iimiiHiniiiiHiiiii li||i|iiiii!!!Si' ('llliiilii j 1 1 1 I n in 1 II lll'l' !I]lSlEEffiDBlinmiflTnmmtmfT]miminnFil.iiiiu, riiiiiiiiin mini jiiimiT WHrrm BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME FROM THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND THE GIFT OF ^ Henrg W. Sage 1891 A/ss/j^f. wKiju'L..^ Digitized by Microsoft® Cornell University Library Z124 .S64 Printing and writing materials: .their ,ev oiin 3 1924 029 493 891 Digitized by Microsoft® This book was digitized by Microsoft Corporation in cooperation witli Cornell University Libraries, 2007. You may use and print this copy in limited quantity for your personal purposes, but may not distribute or provide access to it (or modified or partial versions of it) for revenue-generating or other commercial purposes. Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® PEIiq-TIITG AND WETTING MATERIALS Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® .I"H\ (UTEMIKI!... [Fnim Larniix.J Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® PRINTING AND WRITING MATERIALS: Their Evolution By ADELE MILLICENT_SMITH DREXEL INSTITUTE SECRETARY TO THE PRESIDENT AND INSTRUCTOR IN PROOF-READING, AND AUTHOR OF " PROOF-READING AND PUNCTUATION" :::: •.::::::::::;:: : PHILADELPHIA PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR 1901 -f,.'f Digitized by Microsoft® '-/./ h Copyright, 1900, »-" i,by \ ADi:LE MiLLIOENT SMITH All rights reserved AVIL PRINTINQ COMPANY MARKET AND FORTIETH STREETS PHILADELPHIA Digitized by Microsoft® I PREFACE N the prepaxation of this handbook, the purpose has been to furnish in suBfcinct form the leading facts •bating to the history of printing, writing materials, and of bookbinding, and the processes by which they are made ready for general use. At present this inforniation is usually found by labor- ious search through the pages of encyclopedias and other large volumes. While it is hoped that enough of general interest has been included to render the bpok pleasant reading, the aim has been also to supply a manual that will be useful for purposes of instruction. The descriptions of the methods of type-found- ing, typesetting, newspaper printing, paper-mak- ing, bookbinding, and of the reproductive pro- cesses have been obtained from the offices and (iii) Digitized by Microsoft® PREFACE shops of companies of the highest standing, so that the information in each case coincides with what is actually practised in the workroom. The historical sketch of Bookbinding has been compiled from the works of such authorities on the subject as Joseph Cundall,W. Salt Brassington, S.T. Prideaux, Henri Bouchot, and Brander Matthews. The author desires to express her gratitude and indebtedness to the following persons and firms for important information respecting the various pro- cesses described : Mr. Theodore L. De Vinne, R. Hoe & Company, Mr. PhiUp T. Dodge, President of the Mergenthaler Linotype Company, the C. B. Cottrell&Sons Company, of New York; the editors of The New York World and The New York Journal ; Mr. Henry Hoe, Sole Agent of Joseph Gillott & Sons, and Mr. John Winnacott, of New York; Mr. Talbert Lanston, of the Lanston Monotype Ma- chine Company, Washington, D. C. ; Mr. A. B. Daniels, of the L. L. Brown Paper Company, Digitized by Microsoft® PREFACE Adams, Massachusetts; Mr. H. A. Moses, of the Mittineague Paper Company, Mittineague, Massa- chusetts ; Miss Mary H. Upton, of liOndon, England ; Mr. Charles H. Clarke, Mr. Frank S. Holby, Mr. Edward Hill (foreman), of the Avil Printing Com- pany; Mr. J. Howard Avil, of the Phototype En- graving Company; Mr. J. Shoemaker, of the J. B. Lippincott Company; Mr. Charles R. Graham, of the Historical Pubhshing Company; Mr. A. E. Whiting, of the Whiting Paper Company; Mr. P. S. Collins, Manager of Circulation Bm^eau of the Cur- tis Pubhshing Company ; Mr . W. Ross Wilson,'Mana- ger American Type-Founders Company; Mr. L. S. Bigelow, General Manager Keystone Type Foundry ; Messrs. Irwin N.' Megargee & Company; Messrs. Theodore Leonhardt & Son; the Moore & White Company ; and the editors of The Evening Bulletin and the Sunday Press, of Philadelphia. Acknowl- edgments are also made to Mr. Brander Matthews, the Macmillan Company, G. P. Putnam's Sons, Digitized by Microsoft® vi PREFACE R. Hoe & Company, the Mergenthaler Linotype Company, the American Type-Founders Company, the Avil Printing Company, and the Moore & White Company for plates furnished or kind permission to reproduce cuts for the illustration of the book. The author also makes grateful acknowledgment to President James Mac Alister, Professor Ernest A. Congdon, Professor Parke Schoch, Miss Alice B. Kroeger, Miss Harriet L. Mason, Miss Alice M. Brennan, and Miss Sarah W. Cattell, of the Drexel Institute, for valuable aid and suggestions given during the progress of the work. A. M. S. Philadelphia, October, 1901. Digitized by Microsoft® CONTENTS PRINTING Page Introduction 3 Chapter (^ Ancient Relief Processes 6 Babylonia and Assyria 6 Egypt 8 Greece and Rome 8 Lack of Suitable Materials 12 China and Japan 15 II. Printing in Europe 17 Image Prints 18 Block-books 20 III. Invention of Typography 27 John Gutenberg 28 John Fust 32 Peter Schoeffer 33 Lourens Janszoon Koster 35 Spread of Typography 37 Early Printing-Presses 40 Aldus Manutius 40 Anthony Koberger 42 Elzevir 43 (vii) Digitized by Microsoft® viii. CONTENTS CsAPTKR Page Estienne 43 Christopher Plantin 44 V. England and America 47 William Caxton 47 Mexico 49 South America 49 United States 49 VI. Type-founding 57 VII. Typesetting 65 A^&. History of the Peinting-Press .... 72 ^"""^ Early Presses of Wood — Guten- berg— Blaeu 72 Iron Presses — Stanhope — Frank- lin — Columbian — Washington 73 Job or Treadle-Presses 75 Power Presses — ^Adams 77 Cylinder Presses 77 Composition Inking-RoUers 82 Curved Plates 84 The Continuous Web 85 Hoe Web-Perfecting Presses .... 86 Presses for Illustrated Work 87 Cottrell Presses — Miehle — Goss . . 88 Printing by Electricity 90 Printing by Photography 92 Digitized by Microsoft® CONTENTS ix Chxpteb Page IX. Newspaper Printing 94 The Consecutive Processes in the Printing of a Newspaper . . 94 Output of the latest Hoe news- paper press 96 Color-Printing 97 The Electrotype Multi-Color Press 98 The Combination Octuple Multi- Color Press 101 Late News 103 REPRODUCTIVE PROCESSES I. Stereotyping and Electrotyping . . 107 II. Half-Tone and Line Plates 113 WRITING MATERIALS \J}. Materials Used by Ancient Peoples 123 Rocks — Sharp pointed Instru- ments 123 Tablets of Stone— the Stilus.... 123 Wooden and Leaden Tablets .... 124 Tablets of Clay 125 Waxen Tablets 125 Bark, Skins, Leaves — the Calamus, or Reed, and Ink 127 Digitized by Microsoft® X CONTENTS Chaetee Page (^. Paptbtjs 131 History 131 Manufacture 133 Discoveries of Papyri 135 |l^. Parchment and Vellum 138 History 138 Manufacture 140 Vegetable Parchment 140 ^ Paper 142 History 142 Manufacture 146 Staples 147 Machine-made Paper 149 Hand-made Paper 156 Classes of Paper 159 '^ Pens and Lead-Pencils 163 Pens 163 QuiU 163 Metal 164 Gold 166 Fountain 167 Lead-Pencils 168 ^- Ink 171 Digitized by Microsoft® CONTENTS xi ChaJpter Page BOOKBINDING I. Ancient Covebs — Eaely Bindings 181 The Flat Book 183 Monastic Bindings 186 Materials Used 188 II. Medieval Bindings 190 Leather Bindings 192 Tooling 195 III. Medieval Bindings — Modern Bind- ings 200 Mr. Cobden-Sanderson — the Doves Bindery 209 IV. Commercial Bindings 212 V. Forwarding 217 Index 227 Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS FULL-PAGE PLATES Opposite page John Gutenberg Frmuupiece Babylonian Tablet 6 The Btjxheim St. Christopher 18 First Page of Biblia Pauperum 20 Page of a Donatus 24 Gutenberg Taking an Impression 28 Fragment of a Forty-two Line Bible .... 30 Statue of Gutenberg at Strasburg 36 Court of Plantin Museum 44 Lanston Typesetting Machine 68 Mergenthaler Typesetting Machine (Linotype) 70 Old Wooden Printing-Press, 1508 72 Washington Press 76 Hob Sextuple Newspaper Perfecting- Press 86 Selection from Book of the Dead — Turin Papyrus 134 Page from Manuscript Missal — German . . 144 (xiii) Digitized by Microsoft® xi V LIST OF ILL USTBA TIONS Page from the " Odes of Hobace ' ' — AN Italian Manuscript of the Fif- teenth Century 146 Stack of Supercalenders 154 Grolier Binding 198 Cobden-Sanderson Binding 210 ILLUSTRATIONS IN THE TEXT , Page Roman Stamps 9 Bruce Type-Casting Machine 59 Digitized by Microsoft® FEINTING Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® PRINTING AND WRITING MATERIALS PRINTING PUINTING is commonly understood to be taking -*- impressions from ink-covered types upon pa- per or some other smooth substance. This, how- ever, is typography, which is but one form of the art. A definition embracing all the processes which might be included under the head of print- ing could hardly be given in one brief state- ment. In a broad sense, printing is making copies by impression; but what is generally known as this art is the taking of impressions upon paper or other substance from a surface covered with ink or pigment. Printing may be divided into four classes : Typography, or the art of making impressions with movable types. This includes printing from electrotypes and stereotypes. Xylography (Wood-engraving), or the art of taking impressions from a design engraved in high relief on a block of wood. (3) Digitized by Microsoft® PRINTING Lithography (Chemical Printing), or the art by which impressions are taken from a design made on the surface of a prepared stone, or sometimes on zinc or aluminum. Intaglio Printing (Steel-plate and Copperplate Printing), or the art of taking impressions from a design cut below the surface of a plate of steel or copper. In putting the characters or designs upon the respective surfaces, three processes are employed. In Typography and Xylography, the characters, designs, or pictures to be printed are in relief. Ink is deposited on these characters or lines, paper is placed upon them, and pressure causes most of the ink to leave the printing surface and adhere to the paper. In Lithography, the lines are on the surface, in very slight relief. A drawing is made with greasy ink on the surface of a prepared stone. The rest of the stone is moistened with water. The ink used for taking the impression adheres to the greasy drawing, but is repelled by the water. Pressure causes the ink to leave the stone and ad- here to the paper. The design may also be put upon the stone by transfer from another stone or from prepared paper, by engraving, or by transfer from a photograph. Digitized by Microsoft® PSINTING In Intaglio Printing (Steel-plate and Copper plate Printing), the lines are cut below the sur- face of a plate of polished metal. Ink is deposited in these incisions, and any that is left upon the surface is wiped away before an impression is taken. Paper is laid upon the plate, pressure forces it into all the furrows, and a sharp, clean impression is obtained. Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER I ANCIENT BELIEF PROCESSES Babylonia and Assyria. Clay tab- lets, cones, and cylin- ders. A LTHOUGH in Europe printing from movable -^ types dates from the middle of the fifteenth century, the transfer of form by impression is one of the oldest of the arts. In Babylonia and AssjTia, letters, pictures, and arbitrary signs were stamped on soft clay which was afterwards baked. In the ruins of the buildings of these ancient peoples, there has been found scarcely a stone or a kiln-burnt brick without an inscription or a stamp. The inscriptions on the stone were prob- ably made with a chisel, but those on the bricks were made either from wooden stamps cut in reUef or by the separate impressions of some pointed instrument. The bricks show vari- ous shapes: square or oblong tablets, cones, and cylinders, the latter often of considerable size. Some of the tablets are not more than one inch long; others found in the ruins of the palace of Nineveh measure 9 by 6 J inches. The cuneiform (wedge-shaped or arrow-headed) characters on (6) Digitized by Microsoft® BABYLONIAN TABLET WITH CUNEIFORM INSCRIPTION. Size of the Original (2 x Z% inches) In the Museum of Drexel Institute. Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® ANCIENT BELIEF PROCESSES most of the tablets are sharp and well-defined, but in some cases they are so minute as to be almost illegible without the aid of a magnifying glass. Whole libraries were formed of such bricks. Libraries. These clay books, as they may be called, were arranged according to their subjects, numbered, catalogued, and placed in charge of librarians. The libraries were public property, and were intended for the instruction of the people. Each of the principal cities of Babylonia and Assyria possessed a library of this kind, of which the great national library of Assur bani pal (Greek, Sardana- palus), at Nineveh, was the most famous. Large numbers of the tablets found in Assur bani pal's palace have been placed in the British Museum. Fragments of the catalogue have also been found, and show that the library contained : legal, math- ematical, and geographical treatises ; historical and mythological documents; poetical composi- tions; works on astronomy and astrology; religious records; lists of stones, birds, and beasts; royal proclamations, and petitions to the king. Contracts of marriage, sales and leases of contract tat)- property, and other business transactions were recorded on clay tablets. Sanction was indi- cated by an indentation made in the clay with Digitized by Microsoft® ANCIENT BELIEF PROCESSES Egypt. Greece and the finger-nail, preceded or followed by the men- tion of a name. From the contract tablets, which have been found in great numbers, much has been learned of the social life of Babylonia and Assyria. In Egypt characters were impressed on bricks, but not to the same extent as in Assyria. Sev- eral old wooden stamps have been discovered in the tombs at Thebes, Meroe, and other places. The characters on their faces are cut in intaglio, or below the surface, so that impressions taken from them would be in relief. The ancient Greeks and Romans were acquainted Kome. ^th the art of metal-engraving. The Greeks engraved maps on metal plates by cutting lines below the surface.- Impressions on veUum or papyrus could have been taken from these plates, but instead of thus quickly and easily multiplying copies, a new engraving seems to have been made for each map. Thin stencil-plates of wood were recommended by Quintilian as an aid for boys in learning to write. Cicero perceived that, with proper care, the letters of the alphabet might be so arranged as to form an infinite number of sentences; but we have no evidence that he thought of combining them for the purpose of printing. Digitized by Microsoft® ANCIENT BELIEF PROCESSES 9 The old Romans employed wooden and metal wooaen and stamps with letters cut in relief. The potters marked their manufactures with the name of the contents of the vessel or of that of the owner. They seem also to have used movable types. Some rlsciADp SOMAN STAMPS [From JackBOn] of the inscriptions on their clay lamps were made by impressing consecutively the type of each let- ter. Brass stamps, with letters engraved in rehef, have been frequently found in Italy and also in Digitized by Microsoft® 10 ANCIENT BELIEF PROCESSES France. They are all small in size and contain the names of persons only. Several of these ancient stamps are preserved in the British Mu- seum; two are of curious shape, as shown in the illustration on the preceding page, and have the letters cut into the metal. In using such stamps, the Romans seem to have practised, to some extent, the art of printing with ink. A stamp in the British Museum Collection is in the form of a plate, about two inches long and nearly an inch wide. On the face, engraved in relief, are two lines of capital letters, cut the reverse way, as would now be necessary for printing. An impression taken from the stamp would read : CICAECILI HEEMIAE. SN. Stamps for which was probably the signature of one Cecilius signatures. . tit i • • i .