati ante aduentum, hora quasi sexta. Et omnia quae in eo ac ceteris opusculis per me compilatis compilandisue incaute seu minus perite posita continentur peritiorum et praesertim sacrosancte ecclesie submitto correctioni, et cetera.

And this zeal hath urged me, Nicholas of Osimo, an unworthy brother of the order of Friars Minor, to the compilation, for some aid of more simple men, of this Supplement, which by the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, save for the table of chapters and abbreviations and rubrics, has been completed at our abode near Milan, called Saint Mary of the Angels, and vulgarly Sant Angelo, in 1444, on November 28, the Saturday before Advent, at about the sixth hour. And both in it and in the other works which either have been or are to be compiled by me, all things which are found stated incautiously or unskilfully I submit to the correction of the better skilled and especially of the Holy Church, etc.

The submission of a book, more particularly a theological one, to the correction of the learned and the church was of course “common form” while the Roman dominion was undisputed, and many colophons containing such phrases could be collected. We must pass on now, however, from authors to editors, taking William Caxton, by the way, as an editor and translator who put so much of himself into his work that he deserves honorary rank among authors. That he was his own printer and publisher as well has certainly rather hindered the appreciation of his literary merits, but gives to his colophons, prologues, and epilogues a special flavor of their own. As to which of these opportunities of talking to his readers he should use, Caxton seems to have cared little; but even if we confine ourselves fairly strictly to colophons properly so called, there is no difficulty in finding interesting examples, as, for instance, this from his “Godefroy of Boloyne”:

Thus endeth this book Intitled the laste siege and conqueste of Iherusalem with many other historyes therin comprysed, Fyrst of Eracles and of the meseases of the cristen men in the holy lande, And of their releef & conquest of Iherusalem, and how Godeffroy of Boloyne was fyrst kyng of the latyns in that royamme, & of his deth, translated & reduced out of frensshe in to Englysshe by me symple persone Wylliam Caxton to thende that euery cristen man may be the better encoraged tenterprise warre for the defense of Christendom, and to recouer the sayd Cyte of Iherusalem in whiche oure blessyd sauyour Ihesu Criste suffred deth for al mankynde, and roose fro deth to lyf, And fro the same holy londe ascended in to heuen. And also that Cristen peple one vnyed in a veray peas myght empryse to goo theder in pylgremage with strong honde for to expelle the sarasyns and turkes out of the same, that our lord myght be ther seruyd & worshipped of his chosen cristen peple in that holy & blessed londe in which he was Incarnate and blissyd it with the presence of his blessyd body whyles he was here in erthe emonge vs, by whiche conquest we myght deserue after this present short and transitorye lyf the celestial lyf to dwelle in heuen eternally in ioye without ende Amen. Which book I presente vnto the mooste Cristen kynge, kynge Edward the fourth, humbly besechyng his hyenes to take no displesyr at me so presumyng. Whiche book I began in Marche the xii daye and fynysshyd the vii day of Juyn, the yere of our lord M.cccc.lxxxi, & the xxi yere of the regne of our sayd souerayn lord kyng Edward the fourth, & in this maner sette in forme and enprynted the xx day of nouembre the yere a forsayd in thabbay of Westmester, by the said Wylliam Caxton.

Here, it will have been noticed, Caxton runs epilogue, colophon, and dedication all into one after his own happy and unpretentious fashion. Our next example is from a book which had indeed a royal patron in France, but in England was brought out at the request of an unnamed London merchant, though its name, “The Royal Book,” has probably had something to do with its high pecuniary value among Caxton’s productions. This colophon runs:

This book was compyled and made atte requeste of Kyng Phelyp of Fraunce, in the yere of thyncarnacyon of our lord M.cc.lxxix, and translated or reduced out of frensshe in to englysshe by me Wyllyam Caxton, atte requeste of a worshipful marchaunt and mercer of London, whyche instauntly requyred me to reduce it for the wele of alle them that shal rede or here it, as for a specyal book to knowe al vyces and braunches of them, and also al vertues by whiche wel vnderstonden and seen may dyrecte a persone to euerlastyng blysse, whyche book is callyd in frensshe le liure Royal, that is to say the ryal book, or a book for a kyng. For the holy scrypture calleth euery man a kyng whiche wysely and parfytly can gouerne and dyrecte hymselfe after vertu, and this book sheweth and enseygneth it so subtylly, so shortly, so perceuyngly and so parfyghtly that for the short comprehencion of the noble clergye and of the right grete substaunce which is comprysed therin It may and ought to be called wel by ryghte and quycke reason aboue al other bookes in frensshe or in englysshe, the book ryal or the book for a kyng, and also bycause that it was made and ordeyned atte request of that ryght noble kyng Phelyp le bele kynge of Fraunce ought it to be called Ryall, as tofore is sayd, whiche translacyon or reducyng oute of frensshe in to englysshe was achyeued, fynysshed and accomplysshed the xiii day of Septembre in the yere of thyncarnacyon of our lord M.cccc.lxxxiiii And in the second yere of the Regne of Kyng Rychard the thyrd.