• i • Hermias. Nothing is known of this man. He may have used the stamp to save himself the trouble of writing or to hide his inability to write. The use of stamps for affixing signatures con- tinued until the beginning of the Renaissance, or the revival of learning which succeeded the dark age. We read that the Emperor Justinian Digitized by Microsoft® ANCIENT BELIEF PROCESSES 11 made use of a perforated golden plate to assist him in signing his name. Theodoric, King of the Ostrogoths, did the same. It appears also that "the Emperor Charlemagne and the kings who were his immediate successors formed the strokes of their monograms by following with the pen all the openings cut into the plate or tablet laid upon the act to which they wished to subscribe." A method of making impressions, employed for centuries throughout Europe, was that of branding. Cattle and also human beings were marked in this manner. The Romans marked runaway slaves (jugitivi) and thieves (jures) with the letter F. Under the famous Statute of Vagabonds, enacted during the reign of Edward VI. of England (1547-1553), runaway servants and idle loiterers in the highways able to work were branded on the breast with the letter V, and fugitive slaves were marked on the cheek and forehead with the letter S. Branding was also a mild form of punishment for the gypsies, and in 1698 was made the penalty for theft and petty larceny. Cold branding Avas afterwards substituted as a nominal infliction of the penalty. This barbarous mode of punishment was discon- Branding. Digitized by Microsoft® 12 ANCIENT RELIEF PSOCESSES tinued in England in the reign of George III.; and was finally abolished in 1829. In France, as late as 1832, galley slaves were marked with the letters T F {travaux forch). In Germany brand- ing has never been recognized by the common law. Except in the few eases mentioned, these ancient peoples seem not to have taken impres- sions from stamps nor to have multiplied im- pressions from the same stamp. Had they wished, however, to repeat the same inscrip- tion many times upon papyrus or parchment, there were mechanical difficulties in the way which would have rendered their work in- different and unsatisfactory, and which explains, in some measure, why the world had to wait so long ^fe^mite"'*^ for the invention of typography. These nations printing. were destitute of some of the commonest printing materials which to-day are considered indispens- able. What we term paper did not exist, except in China, before the eighth century, and was not manufactured in Europe before the twelfth. The papyrus used as a writing surface could not be folded like ordinary rag paper, and would probably have torn apart imder the action of a press. It could not be rolled upon Digitized by Microsoft® ANCIENT BELIEF PROCESSES 13 itself, in the same way as a sheet of paper, but had to be wound around a wooden roller. Parch- ment, being greasy, resists ink, is hard to han- dle, and even at the present day is regarded as an undesirable printing material. The ancients lacked also a suitable ink. Trifling as it may seem, this would have been one of the chief ob- stacles in the way of success, even had there been an invention of types. Their ink was a thin wash made of soot thickened with gum, with an acid sometimes added to make it bite or sink below the surface of the papyrus. These watery inks would have collected in blotches upon a smooth metal plate, and if stamped upon paper or parch- ment the impressions would have been of irregu- lar blackness and illegible in many places. The chief ingredients of printing-ink are lampblack and oil. The early printers of the fifteenth cen- tury took a lesson from an innovation which immediately preceded the invention of typog- raphy; this was the mixing of color with oil,' a step which wrought a revolution in the art of painting. The printers, finding that they could 1 The introduction of thia method has been generally attributed to Jan Tan Eyck of Holland, who lived during the early part of the fifteenth century; but it is believed that hia brother Hubert has an equal claim to the honor of the discovery. Digitized by Microsoft® 14 ANCIENT RELIEF PB0CES8E8 not use the ink of the copyists, mixed their black with oil, and succeeded in giving to the world books which after more than four centuries are still beautifully legible. Besides the lack of suitable materials, the old Romans had no great mechanical skill. Archi- tecture was about the only art requiring the cooperation of many persons, in which they achieved success. Simple labor-saving devices, so common at the present daj^, were unknown to them. The civilization of ancient Rome had no great need of the art. There were many scribes and copyists. These professional scribes were edu- cated slaves, whose food and clothing cost but little, and who produced books faster than they could be sold. They were read not only in the libraries, but in the porticoes of houses, at private dinners, and at the baths. Horace complained that his books were too common, and that they were found in the hands of vulgar snobs for whom they had not been written. Volumes produced by slave labor were, of course, cheap. Martial's first book of epigrams, in plain binding, was sold for six sesterces, or about twenty-four cents of American money. Digitized by Microsoft® ANCIENT BELIEF FEOOESSES 15 The Chinese have practised block-printing for ^40^, many centuries. Printing with ink from wooden blocks has been traced as far back as the sixth century, and some writers claim that China had a knowledge of the art even before the Christian era. The invention of movable types of clay was made by a blacksmith, Pi Shing, in the eleventh century. This method of printing was done by rubbing, but it did not supersede block-printing. The British Museum possesses a work printed in 1337, which is exhibited as the earliest instance of a Korean book printed from movable types. Various attempts have been made to substitute types for engraved blocks, but this is difficult because of the great number of the Chinese char- acters. These characters do not stand for letters or sounds, but represent complete words or ideas; besides the two hundred and fourteen radicals, the characters formed by combinations have been variously estimated from forty thousand to over two hundred thousand in number; not more than fourteen or fifteen thousand, however, are in regular use. A Chinese missionary house employs about six thousand characters; for an ordinary newspa- per only about four thousand are necessary ; while magazines which treat of a greater range of sub- Digitized by Microsoft® 16 ANCIENT BELIEF PROCESSES jects require ten thousand. The printing-offices arrange the characters by the radicals. Movable types, both of wood and of metal, have long been employed in China. Movable types of metal were first cut in 1815, for the purpose of printing Morrison's Dictionary. Print- ing from metal types is practised m China mainly for the purpose of circulating the Bible and for newspapers. It is indisputable that block-printing was first practised in China, but there is nothing to prove that Europe originally derived its knowledge of this art from the East. In Japan the earliest example of block-printing Japan dates from the middle of the eighth century. The Jesuits were the first to print from metal types in that country, in the seventeenth century. Because of the avidity with which the Japanese have taken hold of Western learning, printing is extensively carried on in Japan, both blocks and types of metal being employed. Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER II PRINTING IN EUROPE TN Europe until the second half of the four- -*- teenth century, books of every kind, letters, and all private and public dociunents were written by hand. Figures and pictures were produced with either the pen or the brush. Before the invention of typography in the middle of the fifteenth century, playing-cards, pictures of saints, and block-books were printed from engraved wooden blocks.' When this method of printing began to be developed in Europe, it was in connection with playing-cards. The work was extended in the production of image prints (sometimes accom- image prints panied with a text), texts of scripture without books. pictures, and whole books, — each picture, text, or leaf being printed from one engraved block. The latter, called block-books, sometimes consisted only 1 Block-printing on clotli and vellum seems to have been practised as early as the twelfth century, and on paper as early as the second half of the fourteenth century. 2 (17) Digitized by Microsoft® 18 FEINTING IN EUROPE of pictiu-es, sometimes they were half picture and half text, and occasionally they contained only text. Image prints From their perishable nature, but few of the early image prints have come down to us. With a few exceptions, these prints were colored. They were pictures of sacred personages, and were undoubtedly copied from illuminated religious boolcs then to be found in all the large monas- teries. They were intended for religious instruc- tion and comfort, and were bought by the poor and hung on the walls of their huts and cabins. These prints were produced as early as the four- teenth, perhaps as early as the thirteenth cen- tury. The earliest print still existing with a The St. definite and imquestioned date is the St. Chris- ns op er. ^gpf^gj. ^f 142-3. It is a rude wood-engraving, about 8 by 11 inches, and represents the Saint carrying the infant Saviour across a river. This print was discovered by Heinecken, in 1769, pasted inside the binding of an old manuscript volume of 1417, in the library of one of the most ancient convents of Germany, the Chartreuse at Buxheim in Swabia. The manuscript was placed in what was known as the Spencer Library, which afterwards passed into the possession of Mrs. Digitized by Microsoft® THK BVXHEIM SAIKT CHEJSTOrHEE, 1423. Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® PRINTING IN EUBOPE 19 Rylands, of Manchester, England.^ In the book which contained the St. Christopher was also found another image print, the Annunciation, by some The Annun- ClSluOIl I thought to be of the same age and workmanship as the former. It is about the same size and is printed on the same kind of paper. Many image prints, of course, were produced before the St. Christopher, but this bears the eariiest date of any now in existence. The Mary Engraving, or the Brussels Print, was formerlj'- thought to be of the The Brussels year 1418; but the date had evidently been tam- pered with, and the authorities now consider it to be 1468. This print was discovered by an inn- keeper, in 1848, pasted on the inside of an old chest, and was placed in the Royal Library at Brussels. Other old prints are the St. Bridget, supposed to be of nearly the same age as the St. Christopher; the Martyrdom of St. Sebastian, with fourteen lines of text and bearing the date 1437, found in 1799 in the monastery of St. Blaise in the Black Forest, and preserved in the Imperial Library at Vienna; the St. Nicolas de Tolentino, with the date 1440 written in by hand; a print representing 1 This has "been made a puhlic library of research and reference in the city of Manchester, under the name of The John Rylands Library. It was formally opened on October 6, 1899, and takes its place as one of the great libraries of the world. Digitized by Microsoft® 20 PRINTING IN EUROPE Block-books. Block-books without text. the bearing of the cross, St. Dorothea and St. Alexis, with the date 1443 also written in by hand. No other wood-cuts are known with dates prior to the second half of the fifteenth century. A number of engravings exist, which, judging from the style of the workmanship, may have been produced somewhat earlier, probably in the latter part of the fourteenth or early in the fifteenth century. The block-books were printed wholly from carved blocks of wood. A whole page, sometimes two whole pages were printed from a single block. The block-books are of two kinds: books of pic- tures without text, but containing words descrip- tive of the picture at the foot of the page, in the corners, or in scrolls near the figures; and books of pictures containing explanations of the pictures in a full page of text, usually printed on the page opposite the picture. Of the first class, pictures without pages of text, the best known are the Biblia Pauperum (Bible of the Poor), the Apocalypse of St. John, the Caniicum Canticorum (The Canticles), and the Story of the Blessed Virgin. To the second class belong Der Endkrist {The Antichrist), the Ars Memorandi (How to Remember the Evan- Digitized by Microsoft® snn rttuonAirrf tt soDf a ibiicm Imtm'ntintt! SmttMvt &t luamsto aMm5i ^gparl 9Wct - ■m«iif.tn~OTUt5irti!an- ff! trntf&jH igj^fiBtwa' bat mi'ijiiif.iuanaiu: fltoaofmn Pjip roUMBh- ouc lUlDitJrtEJtta i3= Q)6&tinftifi(mc! FIRST PAGE OF THE BIBUA PAUrEEl'M. (THE ANNUNCIATION.) Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® FEINTING IN EUROPE 21 gelists), the Ars Moriendi (How to Die Becom- sioek-booke irigly), the Mirahilia Romce (the Wonders of w't'^te^'- Rome), and the Dance of Death. The only block- book without pictures, of which we have knowl- edge, is the Donatus, or Boy's Latin Grammar. One of the best known of the block-books is the Speculum HumancB Salvationis (Mirror of Salva- tion) . This is of special interest in the history of typography, as it occupies a position midway J^^p®""' between the block-book proper and the ordinary printed book. In the true block-book, both pictures and text were engraved on blocks of wood. In the four known editions of the Speculum the text is printed from movable types, except in one edition which contains twenty xylographic pages. It is not known just how many different block- books are now in existence, but there are perhaps nearly one hundred. Sotheby, in 1858, described but twenty-one; the Encyclopedia Britannica of 1888 enumerates but thirty. It is probable that many have been lost and forgotten. Although but few distinct works were published, the editions were numerous. From the number and variety of the editions, there must have been a large demand for these books. They were made both Digitized by Microsoft® 22 PRINTING IN EUROPE before and after the invention of typography. They were issued after the invention of movable types because of the cheapness with which they could be produced. Many of those which have come down to us are unimportant, others are of so late a date as to be of little interest in the history of printing. An Italian adaptation of the Biblia Pauperum was printed at Venice as late as 1512, and a few block-books of less merit were printed after this. The latest block-book of any size was produced also at Venice. It is known as the Figure del Testamento Vecchio (Pictures from the Old Testament), printed about 1510, by Giovanni Andrea Vavassore. The separate issues are not editions in our sense of the term: they were not printed from one set of blocks after another, as the sets were successively worn out. The cutter who carved the blocks sold not the books but the blocks themselves, to private purchasers, who were men of wealth or heads of religious establishments. The editions, conse- quently do not always follow one another; a short interval may have sometimes elapsed between two issues; but when a work was popular, the blocks were often produced side by side by different cutters. Digitized by Microsoft® PRINTING IN EUROPE 23 The block-books were printed on one side of the paper only, in brown ink. Impressions were taken off by rubbing; occasionally two sheets were pasted together to form one leaf. The paper was harsh and uneven. Books printed on both sides of the paper and in black ink are considered to have been produced after the invention of typography. The image prints were usually colored after they were printed. In many the colors were painted in, but the later prints show that they were stenciled. The block-books, also, were often painted, or colored bj-- means of stencil-plates. Most of the block-books are of a reUgious char- acter, but the religion they teach is, of course, dogmatic and doctrinal. They were probably written by ecclesiastics of high positioH for the instruction of ignorant monks and curates unable to read. They gradually, however, found their way into the hands of the laymen, who admired the pictures if they could not read the Latin. Although written by ecclesiastics, we have no evi- dence that these books were printed in monas- teries. The block-printers of a later day were laymen, and it is probable that the earlier books were also printed by laymen. Digitized by Microsoft® BiWia Pau- perum, or 24 PRINTING IN EUROPE The most famous of the block-books was the iweofthe Biblia Pauperum, or Bible of the Poor. This name seems to have been given to it to distinguish it from the complete Bible in manuscript which, of course, could be owned only by the rich. The Bible proper of that day was in the form of two or more thick folios and was written on fine vellum. Although called the Bible of the Poor, this book was written for the clergy; the poor of the laity, however, were doubtless able to appre- ciate the pictures. It was the block-book most often reproduced, and was printed in both Latin and German. The edition supposed to be the first is in Latin, and contains neither date, place, nor name of printer. By some it is claimed to have been printed in Germany, by others in Hol- land. The Biblia Pauperum consists of forty wood-engravings, printed on only one side of the leaf. The prints face each other, two pages of pictures being followed by two blank pages. The Life and Passion of Christ are represented, with parallel subjects taken from the Old Testament. The origin of the Ars Moriendi is not known, ArsMoriendl, .... , . , . , or How to Die but it was a popular work long after the mtroduc- Becomingly. * ° tion of the printing press. Its object is to set forth the temptations that beset both the good and the Digitized by Microsoft® ] rtonis (luf trpofim aiiie par rilnta omtote figntfifanmr autmimiir,0Sje|Jofiru)i qpotarriDfU" ^tni|«^titnf€aGid nTuOiiorcadtd ^u0r0Mi:'Sdi6 taiJto.BavpO" DttonramiraruorufaD.apuD.aiitr atiufrrm!i.rt0.niTa.arai.rirfa. ntru. rrp.mra.iiirer4nrra.kfra.mta'a (i*'« j|jonf.pn:.jjjf jptf t\fi^ni.yoft.rrair^ iiItra.p2frrr.fiipja.arnrfr.u(ii^.too prtK9.0uo Dintniia mt^ 9lD parrnn 0|iut uuiUa.antr rord .a^urrrmn mmii ftre.n0 rfiiu.atrafom. nrmu^rmo*' firmifntplu.fcinnal)oto.^ffaj4Ju^ ituo0.r{n'atrriH>nQ(^tnrrrnaufd4n« trammta.mfra trfru.mf ramatdtmr OT>au0unri4Jonf mbunal^panrmu '|?f8fwara.jjJtfri»(iriplttta Crtlmfi) PAGE OF A DONATUS. [From Boucliot.] The original blocli is preserved in the National^Lihrary at Paris. Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® FBINTINO IN EUROPE 25 bad in the hour of dissolution. Angels and demons surround the bed of the dying person, and strive to win for themselves the departing soul. A kind of dialogue is kept up between the angels and Satan, which is set forth in the scroUs. In the illustration which repre- sents the death of the rich man, one devil tells him to provide for his friends, another calls out "Pay attention to your treasures." In the next cut, an angel exhorts him not to heed the advice of the devils, but to leave his property to the church. In the last picture, the spirit of the dying man, represented by a manikin, is exhaled with his last breath, and is received by the angels. The book was apparently written to prepare man for another world, but its real purpose was the aggrandizement of the church. The work was popiilar for more than a century. The Donatus is the only block-book without pic- tures of which we have any knowledge. Its author or Boy's Latr' in Grammar. was jElius Donatus, a Roman grammarian of the fourth century and one of the instructors of St. Jerome. The block-book was the grammar abridged, and is the only school-book known to have been printed from blocks. "When printed in the largest letters, it contained but thirty-four pages; Digitized by Microsoft® 26 PBINTINO- IN EUROPE when put in small letters it had only nine pages. As the Donatus was constantly used in every pre- paratory school, there was always a large demand for it. For so small a book, the engraving of the blocks would cost little more than type composi- tion, consequently, xylographic editions were still produced at the end of the fifteenth century. Originally, the Donatiis was written for students who spoke Latin, and who, when the book was first published in the fourth century, could easily read it. The work continued to be used as late as the fifteenth century, because Latin was the only language taught in the schools. The use in the fifteenth century of a text-book written in the fourth, shows the little progress made in edu- cational methods. From the forbidding appear- ance of the book, one infers that no effort was made to render the path of knowledge inviting. Two original blocks of the Donatus were bought in Germany by Foucault, Minister of Louis XIV., about. two himdred years ago, and are preserved in the National Library at Paris. There is part of a Donatiis in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, with a colophon stating it to be the work of Conrad Dinckmut, who practised printing at Ulm from 1482 to 1496. Fragments are also preserved in several of the great European libraries. Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER III INVENTION OF TYPOGRAPHY npHE progress of the development of the art of im- -*- pressing characters from engraved designs has thus far been traced from the clay bricks of Baby- lonia, Assyria, and Egypt to the block-printing of China and Europe. All the steps necessary to give the world the art of typography had been taken except one, and the people of Europe, especially in the North, were ready to receive the art. Paper had been manufactured for more than two hundred years and it was now in common use, although regarded by the cultured classes as a plebeian writing material. The printers had found a suitable ink for their work, and in Ger- many and the Netherlands, where typography was first practised, there had been for some time a steady progress in education, and consequently a developed mental activity which was put to prac- tical use. The final step needed was the casting of movable metal types. Printing could never have been (27) Digitized by Microsoft® 28 INVENTION OF TYPOOBAPHT The type- mould. John Guten- berg. practised on an extensive scale, if the idea of casting types had not been conceived. The key to the invention was the type-mould. The honor is due to the man who invented the first type-mould, for types which are cast are the only ones that can be used to advantage. There is no evidence to prove that engraved wooden t3^es were ever used except in an experimental way. A fierce controversy has waged as to who first gave the world a knowledge of typography, but the weight of evidence is strongly in favor of John Guten- berg, a printer of Mainz. We do not know when and where Gutenberg made his first experiments with movable types, but before 1439 he seems to have been at work at Stras- . burg, endeavoring to perfect his art. From Stras- burg he went to Mainz, where his name appears in 1448, in a record of a legal contract. Here, about 1450, he entered into partnership with Jo- hann Fust or Faust, a wealthy money-lender, who furnished the means necessary to set up a print- ing-press. In a few years (1455), Fust brought a lawsuit against Gutenberg, to recover the sum of money he had advanced. The verdict was in Fust's favor and the printing-press passed out of the hands of Gutenberg. Although now nearly Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® INVENTION OF TYPOGBAPBY 29 sixty years old, Gutenberg did not despair, but determined to found another ofRce. Some of his printing materials still remained to him, and the clerk of the town of Mainz provided him with money. He continued his work for some time, but in 1462 all printing in Mainz was interrupted for several years, by the sacking of the town during the quarrel of the archbishops. In 1465 Gutenberg was made a courtier by Adolph II., Count of Nassau. His death occurred before February, 1468, but nothing is known of the circumstances. The earliest specimen of printing from mov- able metal types known to exist at the present day is the famous Letter of Indulgence,^ of Pope Nicholas V., to such persons as should contribute money to help the King of Cyprus against the Turks. A copy of this Indulgence is now pre- served in the Meerman-Westreenen Museum at the Hague. It bears the earliest authentic date on a document printed from types, — November 15, 1454. 1 A plenary indulgence of three years, granted by Pope Nicholaa v., on the 12th ol April, 1451, to all irersons who from May 1, 1452, to May 1, 1455, should contribute money to aid the King of Cyprus then threatened by the Turks. Digitized by Microsoft® 30 INVENTION OF TYPOGBAPHY Bible of S'orty-two Lines. Bible of Thirty-six Lines. The work upon which Gutenberg's fame rests, as a great printer, is the Holy Bible in Latin. There are two editions of this work : one known as the Bible of Forty-two Lines, and the other as the Bible of Thirty-six Lines. The figures in- dicate the number of lines to the page in a col- umn. It is not known which was printed first, but it is generally believed that the forty-two-line Bible is the earlier. This is generally called the Mazarin Bible, ^ because the copy which first attracted notice was discovered in 1760 in the library of Cardinal Mazarin at Paris; it is also known as Gutenberg's First Bible. It is believed that this Bible could not have been begun before August, 1450, and that it was finished in 1455, but the exact dates are not known. The Paris copy contains the rubricator's inscription, which shows that the work was completed before the 15th of August, 1456. The thirty-six-line Bible has received the name of Pfister's or the Bamberg Bible, because the type used in it was once owned by Albrecht Pfister of Bamberg. A copy of this Bible was discovered in 1728, in the library of a monastery near Mainz. A note found in the 1 The Earl of Ashburnham's copy of the Mazarin Bible, on vellum, ■was sold in 1897 for £4,000, or about 820,000, Digitized by Microsoft® luKi miU Jinfati0.prim9 apuij ma litm*uniat imCittitqm no9 pttQm tttdm^. feriia tllrfttiottitqm ttotua flflKllat.taxiu0 uagcccariU £ Imitit?. £iuart9 uagti!ate::qu£ numti^ uota^ nm0.l)mt9£llfaMalMm:qmtton0^ nmi pnotat J]ijilt ipiqj libu morfi: iiao0,fim£ tl|omrf||fcel^aipllat. ferdm^aii mism fmxtitt majfi* mt a t^u Mm namtttm apim illOQ iormbinuummat.iSanmrubtc|ut ropdiintuDi&Mtulibiirccmiutmt mtimgut ntttf*t{uia in lutb iui^ai : fm £1? natcat l^ifltma. Iccciuo ftquj* tur fammt: qunti ttoo rcgnoi^ pnrn 1 litim iimm9,C5uact? raalarliim tn f FE.ACWENT OF THE FORTV-T^VO-LINE BIBLE, KNOWN ALSO AS GUTENBERG'S FIRST BIBLE Digitized by Microsoft© Digitized by Microsoft® INVENTION OF TYPOQBAPHY 31 manuscript catalogue of the library states that the Bible was given to the monastery by John Gutenberg and his associates. The date 1461 is written on a copy of the last leaf of this book, also preserved in the National Library at Paris. These two editions of the Bible bear no printed date, ^ and were pubhshed, like all of Gutenberg's works, without name or place of printer. The great expense which he incurred and the fear of lawsuits may have led him to omit his name from the books he printed — a fact which makes it diffi- cult to identify all of them. Among some of the later works ascribed to , , Later works Gutenberg were: the Calendar of 1457; a Letter of ^g?"'™" Indulgence of 1461; and the Catholicon of 1460, written by John of Genoa, of the fraternity of preachers or mendicant friars, which contains a Latin grammar and an etymological dictionary, and which was used as a text-book of authority in the higher schools. Five little pamphlets attributed to Gutenberg are: A Treatise on the Celebration of Mass; a Calendar or an Almanac for 1460; the Mirror of the Clergy; a Treatise on the Necessity of Councils, etc.; a Dialogue between Cato, Hugo, 1 The first took with a printed date is the Psalmorum Codex of 1457, issued by Schoeflfer. Digitized by Microsoft® John Fust. 32 INVENTION OF TYPOGBAPHT and Oliver, about Ecclesiastical Liberty. It has not been proved that Gutenberg printed these works, Two books that he probably issued are : A Treatise on Reason and Conscience, by Matthew of Cracow, and A Summary of the Articles of Faith, by Thomas Aquinas. He may have printed many others which have been destroyed and forgotten. Two friends of Gutenberg, who probably knew about his invention, erected tablets to his memory, — one soon after his death, in the church at Mainz, and the other in 1508, in a law school of that city. The inscriptions on these two tablets speak of him as the inventor of printing. Both Strasburg and Mainz have erected fine monu- ments to his memory. John Fust, also known as Faust, was a wealthy money-lender living in Mainz between 1440 and 1460, and one of the three persons to whom has been ascribed the invention of typography. About 1450 Fust entered into partnership with Guten- berg, and advanced the money needed to establish a printing-office. In 1455 he brought suit against Gutenberg to recover the sum lent, which, of course, had increased through interest charges and other expenses The j udges decided in Fust's favor, Digitized by Microsoft® INVENTION OF TYPOGRAPHY 33 and as Gutenberg was unable to pay the money, the press passed out of his hands. Peter Schoef- Peter schoei- fer. fer, son-in-law of Fust, who had been in the em- ployment of Gutenberg, supervised the manage- ment of the printing-office after the departure of the latter. The business was carried on by Fust and Schoeffer until the capture of Mainz,^ in 1462, which stopped the work of the press for a few years. Fust died in 1466 and Schoeffer became the head of the printing-house. He was successful in business and estabhshed agencies for the sale of books at other places in Germany. In the latter part of his hfe, he was made a judge, but con- tinued the business of printing until his death, which occurred about 1502. The first book issued by the Fust-Schoefifer press, after the partnership with Gutenberg had been dissolved, was the Psalter of 1457, a foho of Psaiterof 1457. one himdred and seventy-five leaves. This is the first book with a printed date, and is almost as 1 The archbishopric of Mainz was claimed by Adolph II., Count of Nassau, who was supported by Pope Pius II. In 1462 he attacked and captured the town which toolc the side of Diether, then arch- bishop and elector of the place. Many citizens were murdered and the town was sacked. All industry was, of course, destroyed. The workmen of the printing-ofBces fled to other places, carrying their art with them. For three years after the capture of the town, nothing of value was printed at Mainz. 