Our third Caxton colophon belongs to another book which had no royal or princely patron, only Master William Daubeney, keeper of the jewels. There are certainly, however, no lack of kings in the colophon to “Charles the Great”; for Caxton, who had good reason to be attached to the House of York, alludes very ceremoniously to “his late master Edward IV,” while chronology compels him to name also both Richard III and Henry VII, though in neither case does he bestow any complimentary epithets.

And by cause I Wylliam Caxton was desyred & requyred by a good and synguler frende of myn, Maister Wylliam Daubeney, one of the tresorers of the Iewellys of the noble & moost crysten kyng our naturel and souerayn lord late of noble memorye kyng Edward the fourth, on whos soule Ihesu haue mercy, to reduce al these sayd hystoryes in to our englysshe tongue, I haue put me in deuoyr to translate thys sayd book as ye here tofore may se, al a long and playn, prayeng alle them that shall rede see or here it to pardon me of thys symple & rude translacyon and reducyng, bysechyng theym that shal fynde faute to correcte it, & in so doyng they shal deserue thankynges and I shal praye god for them, who brynge them and me after this short and transytorye lyf to euerlastyng blysse Amen. The whyche werke was fynysshed in the reducyng of hit in to englysshe the xviii day of Iuyn the second yere of kyng Rychard the thyrd, And the yere of our lord M.cccc.lxxxv. And enprynted the fyrst day of decembre the same yere of our lord & the fyrst yere of kyng Harry the seuenth.

Explicit per William Caxton.

The double dating which the worthy translator and printer gives so calmly has here a special interest as (unless indeed he began setting up the translation before it was finished) it shows that he was able to print a book of considerable size between June 18th and December 1st, and also because between these two dates Bosworth Field was lost and won, and the English throne had passed to a new king, on whom Caxton was perhaps at first inclined to look with rather critical eyes. If this was so, however, Henry VII found a sure way to conciliate him, for in the “Fayts of Arms” of Christine de Pisan we find that the translation and printing of the book were undertaken at the king’s request, and there is now no lack of honorific epithets attached to the mention of him.

Thus endeth this boke whiche Cristyne of Pyse made and drewe out of the boke named Vegecius de Re Militari and out of th’ Arbre of Bataylles wyth many other thynges sett in to the same requisite to werre and batailles. Whiche boke beyng in Frenshe was delyuered to me William Caxton by the most crysten kynge and redoubted prynce my natural and souerayn lord kyng Henry the VII, kyng of Englond and of Fraunce in his palais of Westmestre the xxiii day of Ianyuere the iiii yere of his regne and desired and wylled me to translate this said boke and reduce it in to our English and natural tonge, and to put it in enprynte to thende that euery gentylman born to armes and all manere men of werre, captayns, souldiours, vytayllers and all other, shold haue knowlege how they ought to behaue theym in the fayttes of warre and of bataylles, and so delyuered me the said book thenne, my lord th’ Erle of Oxenford awayting on his said grace, Whyche volume conteynyng four bokes I receyued of his said grace and according to his desire, whiche to me I repute a comandement, and verili glad to obeye, and after the lityl connyng that God hath lente me I haue endeuoyrd me to the vtterest of my power to fulfylle and accomplisshe his desire and comaundement, as wel to reduce it in to englyshe as to put it in enprinte, to thende that it may come to the sight and knowlege of euery gentylman and man of warre. And for certayn in myn oppinyon it is as necessary a boke and as requisite as ony may be for euery estate hye and lowe that entende to the fayttes of werre, whether it be in bataylles, sieges, rescowse, and all other fayttes, subtyltees and remedyes for meschieues. Whiche translacyon was finysshed the viii day of Iuyll the sayd yere and enprynted the xiiii day of Iuyll next folowyng and ful fynyshyd. Thenne syth I haue obeyed his most dredeful comaundement I humbly byseche his most exellent and bounteuous hyenes to pardone me of this symple and rude translacion, where in be no curyous ne gaye termes of rethoryk, but I hope to almighti God that it shal be entendyble and vnderstanden to euery man and also that it shal not moche varye in sentence fro the copye receyued of my said souerayn lord. And where as I haue erryd or made defaulte I beseche them that fynde suche to correcte it and so dooyng I shal praye for them, and yf ther be ony thyng therin to his pleasir I am glad and thinke my labour wel enployed for to haue the name to be one of the litel seruantes to the hiest and most cristen kyng and prince of the world, whom I byseche almyghty God to preserue kepe and contynue in his noble and most redoubted enterpryses, as wel in Bretayn, Flaundres and other placis, that he may haue victorie, honour and renommee to his perpetual glorye. For I haue not herd ne redde that ony prynce hath subdued his subgettis with lasse hurte &c and also holpen his neighbours and frendis out of this londe, In whyche hye enterprises I byseche almyghty God that he may remayne alleway vyctoryous And dayly encreace fro vertu to vertue, and fro better to better to his laude & honour in this present lyf, that after thys short and transitorye lyf he may atteyne to euerlastyng lyf in heuen, whiche God graunte to hym and to alle his lyege peple Amen.