3 Digitized by Microsoft® 34 INVENTION OF TYPOGBAPHT famous as the forty-two-line Bible. It is an imitation not only of the copyist's but of the illuminator's work, with black stately types and two-colored initials, red and blue. The letter is in one color and the ornament surrounding it in another. These capital letters are the most striking thing about the Psalter. It is not yet known exactly how they were produced. By many this book is regarded as the finest work issued by the early press, but others think that in order to produce the blackness of the type, some of the lines have been retraced and the initials have been repainted. No later work of this press equals the Psalter either in presswork or type- cutting. It is quite probable that the book had been planned and begun by Gutenberg before he severed his partnership with Fust. The colophon or imprint is so ingeniously worded that, while it does not expressly state that Fust and Schoeffer were the inventors of printing, the reader is left to infer that fact: "This book ol Psalms, decorated witli antique Initials, and suffi- ciently emphasized with rubricated letters, has been thus made by the masterly inTention of printing and also of type-making, without the writing of a pen, and is consummated to the service of God, through the industry of Johan Fust, citizen of Mentz, and Peter Schoeffer, of Gemszheim, in the year of our Lord 1457, on the eve of the Assumption [August 14]." Digitized by Microsoft® INVENTION OF TYPOGBAPHY 35 The books issued by the early printers were in the gothic letter. When the new art was first intro- Gotwo letter, duced, the wealthy looked upon the innovation as an inartistic trade, and the printers therefore copied the characters of the contemporary manu- scripts in order to sell their works. Koster is the person to whom the Dutch ascribe the invention of types. It seems that two men by the name of Lourens Janszoon lived in Haarlem janSn during the first half of the fifteenth century. It is supposed that one was sacristan or hosier in that city; it is claimed that he made his inven- tion between the years 1420 and 1440. Until 1499 no one seemed to doubt that movable types had been first used in Strasburg by John Guten- berg, who afterwards went to Mainz and estab- lished the press which issued the Latin Bible, known as the Mazarin Bible. In the Cologne Chronicle, pubhshed in 1499, one chapter discusses the question of the origin of printing. The chronicler states that the new art was discovered at Mainz, about 1440, but that although it was dis- covered in Germany, " the first prefiguration was in Holland, in the form of the Donaiuses, which were printed before that time." This statement Digitized by Microsoft® 36 INVENTION OF TTPOGBAPBY started the controversy which has waged for foiir centuries as to the true inventor of printing. Junius, in his Batavia, printed in the Plantin office at Antwerp in 1588/ gives an account of the invention, which he said he had heard from old and trustworthy people. He states that in 1440 Kos- ter, who was then living at Haarlem, while one day walking in the Hout, or woods near the city, "cut letters on the bark of a beech-tree; that he printed these letters on paper for the amusement of children; that he invented a suitable printing- ink, and afterwards printed whole sheets with pictures; and that still later he used leaden let- ters and then tin ones.'' Junius also states that in 1441 one of Koster's workmen stole the types and fled to Mainz, where he opened a workshop and published two works with these types in 1442. The most severe assault upon the claim of Kos- ter was made in 1870 by a Dutchman, Dr. van der Linde. He pubhshed a series of articles entitled The Koster Legend, in which he claimed that the documents brought forward to prove Koster the inventor of printing were false, and that the arguments in his favor had no historical • It will be noticed that thia date is about a century and a halt later than the invention of typogtaphy. Digitized by Microsoft® STATUE OF GUTENBERG AT STEASBURG. [From a Photograph.] Digitized by Microsoft© Digitized by Microsoft® INVENTION OF TYP06BAPHY 37 or bibliographical support. The work aroused such indignation in Holland that Dr. van der Linda thought it advisable to leave the country. Hessels, also a native of Holland, took up the subject, and after considerable research, he published in 1882, a book in which he stated that he could find nothing to prove Gutenberg the inventor of print- ing. The controversy between the two authors was kept up for some time, but the Koster theory has been abandoned everywhere except in Holland. The art begun at Mainz soon spread to other g , ^ f cities and to other countries. Travelers were con- typography, stantly passing through this town to the Nether- lands, France, Italy, and Switzerland. The quarrel of the archbishops in 1462 dispersed the printers and probably sent Ulrich Zell to Cologne. Presses were soon set up in other cities, and by the end of the fifteenth century more than one hundred and fifty towns were practising the art. England made a beginning in 1477. France, Germany, and Italy were the countries where tj^pography was most practised and where the greatest improvements were made. Three printers from Germany established a press in Paris in 1470, and others soon took up the work. Many Digitized by Microsoft® 38 INVENTION OF TYPOQBAPEY Nicolas Jen- son. Italic letter. Roman let- ter. beautiful books were printed in France within the next quarter of a century. In 1458 the King of France sent Nicolas Jenson to Mainz to learn the new art. On his return to Paris, he tried to get sufficient money to establish a press, but was not successful and went to Italy. In Venice he became famous . Printers had already preceded him and set up a press in Subiaco, in 1465. The art soon spread to Rome, Milan, and other Italian cities, but the centre of printing and book-making was Venice. At the close of the fifteenth century, this city was renowned not only for the number of its printing-presses but for the beauty of the works they produced. Before the year 1500, over two hundred printers had prac- tised typography in Venice, numbering among them Aldus Manutius, who introduced the italic letter. Jenson perfected the roman type, which he used in 1471, but the letter had already been cast at Subiaco in 1465. Our roman letter of to-day is derived from the two scripts formerly used in Rome, — capitals from the letters used for inscriptions, and small letters from the cursive form employed for business correspondence. The roman type of Jenson was a letter of extra- ordinary beauty ; it has been frequently copied, but Digitized by Microsoft® INVENTION OF TYPOGBAPEY 39 never equaled. The gothic and roman forms struggled together for some time after the intro- duction of printing, but the latter finally triumphed. Roman type was first used in England in 1518, and by the year 1600 books were generally printed in that character. William Morris adopted the roman letter of Jenson as the model for the Kehnscott Press when it was started at Ham- mersmith, England, in 1891. Digitized by Microsoft® T CHAPTER IV EARLY PRINTING-PKESSES HE most celebrated of the early printing-presses were those of: Aldus Manutius, at Venice, fifteenth and six- teenth centuries. Anthony Koberger, at Nuremberg, fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Elzevir, In Holland, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Estienne, at Paris, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Plantin, at Antwerp, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Aldus Manutius was an eminent printer who Aldus . . Manutius. lived in Venice at the beginning of the sixteenth century. It is supposed that he went to Venice about 1489, and began printing there in 1494. He was a man of great learning and industry and exercised extreme care in the production of his works, which are characterized by good typography ^40) Digitized by Microsoft® EABLY PRINTING-PBE88ES 41 and correct texts. The Aldine press is celebrated for its editions of the Greek and Latin classics. To assist in the preparation of these volumes, Aldus gathered around him, as editors and proof-readers, the most scholarly men of his age. He estab- lished in Venice the Aldine Academy, the aim of which was to fiffther the knowledge of classical Greek literature. To this Academy came artists and learned men from both the Levant and West- ern Europe. Greek grammars and dictionaries were pubhshed also by Aldiis. He introduced the type called italic by the Latin and English peoples, and cursiv by the Germans. It is supposed to be formed upon the handwriting of Petrarch. Aldus put his prefaces and introductions in this t3^e, and sometimes whole books. The pres- ent system of punctuation may be said to have been devised by him, as before his time but few marks had been employed and the use of these was not well regulated. The last of this family of printers died deeply in debt, and his printing apparatus was sold by his creditors. The house had existed about one hundred years. It had been noted for the superior character of its work and for its patronage by Digitized by Microsoft® 42 EARLY PBINTING-PBESSES men of letters, and had been a source of the greatest credit to Italy. Anthon Anthony Koberger began to print at Nurem- Koberger. jjgj.g jjj 1472. He was associated in business with Frederick Creusner, another famous Nuremberg printer. He is regarded by some as the most important printer and publisher of the fifteenth century. It is said that he had twenty-four presses at Nuremberg, besides having books printed for him in other towns. In 1480 Koberger pubhshed an interesting catalogue containing the titles of twenty-two books, not all, however, printed by himself. A copy of this catalogue is in the British Museum. He is said to have printed twelve editions of the Bible in Latin and one in German. His best known work, and the most curious, is the Nuremberg Chronicle, published in 1493. This book is a sum- mary of the history, geography, and wonders of the world, and contains about two thousand illustra- tions taken from three hundred wood-engravings, the same engraving being employed several times to represent different objects. The same cut was used to portray both Paris of Troy and the poet Dante. Digitized by Microsoft® EABLT PEINTING-PBE88ES 43 Elzevir is the name of a celebrated family of Elzevir. Dutch printers and publishers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Louis Elzevir, the founder of the house, issued his first work about 1583. There were twelve printers of this family. The press became famous for its editions, in small size, of the Latin classics and of works of French authors on historical and political subjects. As these printers were also booksellers, it is often difficult to determine the genuine Elzevirs. The Estienne family flourished during the EsUenne. sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in Paris and Geneva. The name is sometimes given Stienne, or Stephens, Stephanus being the Latin transla- tion of the French word Etienne. The name is regarded as one of the most honorable in the his- tory of typography. The first printer of this house, Henry, was contemporary with the rise of printing, as he was born about 1460 and died in 1520. He published mathematical and theological works which were distinguished for their accuracy. His son Robert was a man of great learning; in his house conversation was carried on in Latin, even among the women and children. He issued about four hundred works and printed many edi- Digitized by Microsoft® 44 EABLY PBINTIN0-PBES8E8 tions of the Bible. His most important work was his Dictionary of the Latin Language, a book on which he worked day and night for more than two years, and which was for a long time the standard authority on its subject. He incUned to the Pro- testant faith and attempted to publish such works as he chose ; for this, he was obHged to leave France and went to Geneva. Henry, the son of Robert, also a learned man, printed in Paris and Geneva. He pubhshed many works, among them numerous editions of the Greek classics, but his fame as a scholar rests upon his Dictionary of the Greek Language. In the latter part of his hfe, as he suf- fered from pecuniary losses, he became restless, and shifted his residence from one place to another, doing much editorial work and also publishing books. After his death, which occurred in 1598, the reputation of the house was kept up for some time by other members of the family. Christopher Plantin was a celebrated printer piantin. and pubUsher of Antwerp. He was born in 1514, near Tours in France, and studied under the king's printer at Caen. In 1555 he set up a press at Antwerp, and published in that year his first volume, entitled Institution d'une Fille de Noble Digitized by Microsoft® I j*r Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® EARLY PBINTING-PBE88ES 45 Maison. Although a good hnguist, Plantin made no claim to scholarly attainments. He was a skilful business man and spent large sums of money on the details of his work to insure good typog- raphy. He employed a number of scholars and artists to assist in the preparation of his works, which were famous for their beautiful letterpress and fine copperplate illustrations. Plantin pub- lished books, not only in Latin and Greek, as had been done by Aldus and Estienne, but also in the vernacular of the people — in French, German, Flemish, Dutch, English, Spanish and Itahan. He had printing-houses in Leyden and Paris, and an agency at Salamanca. He died in 1589, leaving considerable property to his children. Plantin had no son, but as three of his daughters had married men acquainted with the printing busi- ness, the estabUshment continued in the family. John Moret or Moretus,^ a son-in-law, succeeded Plantin as the head of the house in Antwerp. The most noted of the publications of the Plantin press was the Polyglot Bible, printed from 1569 to 1573 by authority of Philip II. of Spain. It 1 The name Plantin Moretus is sometimes giyen to the museum in the house of Plantin. Digitized by Microsoft® 46 EARLY PSINTIN6-PSESSE8 was in the form of eight folio volumes and was in Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Chaldaic, and Syriae. For four years forty men were continually at work on this book, and the labor alone cost forty thousand crowns. Only five hundred copies were printed, and a large number of these were lost at sea during transportation to Spain. The printing-house continued in the family until 1875, when it was ceded to the city of Ant- werp, for 1,200,000 francs, to be forever main- tained as a pubhc institution under the name of Mu8«e the Mus^e Plantin. The museum consists of a Plantin. number of buildings around a square. Some of the rooms were the counting-rooms and offices of the printing-house, others were the private apartments of the family. The old press, type, proof-sheets, and other printing materials of Plantin and his successors are still preserved. The establishment furnishes a unique picture of the dwelling and adjoining business premises of a Flemish patrician of the end of the sixteenth cen- tury. The museum is regarded by printers as one of great interest, value, and beauty. Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER V ENGLAND AND AMERICA WILLIAM GAXTON is the first printer who ^iujamcax- '' practised the art in England. He was born, as '°°- he himself says/ 'in the Weald of Kent." The year of his birth is not definitely known, but it was probably near 1420 or 1422, as he was apprenticed in 1438 to the mercer's trade. A few years after the latter date he left England for Bruges in the Low Coimtries, which was then the centre of his trade, and remained there for thirty years. In 1462 he became manager, at Bruges, of a new association of EngUsh merchants. By 1470 he had entirely abandoned his business, and had entered the service of Margaret, Duchess of Bur- gundy and sister of Edward IV. Caxton had long been interested in the romances of the day and had translated some of them. Le Recueil des Histoires de Troyes was then in great demand, and as he wished to lend copies to his friends, he resolved io learn the art of printing. This was the first book printed in the English lan- (47) Digitized by Microsoft® guage 48 ENGLAND AND AMERICA First book guage, but was issued without date or place of printed in the ■= ° ' J, mi w«hian- publication. It was pnnted about 1474. The Game and Playe of the Chesse was the second book. About the place of its publication there has been much dispute, but it is generally supposed to have been printed at Bruges; some claim that it was printed in England. In 1477 Caxton left Bruges, and returned to England. Soon after his arrival in his native country, he began to print in Westminster. The first book printed in England was the Dictes and Sayings of the Philoso- phers. Some copies of this book are without the imprint, but one colophon gives the date of pub- lication as November 18, 1477. Caxton was not only a printer; he was also a translator and an editor. He edited all the books he printed and translated not less than twenty-two, among them the Golden Legend. The number of books he issued is about one hundred. They are mostly in English, although he was an excellent French scholar and had a fair knowledge of Latin. His influence, of course, was great in fixing the future of the English tongue. He died about 1491, and his printing-press passed into the hands of Wynkyn de Worde, who had been his apprentice and assistant and who continued the business in the same house at Westminster. Digitized by Microsoft® ENGLAND AND AMEBICA 49 In America printing began in the city of Mexico, printing in The first printer was Juan Pablos and the first Mexico"'" book printed was La Escala Espiritual para Llegar al Cielo (A Spiritual Ladder for Reaching Heaven) of San Juan Climaco, issued about 1536. So far as known, no copy of this book now exists. The oldest American book extant, with a date, is the Manual de Adultos, printed in 1540 by Juan Cromberger, a celebrated printer of Seville, of whom Pablos is said to have been the agent. Only the last four leaves of this book are in existence and are preserved in the library of the Cathedral of Toledo. About ninety books printed in Mexico bear dates of the sixteenth century, the greater number being ecclesiastical works. After Spanish the language most employed was Latin; then came Aztec and other native tongues. Peru was the next coimtry in which printing was carried on. A press was established at Lima about 1584. The earUest known book issued by it was the Doctrina Christiana, in the Quichua and Aymara languages, printed by Antonio Ricardo. The first printing-press in North America was erected at Cambridge, Massachusetts, through the efforts of the Rev. Joss or Jesse Glover, who states. died while bringing the materials to this place. Digitized by Microsoft® 50 ENGLAND AND AMERICA Glover's wife married Henry Dunster, the presi- dent of Harvard College, and he assumed the management of the press. It was operated by Stephen Daye, a workman who sailed with Glover, and in 1639 it issued The Freeman's Oath and an almanac. Its first important work was The Bay Psalm Book, printed in 1640. This press also issued the celebrated Indian Bible of Eliot and other of his works in the Indian language. Printing was begun in Boston in 1676, by John Foster. The first press in Philadelphia was set up by Wilham Bradford, under the patronage of the Friends. The first work issued by him was an almanac, in 1685. Bradford became involved in a reUgious controversy and removed to New York, where he began printing in 1693. An extract from some Virginia documents shows that printing was carried on in that Colony in 1682, and an imprint has been foimd dated St. Mary's, Maryland, 1689. Before the Revolution, about twenty-five towns were practising the art; and after the war ended and settlements were made west of the Alle- ghenies, the knowledge of printing spread rapidly through the country. Havana had a printing-press in 1787, and Montevideo, South America, in 1807. Digitized by Microsoft® ENGLAND AND AMEBICA 51 Among the early books published in America, a few stiU retain their interest, not only for their quaintness but because of the influence they have exerted on the national character. John Cotton's catechism, or MUk for Babes, , ^ ' ' ' John Cotton's first issued in England, was reprinted at Cam- S^uJ^" bridge, Massachusetts, in 1656. The full title ^*^-" reads: " Spiritual Milk for Boston Babes in either England. Drawn out of the Breasts of both Testaments for their Souls' Nourishment. But may be of hke use to any Children. By John Cotton, B. D., late Teacher to the Church of Bos- ton in New England. " This catechism was afterwards included in another famous book. The New England Primer,^ ^he New the first edition of which is supposed to have ap- MmCT.*^ peared between 1687 and 1690. Besides the alphabet and the syllabariim^, the Primer con- tained the Lord's Prayer, the Apostle's Creed, the Ten Commandments; the Catechism, which consisted of either the Westminster Assembly's "Shorter Catechism " or John Cotton's " Spiritual Milk for Babes ; ". the poem of John Rogers, with 1 A fine edition of the New England Primer, coutaining a history of its origin and development and fac-simile illustrations and repro- ductions, was prepared by Paul Leicester Ford, and published in 1897. Digitized by Microsoft® 52 ENGLAND AND AMERICA the picture of the martyr burning at the stake; sometimes another poem; and various verses and precepts intended to inculcate wisdom and virtue. The one feature which must have made it popu- lar with children was its illustrations, especially the rhymed alphabet cuts; thus the letter A is fol- lowed by a picture of the partaking of the forbid- den fruit, with the rhyme. In Adam's Fall We Sinned all In these early times a number of books were printed for the Indians. The Rev. John Eliot not Bible. only learned their language but translated the whole bible into it. This bible was printed by Samuel Green and Marmaduke Johnson in 1663; it is a typographical curiosity. Eliot translated also several other books for the Indians, and pub- lished in their language the catechism, a grammar, and a primer. Manuscript journals, somewhat resembling our Early manu- -i ..... script and modern newspapers, existed in the time of Juhus printed news- ~ , , sheets. Csesar, when the proceedings of the Senate and the principal events in Rome were pubUshed in the Acta Diurrui. There is a tradition of a printed news-sheet at Nuremberg in 1457, but no Digitized by Microsoft® ENGLAND AND AMERICA 53 copy is extant. The earliest German newspaper, the Frankfurter Journal, appeared in 1615. In England the first journal in print was the Weekly Newes, begun in 1622. Journalism in France is said to date from 1631, when the Gazette was first issued. The oldest official journal which is still published is the Peking Gazette. It has ex- isted for centuries, but the date of its establish- ment is not known. The first journal in America appeared in Boston Early new on September 25th, 1690, under the name of ^Jfpower, which increases their capacity and secures the steadier working of the machine. The Gordon is a small job-press which can print over 1,000 cards or small sheets an hour. The inventor, George P. Gordon, a printer of New York, began his experiments in 1834 or 1835, but did not apply for a patent until 1850. The Ruggles press was considered the best of the small presses; its manufacture began before 1840. About 1824, after returning to Boston, Tread- well attempted to bring out a power- or steam- press on the bed-and-platen principle, but his Digitized by Microsoft® ■^5S-iJ>' THB WASHINGTON HAND-PKESS. Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® SISTOBY OF TBE PRINTING-PRESS 77 establishment was burned, destroying his machine, and he was compelled to abandon the project. It is said that at least one book was printed on TreadweU's press. About 1830, Isaac Adams, also The Adams of Boston, took out a patent for a press which '"^^^' embodied many of TreadweU's ideas. In this machine the platen was stationary. The bed of tjrpe did not move backward and forward as in the old hand-presses; it simply moved upward to press against the platen, and then down to its former place. Inking-roUers passed between the form and the impression surface. The press was afterwards enlarged and improved, so that it did in one day the work of ten ordinary hand-presses quite as well as had been done before. The larger sizes of this press have a maximum speed of 1,000 sheets an hour. The Adams presses were favorites for more than fifty years, and some are still in use. The Riverside Press employs a large number of these machines. Cylinder Presses The system of printing from a flat bed carried backward and forward beneath a cylinder was em- ^j^g Aat-ired ployed to some extent as early as the fifteenth cen- press.**®' tury by printers of copperplate engravings. When this method was introduced into typography, it Digitized by Microsoft® 78 MISTOBT OF THE PRINTING- PRESS worked a revolution in the art. There are many- cylinder presses, but in all the radical principles are the same; the great number of patents granted have been mostly for improvements and devices of detail. In some the type is on a flat bed and the cylinder gives the impression; others have two cylinders, one holding the form and the other making the impression. At the present day the greater number of presses employed in ordinary book and job-work are job and cylinder presses. The cylinder presses have come into use since 1814, when the London Times was first printed by machinery. At that time there was a great desire in England for infor- mation concerning the state of Europe, as Napoleon had not yet been banished to St. Helena. More newspapers were demanded than could be quickly and promptly printed. About twenty-fom: men were required for an issue of six thousand copies of a journal, within twelve hours after the copy was set. Friedrich Koenig, who had come to England from Saxony, claimed to be able to solve the diffi- culty. After trying for many years to improve the old method of printing from two flat surfaces, he abandoned it entirely, and with the assistance of some London inventors, among whom were Bensley Digitized by Microsoft® HISTORY OF THE PBINTING-PBESS 79 and Napier, he had a machine built which was fairly tested in 1811.' In this press the type was placed on a flat bed. The cylinder which revolved above it stopped three times ; the first third of the turn received the sheet upon one of the tympans^ and secured it by the frisket,"' the second made the impression and permitted the removal of the sheet by hand; the third returned the empty tympan for another sheet. This machine was a turning point in the printing art, for it showed the greater speed and merit of the cylinder press. Koenig afterwards devised a continuously re- TheKoenig volving cylinder press; he also designed a two- p^^^^- cylinder press which printed one side of the paper at a time, and a two-cylinder press which printed 1 Many printers believe tliat Koenig's eucoesa was due to his adopt- ing the ideas of William Nicholson, a scientific man of the day. Nicholson had taken out a patent for improvements in the construc- tion of the printing-press, but had put none of them to practical use. > The tympan is a framed appliance hinged to the outer end of the hed of a hand-press. It receives the sheet to be printed and com- pletely covers the bed when folded down upon it. Its purpose is to soften and equalize the pressure by means of blankets between its two parts. >The frisket is a thin framework of iron hinged to the top of the tympan. A sheet of pa^er is pasted over it ; from this, spaces are cut out to permit contact between the type and the sheet to be printed. It holds the printed sheet in place, and the sheet pasted upon it keeps clean the parts not to be printed. The frisket is folded down upon the tympan and the tympan is then folded on the bed ; this brings the sheet down on the face of the form ready to receive the im- pression. Digitized by Microsoft® 80 EISTOBY OF THE PBINTIN0-PBES8 both sides of the paper at one operation. The latter has received the name of the perfecting-press. In this press there were two forms of type, one at each end of a long bed. After the paper had been printed on one side by one cyhnder, it was carried to the other cyhnder and printed on the opposite side. The cyhnder presses erected by Koenig in the office of the London Times, in 1814, printed on one side of the paper at the rate of about 1,000 sheets an hour. His press which printed on both sides of the paper could turn out 1,500 or 1,800 perfect copies in an hour. There was no further impor- tant advance in newspaper printing for many years. The cyhnder press was afterwards simphfied and improved by other men, and by 1824 the de- sign was substantially that of the cyhnder press of the present day. The first cylinder press employed in the United States was made about 1832 by Robert Hoe, the founder of the firm of R. Hoe and Company. This was the single large cyhnder press. In this ma- dCT prMs™' chine the cyhnder made one revolution for each impression and never stopped. Hoe and Company and Adams, who also intro- duced a press about 1830, made nearly all the printing-presses used in America for the next thirty The single Digitized by Microsoft® mSTORT OF THE PBINTING-PBESS 81 years — Hoe manufacturing cylinder presses and Adams platen presses. The stop-cylinder press was brought out by a Frenchman named Dutartre, in 1852. It was cylinder afterwards introduced into the United States and improved in many ways. As its name indicates, the cylinder is stopped and started again; the type is carried on a flat bed. It can print from 1,000 to 1,500 impressions an hour, and the finest en- gravings at the rate of 800 impressions an hour. On the cylinder presses, only one sheet could be printed at each forward movement. A double speed was secured by having a feeder at each end, and, after one sheet had been printed, stop- ping and reversing the cylinder, so as to print another sheet on the return movement. Printing on the return movement was the method adopted by Koenig in his improved press. The Koenig press, introduced in 1814, was run by machinery, but it was extremely compli- cated. It was Augustus Applegath who first ^^ ^^ ^^^^^ made practicable the use of the steam-press for po^^r. popular printing. The New York Sun was the first newspaper in America to use steam instead of man-power; it made the substitution soon after the establishment of cheap newspapers in 1833. 