Passing now from authors and semi-authors (if we may invent such a class to do honor to Caxton) to editors of a more ordinary stamp, we shall find that they, or the printers who hired them, in their anxiety to magnify their achievements, have frequent recourse to the opportunities offered by colophons. For unflinching and pretentious self-advertisement the palm, as far as my experience reaches, must be given to Bartolommeo Cepolla, who collected and edited the “consilia,” or counsel’s opinions, of Paulus de Castro, a celebrated jurist:

Si quis rerum omnium naturas inspexerit: vnamquamque non minus suo ordine quam partibus constare facile intelliget. Nec qui pro construendis edibus structori materiam parat sed qui pro consummati operis expeditione dispositam artificiose connectit domum edificare perhibetur: eique iure optimo architecti dum taxat nomen indidimus. Nemo namque sane mentis plineturgos aut cementarios edificatores merito nuncupabit, hi licet coctilia ac reliquia pro ceteris conglutinandis particulis administrent: hominem neque progenuisse naturam iudicaremus si hominis crura vertebris vero ac inguinibus caput et humeros addidisset, quando quidem et si nullius portiuncule integritate caruisset solius tamen situs incongruitate monstruosa res non rationis particeps animal diceretur. Cum itaque clarissimi ac excellentissimi iureconsulti Pauli Castrensis dilapsa undique neque in unum corpus redacta consilia cernerentur non ea fuisse edita seu composita dici posse videbant[ur], ac deperiisse potius tantum opus tamque elegantissimum quam in lucem peruenisse merito arbitraretur, communi studentium utilitati parens, quibus maxima pro eorum beniuolentia summisque in eum benemeritis seipsum debere fatetur, insignis eques et comes ac iuris ciuilis et pontificii interpres famosissimus Bartholomeus Cepolla Veronensis, aduocatus consistorialis, in florentissimo gymnasio Patauino ordinariam iuris ciuilis de mane publice legens, singula queque ab eo clarissimo uiro hinc inde consulta colligere elaborauit: fieri etiam unum reintegratum volumen (quod merito Repertorium Pauli Castrensis appellamus) ad faciliorem doctrinam capescendam curauit ac omnibus eius professionis imposterum accomodatum patere studuit. Idque impressoria arte Nurnberge de mense Octobris M.cccc.lxxxv Indictione tercia: per Anthonium Koburger actum est et diligentia completum.

Any one who has examined the natures of things in general will easily understand that each of them is the result quite as much of its arrangement as of its parts. Nor is he who makes ready the material for the mason to construct a dwelling considered to be the builder of the house, but rather he who skilfully combines the material available for the furtherance of the complete work, and by the best right it is only to this man that we have given the name of architect. For no one in his right mind will entitle tilers and bricklayers builders, although they furnish the bricks and what else is wanted for cementing together the other parts, nor should we judge nature to have given birth to a man if a man’s legs had been added to his vertebræ and a head and shoulders to his middle, since although every portion were there in its entirety, yet merely from the incongruity of their position the result would be called a monstrosity, not an animal partaking of reason. So when of the most famous and excellent counsellor Paulus Castrensis the Opinions were perceived to have been scattered abroad and not brought together into one body, it seemed impossible to speak of them as having been edited or compiled, and it might justly be thought that this great and most elegant work had rather utterly perished than been brought to the light of day. Obeying therefore the convenience of students, to whom he acknowledges himself indebted for their great good will and many services to him, a noble knight and count and very renowned exponent alike of civil and papal law, Bartholomeus Cepolla of Verona, an advocate of the consistorial court, who lectures publicly of a morning in the most flourishing University of Padua on the ordinary course of civil law, has taken the pains to gather from all sides all the individual opinions given by that most distinguished man, and has arranged, in order that his teaching may more easily be understood, for the publication of a single renovated volume, which we rightly call the Repertory of Paulus Castrensis, and has made it his care that this should be available in future for all of his profession, and this by the printer’s art has been finished and diligently completed at Nuremberg in October, 1485, the third indiction, by Anton Koburger.

A more normal example of the custom of blaming previous printers and editors—and it must be owned that the accusations hurled at them are, as a rule, much better justified than the vituperator’s assertions of his own superiority—may be taken from another law-book, a lecture or commentary by Petrus de Ancharano, printed and, as he asserts, edited by Benedictus Hectoris at Bologna.

Opus pene diuinum celeberrimi vtriusque censure interpretis d. Petri de Ancharano in materia statutorum super caput canonum statuta de constitutionibus, quod prius Rome tum Bononie Impressum fuerat, adeo corruptum atque inemendatum fuerat vitio scriptorum et impressorum incuria vt vix tanti viri opus obtenebratum foret: nunc vero per Benedictum Hectoris librarium prius magna arte castigatum, demum originali proprio reperto enucleatius emendatum, editum est, quo si vera fateri licet et multa frustra addita detraxit et maiora detracta addidit impressitque fideliter in eadem ciuitate Bononie. Anno Domini M.cccc.lxxxxiij. tertio nonas Augusti.