6 Digitized by Microsoft® 82 HISTOBT OF THE PBINTING-PBESS Some firms employed a horse or a mule, which they drew up in the morning by tackle to an upper story and let down at night in the same way. The early cylinder machines were used exclu- sively for newspapers. They wore the type badly, and for this reason they were not liked by book- printers. The pressmen gave them the name of " type-smashers. " In 1835 Harper and Brothers printed all their books on hand-presses, and as late as 1849, the law books of the firm of Banks and Gould were printed on these presses, but after this the use of the hand-press was discontinued for commercial book-work in New York city. Rapid printing did not become a possibiHty until the introduction of cylindrical inking-roUers Composition ^^-de of glue and molasses, a compound which had mking-rou- j^^g ^^^^^ ^gg^ j^^ ^j^g potteries of Staffordshire. It is said that two persons, Forster and Harrild, first tested, by the use of balls, the adaptability of this material for ink-printing; the press-builders soon began to cover their inking-cylinders with it, instead of leather or india-rubber. The dis- covery that this composition could be used in- stead of the balls took place about 1810, but it was many years before rollers were generally adopted. The Donkin and Bacon machine buUt in Digitized by Microsoft® HISTORY OF THE PRINTING- PBE88 83 1813 for the University of Cambridge (England) was the first printing-press in the world to discard the ancient balls for the composition inking-rollers. As late as 1835 every printer's apprentice in England learned the use of the pelt balls. Com- position rollers seem to have been introduced into New York about 1826. The chief ingredients now used are glue, sugar, and glycerine. Until 1847 the newspapers of the United States were printed on single small-cylinder and double-cyUnder machines. On the single cyUnder presses, 2,000 impressions could be taken in an hour; on the two-cylinder, 4,000, printing, how- ever, on only one side of the paper. The demand for papers containing the latest news led to ex- periments in making faster machines, and the out- come was the type-revolving press. The actual introduction of this press was due to Richard M. Hoe of New York. The first Hoe type-revolving machine was placed in the office of the Public Ledger in Philadelphia, revoi^g^ in 1847. The distinctive feature of this new press ^'*^' was the fastening of the forms of type on a central cylinder placed in a horizontal position. The type was held firmly in place, and the cylinder was revolved at any required speed without danger of Digitized by Microsoft® 84 BI8T0BT OF THE PBINTINQ-PBESS the type's falling out. Around the central cylinder, from four to ten impression-cyhnders were placed, according to the amount of work required. The sheets were fed in by boys. The capacity was about 2,000 sheets to each feeder an hour. A four-cylinder machine could thus print about 8,000 sheets an hour, and with ten impression-cylinders the ca- pacity was 20,000 sheets an hoiu", in both cases printing on only one side at a time. To print the other side of the paper, a second rotary press was needed, and the foldingwas done by the old method. Although it did not overcome all difficulties, this machine effected a revolution in newspaper printing. The circulation of the old papers was greatly increased, and many new journals came into existence. The first Hoe press used in Europe was erected in the office of La Patrie in Paris, in 1848. Augustus Applegath, an Englishman, de- vised a machine of the same nature as the Hoe press, but with a vertical instead of a horizontal cylinder. The Hoe press preceded this machine by several months. The London Times finally discarded the Applegath presses and substituted those made by Hoe. A still further advance was made by the intro- ^tes!^ duction of stereotype plates on a curve. For fine Digitized by Microsoft® BJSTOBY OF THE PBINTING-PSESS 85 work, such as the illustrations of magazines and some color-plates in newspapers, electrotypes are used, as they give a clearer impression and are more durable than stereotypes; but for ordinary news- paper printing, a curved stereotype plate is made for each page. The page is first set by the linotype, then a mould in papier-mach6 is taken of the type. These moulds, when dried, are put into the casting- box and filled with melted metal. By the Hoe machines, a matrix and four stereotype plates can be made in seven minutes; the plates are moulded and cast with a curved surface which fits them to the cylinder. By dupHcating the forms, several presses can be run at the same time. Since about 1860 stereotype plates made by the papier-mach^ process have been largely employed by the newspapers of both England and the United States. About 1835 Sir Rowland Hill conceived the idea of a press which shoiild print both sides at once ^,^^^^^^5^^. from a roll of paper. In the first World's Fair uousweb. held in London in 1850, Thomas Nelson of Edin- burgh exhibited a little cylinder press, which demonstrated the possibiUty of printing at one operation both sides of an endless roll of paper. It was regarded by the public and also by Nelson Digitized by Microsoft® 86 BISTOBY OF THE PBINTINQ-PBES8 The Bullock press. as nothing more than a mechanical toy. European press-builders failed to utilize the principle, but it was developed and put into practical operation in the United States. The first machine to print on both sides of a continuous web was construct- ed in 1865 by William Bullock, of Pittsburgh; Pennsylvania. The Cincinnati Times used the first press built in his shops; the roU contained five or six miles of linear measurement. As at first constructed, this press was unreliable, especi- ally in the delivery of the papers, but it was afterwards improved and was used to a consider- able extent. It printed ten thousand newspapers an hour, without the assistance of feeders. About 1868 the proprietors of the London Times built a rotary perfecting-press. This was similar in construction to the Bullock press, except that the cylinders were all of one size and were placed one above the other. A press on the same principle was also devised by Marinoni of Paris. Several difficulties were encountered in the con- struction of rotary perfecting-presses to print from a single roll or continuous web of paper, and these were not overcome until 1871, when the Hoe The Hoe web- web press was devised. The first press of this kind was placed in the ofiice of Lloyd's Weekly London The Walter press. perfecting Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® EISTOBY OF TEE PBINTIN6-PBE8S 87 Newspaper, and the first in the United States in the Tribune office in New York. The Hoe ma- chines are used by most of the large newspaper offices of the United States and Great Britain. Hoe and Company continued their experiments, and produced the Double-supplement, the Quad- ruple, the Sextuple, and the Octuple press. They consist of a multiplication of cyhnders and plates, while the general principles remain the same. Hand folding-machines were for a long time Automatic used in newspaper offices, but it was highly desir- ° ®"' able that the press should deliver the papers folded. Folders were attached to the fast presses, but the output was not more than 8,000 an hotir. A rotating folding-cylinder was patented by Hoe and Company in 1875; this folded papers at the rate of 15,000 an hour. These folding-cylinders were first placed on presses built for the Philadelphia Times, and were operated in the Centennial Ex- hibition of 1876. Hoe and Company have also built rotary presses for illustrated work. In 1886 a per- presaeafor fecting-press was constructed for Theodore L. work. De Vinne, of The Century Magazine, to print the plain forms of that periodical. This magazine is printed on two kinds of rotary presses. The Digitized by Microsoft® 88 SISTOBY OF THE PBJNTING-PRESS plain forms, without cuts, and the advertisements are printed from an endless roll of paper, on sixty- four curved electrotype plates, fastened on two cylinders. The paper is printed on two sides' thirty-two pages to a side, and is cut and folded ready for the binders. On the other press, at each revolution, sixty-four pages, largely of the finest illustrations, are printed on one cylinder, necessarily on one side only. To preserve f uU black- ness and fineness of line, in the fuU-page illustra- tions the second side is not printed until the first side is dry. The illustrations are printed with the type, always in black ink. Hoe and Company have built for the Century a machine that wiU print two colors at each revolution. The fine colored illustrations which appear in the November and December numbers of this magazine are printed on flat-bed presses with the stop-cylinder move- ment. Among other fast printing-machines which do TheCottreii goo^ work are the Cottrell, the Miehle, and the presses. Goss. The CottreU presses comprise a variety of types, — a lithographic press, a stop-cylinder, a two-revolution, a flat-bed perfecting, and a web press. The Flat-bed Perfecting press prints on the second side of a sheet already carrying half-tone Digitized by Microsoft® HISTOBT OF TEE FSINTINQ-PBESS 89 pictures on the first. "Offset,", or smirching, is prevented by means of the shifting tympan mecha- nism which unwinds from a manila roll sirfRcient paper to cover the impression surface. After the mechanism is set, the tympan makes the changes automatically at stated intervals, according to the length of time the offset roll is needed. The large editions of many illustrated papers and magazines are printed on the Cottrell Rotary Machine, which gives the impression on both sides of a web of paper at one operation, and cuts off the sheets, folds and trims them, ready for binding. This press is adapted to fine illus- trated work in one or more colors. On the Cottrell presses the Curtis Publishing Company issues every month 950,000 copies of one of its periodicals, and every week 340,000 copies of another journal. The weekly editions of other magazines sometimes reach 500,000. For pages containing fine illustrations, presses are not run at the speed with which newspapers are printed. The Miehle presses are built for book and job- TheMiehie work, and also for newspaper printing, and have remarkable speed. The present tendency in press-building seems to be towards greater compactness and directness. press. Digitized by Microsoft® 90 SISTOBT OF THE PBINTlNa-PBESS TheGoss The Goss, which is a straight-line machine, prints from four separate rolls of paper; the sheets issue in parallel lines, and are united, after cutting, in folded papers. Rotary presses have proved indispensable in newspaper offices, where only one size of paper is used and where a large edition must be printed in Presses for a short time. For book and job-work, in which book-work. many sizes of paper are required because of the different sizes and numbers of pages, much of the printing is done on flat-bed machines, some of which are perfecting presses with shifting tym- pans. Many books, pamphlets, and illustrated periodicals, however, are printed on the Hoe Electrotype Rotary Perfecting Press, which, as its name indicates, gives the impression on both sides of the sheet at one operation. Printing by At the present time an effort is being made in England, to introduce a system of printing^ from types by the electrochemical process, which dis- penses with the use of ink. Mr. Friese Greene, a London photographer, has produced an electro- graphic paper, and a syndicate in London has 1 An account of tliis system is given in tlie supplement to the New York Tribune of February 11th, 1900 ; also in the Scienliflc American of November 24th, 1900. Digitized by Microsoft® EISTOBY OF TEE FBINTING-FBESS 91 been engaged for a year or more in perfecting the process. The experiments seem to have yielded satisfactory results, and the -syndicate is now demonstrating the workings of the new system. Several of the great London dailies have placed their plants at the disposal of the syndicate for a complete test of the process. The materials with which the paper is sensitized are mixed with the pulp in the process of manu- facture. The electricity flows through the paper from the face of the type, and the chemicals con- tained are turned black. The paper is said to be unaffected by any other agent than the electric current; it may be kept for any length of time, and sent to the press directly from the roll as manufactured; it yields instantly a deep black, permanent impression, and is ready for distribu- tion immediately, as no drying is required. An ordinary printing-press is used, divested of its inking mechanism, and having the cylinder which carries the paper covered with a suitable conducting metal. The intensity of shade is regulated by the degree of influence exerted on the paper; this influence is proportional to the amount of electricity passing through the paper. Digitized by Microsoft® 92 HISTORY OF THE PBINTINCt-PBESS It is claimed that the cost of the current for the actual printing is much less than that of ink, also that the power necessary to drive the press is diminished, and that there is a saving of at least one-third in the original cost of the press. The new process is said to lend itself to aU speeds, even to that of the fastest web-press. The work is considered perfect in every particular. Printing by -^ these sheets pass the press, an account is photography, p^biighed of an experiment in printing by the photographic process, which, if successful, will do away with movable types. The originator of the idea believes that if pictures can be multiplied by photography, there is no reason why the text should not be reproduced by the same method. A machine, which is substituted for the lino- type, sets up lettered cards in the rack according to copy and photographs them, one line at a time; the glass sensitive-plate moves automatically and takes the matter line by line until it is all set up. The negative is developed in the usual manner. After the plate is etched it is ready for the press, and is printed in the same manner as a line-plate is printed at the present time. It is said that within thirty minutes after the first exposure Digitized by Microsoft® SISTOBT OF THE PBINTING-PBESS 93 of the negative the zinc plate is ready to go to press. A fact of great importance, as regards the cost of printing, is that one set of letters is to serve for all sizes of type. The distance of the camera from the letters determines the size of the text as it is to appear in the finished work. If the discovery can be put to practical use, the saving in the cost of printing materials will be almost beyond computation, as in place of the ex- pensive stock of type the publisher is now obliged to carry, he will need only a few photographic machines and the lettered cards which can be kept in small space. These two systems are, of course, still in their infancy, but if proved to be of real advantage they will work another revolution in the art of printing. Digitized by Microsoft® paper. CHAPTER IX NEWSPAPER PRINTING A SIDE from its general framework, a newspaper tive processes -'^ press consists of the apparatus for the feed- in the print- ing of a news- ing-in of the paper, the ink-fountains or troughs, the rollers and cylinders for distributing and trans- ferring the ink, the cylinders carrying the stereo- type and the electrotype plates, the impression- cylinders, the paste-fountain, the folder, and some minor appliances. The paper from which newspapers are printed is made in long webs or rolls, varying in length from three to nine miles, and is prepared at special mills. Each roll is made upon an iron core, which forms the hub through which a metal axle is passed. This roll or wheel of paper is placed at one end of the press just above the floor, and the end of the sheet is led between the cylinders; when the machinery starts the paper unwinds as fast as it is needed. These long rolls are sometimes uneven, varying in tenacity or being more tightly wound in some places than in others; the result is that the paper snaps in two and necessitates the stopping of the press. This difficulty is overcome (94) Digitized by Microsoft® NEWSPAPER PRINTING 95 either by tension springs, which permit the sheet automatically to adjust itself to all conditions, or by an endless belt which rests on top of the paper and pushes it along at a speed equal to and some- times greater than that of the plate-cylinders. The receptacle for the ink, known as the ink- fountain, is a trough located almost directly over the web of paper. A system of rollers and cylin- ders distributes and transfers the ink from one to another until it is appUed evenly to the surface of the stereotype or the electrotype plates. Each plate-cylinder is in contact with a blanket- covered cylinder, and by passing between these the continuous web of paper receives the impression. The paper is drawn between two pairs of cylinders, one pair giving the impression for one side, and the other the impression for the other side. The web is then carried up to the top of the machine and is cut in two lengthwise, or between the newspapers, so as to free one from the other. These sec- tions are passed over the angle-bars, which switch one directly over the other, so that they may enter the folder in their proper order. By pass- ing over a triangular metal piece, called the "former," they receive a fold the length of the paper; they are then cut crosswise and folded Digitized by Microsoft® NEWSPAPER FEINTING almost simultaneously, the second fold, in the middle, leaving the paper just as it is commonly sold by the news-dealers. The papers are coimted automatically, in lots of twenty-fives, fifties, or hundreds, every twenty-fifth, fiftieth, or one- hundredth paper, being thrown out a few inches in advance of the others, so as to make a sharply defined line in the pile. Some newspapers are pasted at the back by an appliance on the press; others are issued without being pasted. The Improved Double Quadruple Combination Octuple Press is the latest newspaper perfecting press designed by Hoe and Company; they are now building a number of this type for the Chicago Tribune. For ordinary black work, this press can print, cut, paste, fold, count, and deliver, in an The output of hour, 24,000 papers of eighteen, twenty, twentv- thelatestHoe tl newspaper two. Or twenty-four pages; 48,000 of twelve, four- web-perfect- ./ ± o ; ; ; ing press. teen, or sixteen pages; 72,000 of ten pages; and 96,000 of four, six, or eight pages. When print- ing twelve pages, the press can issue 60,000 papers an hour : 48,000 in book form and 12,000 composed of two six-page sections laid on each other and delivered folded together. This method is called "collecting", twelve-page papers. When printing colored plates, this machine can produce in an hour 96,000 four-page papers, with Digitized by Microsoft® NEWSPAPER PRINTING 97 all the pages in two colors; or 48,000 six or eight- page papers, all inset,^ with aU the pages in two colors. This is one of the largest printing-machines of this design that has been constructed, up to the present time, for newspaper work. Some of the leading newspapers issue supple- ments with colored pictures. The plates for the ing. different colors are placed upon separate cylinders, opposite to each of which is attached an impression- cylinder. The large newspaper offices which issue sup- plements with colored illustrations, have two distinct styles of presses, one being used for ordinary newspaper work in black only, or having some color-attachments added in a manner which permits the work to be done in a short space of time — an essential feature for a daily. On this press, the color work is printed from stereotype plates, against soft felt blankets, and the printing is done on the web of paper without any preparation, ex- cept the proper placing of the plates on the cyhn- i In newspaper work, inserted or " inset " means that the sheets are delivered folded one inside the other, as the sheets are arranged in a quire of writing-paper, but not necessarOy pasted, although this is generally done. When the sheets are not all placed one inside the other, but the sections are laid one on top of the other, full- page size, and then folded together to half-page size, the method is called " collecting." 7 Digitized by Microsoft® 98 NEWSPAPER PRINTING ders, so that the colors will be printed in their respective places according to the design. The other press is the Electrotype Multi-Color type nmiti^ Machine, and is used to produce the best class of color and half-tone work for Sunday magazines, comic, and music sheets. This press prints from electrotype plates, against a very hard surface on the impression cylinder, called hard-packing, which shows up all the imperfections of the plate. These imperfections have to be equalized "Overlay" ^^'^ overcome by processes called "overlaying" Jea^ayT'^"*' and "making ready"; an "overlay'! paper is placed over a plate to bring out the solids, middle tones, and different shades that go to make a perfect picture; on the amount of time spent on this preliminary work and the fineness with which it is done depends the quality of the printing when the press is started. Some of the leading journals of New York City have presses of this description, printing automatically as many as eleven colors at one operation. The whole eleven colors can be printed on one double- width web of paper, i. e. a roll the width of four newspaper pages, giving five colors on one side and six colors on the other side of the web ; or the eleven colors can be printed on two double-width, Digitized by Microsoft® NEWSPAPER PRINTING 99 or four-page, webs. In the latter case one web is printed in four colors on one side and two colors on the other side; the other web in two colors and three colors; these webs, when the sheets are cut apart, brought together and folded, make a publication of from eight to thirty-two pages, with all the pages in either two, three, or four colors. The papers are printed at a running speed of 16,000 to 24,000 copies an hour, or as many as 48,000 for the lesser number of pages. The output of 96,000 eight-page or 48,000 six- teen-page papers an hour, with part printed in four colors in a fine manner, is equal to an issue of 270 papers of eight pages, or 145 sixteen- page papers, per second. The Electrotype Multi-Color Press, as stated, has eleven pairs of cyUnders, or couples, each couple consisting of one plate- and one impression- cylinder. Each pair has its own ink-fountain and numerous ink and distributing-rollers for the different inks. The paper passes from one couple of cylinders to the other to receive the various colors. Before the press is started on its regular run for producing the editions, which sometimes amount to as many as 800,000 copies for one week's issue, a proof of each color is taken Digitized by Microsoft® 100 NEWSPAPER PRINTING separately to discover the imperfections of the plates; these defects are overcome by the pro- cesses of "overlaying" and "making ready," already mentioned. Another reason for proving each color is to The register , . of the colors, get the "register," which means so arranging the plates on the cyhnders that each color will be printed in its proper place. The secondary colors are produced by printing one primary color over another. A plate which receives a primary color that is to appear in an illustration prints the same color where it is to be the base of a secondary color; thus, a plate taking red and printing red as a primary also takes and prints red as the base of orange; a plate taking blue as a primary receives also the blue as the base of pm-ple. The colors are printed first; the black, called the "key-plate," is printed last, and all the colors must register within the outhnes of the key-plate. The ink contains chemicals, called driers, which cause it to dry immediately, one color being quite dry, through the presence of the chemicals and the absorption of the paper, before the web passes to another pair of printing cylinders. When a sheet or web is printed on both sides, an The driers. Digitized by Microsoft® NEWSPAPER PRINTING 101 "offset", sheet or web of paper runs with the paper which is printed and takes off the surplus ink. When the colors are printed on one side only the "offset", web is not needed. The flow of ink is regulated by alarge number of screws, set about two inches apart. These govern ^®e^(fw of the pressure of a knife-blade against a roller which '"''• revolves in a fountain filled with ink, allowing either more or less to feed forward to the inking rollers, which, in turn, give it to the printing-plates. The screws are operated on the same principle as the tension screw of a sewing-machine. The Electrotype Multi-Color Press is 35 feet long, 17 feet high, 10 feet wide, and weighs 100 tons. It consists of over 200,000 separate pieces and requires 50 horse-power to keep it in motion. Another style of press, which is the largest in the world, is the Combination Octuple and Multi- Color Machine, which consists of a regular sex- nadon'octu- tuple newspaper press with a full five-cylinder color multi-color press on top and working in conjunc- tion with it, the upper portion printing from electrotype plates, the lower section from stereo- types, thus producing an ordinary newspaper product with a fine cover section. This press carries four rolls of paper, each the width of four Digitized by Microsoft® azines. 102 NEWSPAPER PBINTING carries four rolls of paper, each the width of foiir newspaper pages and weighing from 1500 to 1800 pounds each. The fine colored plates which illustrate cer- ofsome m*ag- *^i° numbers of some magazines are printed on the same kind of presses that is employed to a great extent for book-work — flat-bed presses with the stop-cylinder movement. These colored illus- trations are produced at the rate of 800 impres- sions an hour for each separate color. The merit of a colored illustration begins with the de- sign and its adaptability to color. If the design is not good and adaptable, it will not make a good print. The dissection of a colored sketch requires an artist of great ability and experience. He must know (not guess) how much or little color to put on each plate; he must understand the proper sequence of overlapping colors. That done, the printing of the plates is comparatively simple work. These mammoth presses possess a wonderful fascination when running at full speed. To watch the paper enter the machine simply as a blank roll, fly swiftly from cylinder to cylinder to receive the impressions of stereotypes, electrotypes, and half- tones, in black and in color, separate into news- papers under the action of the knife, again divide into sections, and issue from the press neatly Digitized by Microsoft® NEWSPAPER PRINTING. 103 folded and counted, ready for delivery, gives one the impression of a force not only wonderful but superhuman. One marvels at the in- ventive skill which has achieved this mechanical triimiph and which holds within itself the power to further the march of civiUzation by aiding in the dissemination of knowledge among the people. In the large newspaper offices every arrangement is made for performing each step of the work with the greatest possible speed and also for furnish- Axrange- ing the most recent news even up to the last few ftlroiahitag minutes. A button is turned, a red light flashes through the pressroom, and the rapidly-fljdng cyhnders stop immediately; a green light shows, and the pressmen are ready to take up important news. When games and races are being held, a man seated alongside the press is in direct commu- nication with the scene of action by telegraph and by telephone. "Crawford wins,", flashes over the wire. "Crawford wins!" cries the operator to a workman seated on the press. The words are instantly set and inserted, and in a few seconds they appear in the finished paper. Within three minutes after a game ends, two of the leading dailies of New York sell on the streets papers announcing the result. Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® KEPEODUCTIVE PEOCESSES (105) Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® KEPRODUCTIVE PEOOESSES CHAPTER I STEHEOTYPING AND ELECTBOTYPING nTEREOTYPES are plates of type-metal and ^ are made by casting; electrotypes are pro- duced by galvanic action. Stereotyping and electrotyping have proved a source of great economy to both the printer and the publisher. Before the discovery of these pro- cesses, a work to be printed as occasion required had to be kept standing in type or else reset for each edition. By electrotyping the forms, only a small number of the first edition need be printed, as additional copies can be taken off at any time. The plates occupy much less space than type matter kept in form, and can easily be stored away for future use. The printer's type is re- leased for other work, which in itself is a decided advantage. These two processes also save wear of the original type or cut. Electrotypes have superseded stereotypes for book and magazine work, as they give a clearer impression and are more durable. (107) Digitized by Microsoft® 108 8TEBE0TTFINQ AND ELECTBOTTPING Three methods of stereotyping are known, — the stereotyping, plaster, the clay, and the papier-mach6. Only the last is now much employed. The process of casting type-metal in moulds of pnfcess***' plaster-of-paris was discovered by WilUam Ged, a goldsmith of Edinburgh, who began his experi- ments about 1725. His method proved successful, but he could not get the printers to use his plates. Nimierous experiments followed, but all other methods were superseded by that of the Earl of Stanhope, which was introduced about 1804. The plaster process served for types on book-work for about fifty years, but it was unsuitable for engrav- ings, and was found too slow for daily newspapers. The first work stereotyped in America was the Westminster Catechism, produced in New York, by John Watts, in 1813. Watts, however, sold out and went to Austria in 1816. The actual introduction of the art in America was due to David Bruce, one of the two brothers who afterwards established the type-foundry known by that name. In 1813 Bruce returned from England, where he had been endeavoring to study the methods of Lord Stanhope; he began his experiments, and in 1814 succeeded in casting plates for the New Testament. Digitized by Microsoft® er- STEBEOTTPING AND ELEOTBOTYPINQ 109 The papier-mach6 process was discovered by Genoux of France, in 1829, and was introduced into Great Britain in 1832. In the papier-mach6 process, a paper matrix is ^he first made of the page of type by machinery. The ^.^^*''°' material for the matrix is formed by pasting together layers of thick misized paper and tissue paper, each layer being carefully roUed smooth with a heavy iron roller. The matrix is dried by steam- heat; to expel any remaining moisture, it is ex- posed for half a minute, either in an oven or to the flame of a gas-jet. After the edges are trimmed, the matrix is placed in the casting-box and filled with melted metal. On being removed from the casting-box, the superfluous metal is cut off from the plate, which is then trimmed by hand, and shaved on the reverse side until it is brought to the exact thickness required. These operations are performed by machinery. The papier-mach6 process is more expeditious than any other method. By the Hoe machine a matrix and foiu: stereotype plates can be made in seven minutes; it is possible to cast a plate a minute after the matrix is made. Curved plates can be made as easily as flat, and as many as forty plates can be cast from the same matrix. Digitized by Microsoft® Electrotypes. 110 STEREOTYPING AND ELEOTBOTYPING This process has been adopted by all large daily- newspapers. Electrotypes are plates produced by means of electricity; they are made from type, woodcuts, and engraved plates. The process of causing one metal to be deposited on another by galvanic ac- tion is not new, but the electrotyping of type, wood- cuts, and plates is of comparatively recent date. An engraving made by this method appeared in the London Journal for April, 1840. In America Joseph A. Adams, a wood-engraver of New York, produced plates which were used in Mapes's Magazine as early as 1841. Before 1855 the art of electrotyping was in general use in New York. To make an electrotype plate, copper, placed in a state of solution, is caused by electric action to spread itself over the surface of a mould and there be deposited in a sheet. A wax mould is first made of the engraved plate, The process cut, or type. To produce this, beeswax is pomred typing. on a leaden slab and is left to cool, after which graphite is brushed evenly over the surface. The form of type or the plate is forced into the wax by means of a steam-press. This gives a mould of the type or plate in the wax. The surplus wax is removed with a sharp knife. Digitized by Microsoft® STEREOTYPING AND ELECTBOTYPING 111 As the mould comes out uneven, it has to be built up; this is done by filling the large blank spaces and the surfaces between the lines with hot wax, so that the deposits of copper may be shallow. The mould is then given a coat of graphite in the black-leading machine. The graphite makes the mould a conductor of electricity. After the deposit of this metallic surface, the superfluous graphite is washed out by water. Iron filings are then sifted on the mould and a weak solution of sulphate of copper is stirred in. This coating of copper is given to facilitate the plating. To make the electrical connection, a piece of copper or lead is imbedded in the edge of the sheet of wax. The mould is then suspended for one or two hours in a bath of sulphate of copper solution. By the action of the electric current, the coating is increased until it is about .005 of an inch thick. The shell of copper is removed from the wax and is washed in boiling water. It is brushed on the back with a solution of chloride of zinc, and sheets of tinfoil are laid over it and melted. Enough molten lead is poured on the sheU to give it the necessary thickness — about one-eighth of an inch. An air-blast causes the plate to cool and solidify immediately. Digitized by Microsoft® 112 STEREOTYPING AND ELECTBOTTPING Any defects or indentations on the face of the plate are hammered up from the back, and it is afterwards passed through machines which finish it and give it a bevel on the side. When mounted it is ready for the press. A plate to be used on a Hoe web-perfecting press, is given a curva- ture to fit it to the cylinder. When red ink is used, electrotypes are usually given a coating of nickel, to protect the copper from the action of the mercury. An electrotype plate will stand from five hun- dred to six hundred thousand impressions. A stereotjrpe plate lasts for only about one himdred thousand impressions. Both stereotype and elec- trotype plates are now sometimes made as large as two pages of a newspaper. By hurrying each step of the process, it is possi- ble to make an electrotype plate in an hour; but for a high grade of work more care is taken, and it then requires several hours to produce a plate with fine finish. Electrotyping is a much cheaper process than either half-tone or line work, the price being from one to three cents a square inch. Line work costs about seven cents, and half-tones from twelve to fifteen cents a square inch. Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER II HALF-TONE AND LINE PLATES rrHE numerous illustrations which give life and -*- add to the value of our books, magazines, and newspapers,' without greatly increasing their cost, have been brought into existence by the devel- opment of the relatively new art of photo-engrav- ing, which by 1880 was beginning to supplant the re- producing of woodcuts. Reproductions of photo- graphs, wash-drawings, paintings, or of any picture or object in which there is a gradation of color, are made by the half-tone process. Drawings or pictures consisting of simple lines, that is without tones of color, such as pen sketches or fac-similes of old writings, are reproduced by line-plates. An illustration printed from a line-plate resem- bles a pen and ink drawing; that is, it consists of lines in relief. A half-tone has no lines at all : 'The illustration of English journals dates back to 1832 when the Penny MagasiTie, a periodical somewhat of the nature of a popularized cyclopedia, was first published ; but it cannot be said that illustrated journalism had fairly begun until The JUustraied London News was founded in 1842. Gleason's Fictorial was started in Boston about 1850. Frank Leslie's followed in 1854, and Sarper's Weekly in 1857. The first Illustrated daily paper in America was Tlie Daily Oraphie of New York, established in 1873; 8 (113) Digitized by Microsoft® Half-tones. 114 BALF-TONE AND LINE PLATES it is composed of dots, and has middle tones, full tones, and high lights. To produce a half-tone, a negative is made of the picture by the wet collodion process, with the use of a screen, and a copperplate is made of this negative. Line-plates are prepared by the same process without the use of a screen, and are made of zinc. In newspaper work, both half-tone and line plates are produced by zinc etching, as copper requires too much time. If a plain negative of a photograph were printed and etched on metal and then mounted the proper height and placed on a printing-press, the impres- sion taken from it would-be entirely black and white, the shades being black and the high lights white. There would be no relief to the black portions, and the white parts would be etched entirely away. A printing-plate must have these parts broken up in some way, so that the light and the dark parts may be given their proper values. In the half-tone process, this is accom- pUshed by the use of a transparent screen, generally of glass, which consists of two plates and on which have been made fine lines, the lines of one plate intersecting those of the other at right angles. This screen is placed in the plate-holder, in front of the Digitized by Microsoft® SALF-TONE AND LINE PLATES 115 negative, and the rays of light passing through it break up the parts in such a way as to show the gradation of color. When the lines are close to- gether the engraving will be finer than when a coarse screen is used, but it will be more difficult to print. One hundred and thirty or forty lines to the inch is the average number. As stated above, for newspaper illustration, both half-tone and line work are printed on zinc. A negative is first made from the photograph ung-iates or sketch, and is developed in the dark-room. A plate of zinc is sensitized with a solution consist- ing of bichromate of ammonium (or potassium), distilled water, and albumen. This solution is poured several times over the plate. The sensitiz- ing is done in the dark-room, and the zinc plate is then placed in the printing-frame. The plate is laid flat upon the negative and the cross-bars are screwed down very tight, to insure perfect contact. Exposure to strong Ught, either sunlight or electric light, from two to eight minutes, then follows; the light passes through the transparent parts and prints on the metal. Nothing shows on the plate when it is taken out of the printing-frame. It is rolled with printer's or Hthographic transfer-ink, and is laid face upwards in a tray containing enough Digitized by Microsoft® 116 HALF-TONE AND LINE PLATES water barely to cover its surface. The plate is afterwards rubbed very gently with a piece of clean absorbent cotton which removes the superfluous ink. The print appears in the form of black lines against a bright backgroimd. The ink clings to the parts acted on by the light ; it rubs away the parts not acted on and leaves the plain metal. After the plate is washed and heated it is powdered with dragon's blood, which protects the lines of the engraving when the plate is etched in the acid bath. In the etching all the parts not so protected are eaten away, the lines being left in relief. The etching solution is composed of nitric acid and water. In ordinary commercial work, three or four baths, sometimes more, are necessary before the plate acquires the proper depth; for newspaper work the plate is given from two to four bites, as time permits. The next step is the routing, or drilling. On the routing-machine, in those parts where the acid did not bite deep enough the plate is still fiu-ther cut away, and large parts which are not to show at all are removed. The plate is then mounted, or nailed to a block, and is ready for the composing-room. In printing from the plate on the press, the projecting parts show black and the indentations white. Digitized by Microsoft® The Sims. HALF-TONE AND LINE PLATES 117 The body-work, or background, of an illustra- tion is sometimes produced by rubbing the plate, before it is etched, through films which are made of a preparation of gelatine and which are inked. By placing films on parts of the plate to be strengthened, and gently rubbing on the back of the film, various lines or dots are produced. The films are so made as to give different shades of color — small dots and fine lines for delicate tones, heavy lines and large dots for deeper tones. The stipple-work which forms the back- ground of colored illustrations is produced in this way. In printing a half-tone on copper, the plate is sensitized in a silver bath instead of a solution of bichromate of ammonium. The etching mordant is perchloride of iron instead of nitric acid. Half-tone and line plates for newspapers are Plates for made inabout the same way as for books and maga- newspaper work. zines, except that for the former, each step of the process is performed with greater rapidity. Daily journals have many little devices for f acihtating the work; they spend less time in taking the negative and use an electric fan for drying. For book or magazine work, several hours are required to make a plate carefully; a newspaper produces a Digitized by Microsoft® 118 SALF-TONE AND LINE PLATES plate in an hour. If a fire or some unusual occur- rence takes place a little before midnight, a sketch artist is sent out, a cut is made, and the illustration appears in the two o'clock edition of the paper. The plates for colored pictures, with which many of our newspaper supplements are illus- trated, are prepared by about the same process as an ordinary line-plate; the main difference con- sists in making a separate plate for each color, as on the press the paper passes from one cylinder to another to receive the various colors. [For CoLOE-PEiNTiNG ON THE Press, See page 97.] In newspaper work, a line-plate is locked up toe'prel™ ^^^ *^^ ^^'"'^ °^ ^^P^' which is Set by the Hno- from plates, ^ype and which is the size of one full page of the paper, and is stereotyped with the type. To get a clear impression of the cut, in malting the matrix, an " overlay, " or piece of stiff prepared paper, is placed directly over the plate, so as to keep it down as tight as possible. Matrices are made from half-tones, but in order to get better effects, some newspapers print directly from the plate itself, as is done in fine work. A depression or space is left in the matrix and the half-tone is inserted in it; when Digitized by Microsoft® BALF-TONE AND LINE PLATES 119 ,the molten lead is poured over the matrix, the cut is soldered into the stereotype plate. To save wear, half-tones are nickel-plated for color work, as nickel is not easily affected by colored inks. A plate to be used on a web press is made with a curve which fits it to the cylinder. In printing a half-tone, a paper or "overlay" is placed be- tween the plate and the impression-cylinder, so as to bring out the lights and shades that should appear in the picture. Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® WRITING- MATERIALS (121) Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® WEITIJSTG MATEEIALS CHAPTER I MATERIALS USED BY ANCIENT PEOPLES rPHE chief substances which have been used as -*- writing materials are stone, clay, bark, leaves, skins of animals, metal, potsherds, wood, linen, papyrus, parchment, wax, and paper. It is probable that the primitive races first Eock»- wrote on rocks with some sharp-pointed instru- ^iSted ment, to delineate familiar objects or to convey information to passers-by. The Eskimo of Alaska, at the present day, cut characters upon the smooth sides of their ivory drill-bows with sharp pieces of iron or steel. They thus graphic- ally depict their hunting expeditions and various social and religious practices. The prairie tribes of Indians, also, incise characters upon the shoul- der-blades of the bi:iffalo and other large animals, when they are on the himt, to inform members of their band of the course of travel. When men were able to give fuller expression TaWetsof , . . , . 1 ,. 1 . • • !_• Stone— the to then- ideas, instead of making inscriptions on stilus. (123) Digitized by Microsoft® 124 MATERIALS USED BY ANCIENT PEOPLES Wooden tab- lets. Tablets of lead. rocks, they wrote on tablets of soft stone with a pointed tool, called a stilus, made of iron or other metal. The pen used by the early Hebrews was probably such an instrument. In some in- stances the stilus was pointed with diamonds, as mentioned in Jeremiah xvii., 1. Wooden tablets were used at an ancient date. Sometimes the inscriptions were made upon the bare wood; in other cases, the tablets were coated with some kind of composition, the writing being scratched upon the surface with a pointed implement. The Egyptians employed tablets covered with a glazed composition, upon which they wrote with ink. Wooden tablets con- taining the names of the dead have been foimd with mummies. Lead was employed in very early times. Pliny states that the public acts of the most remote nations were recorded in leaden books. Tablets of lead have been discovered which contain petitions to oracles, and in some cases the answers; charms and incan- tations were also inscribed on leaves of this metal. These leaden plates were often so thin that they might easily have been rolled up. For literary purposes, lead was employed to some extent in the middle ages in Northern Italy. Digitized by Microsoft® MATERIALS USED BY ANCIENT PEOPLES 125 Bronze was a material used in both Greece and Rome, on which to engrave laws, treaties, and other solemn dociraients. In Babylonia and Assyria, tablets were made of Babylonia and Assyria^ soft clay; after receiving impressions, they were taWetsof dried in the sun or baked in ovens. The scribe, who held an important position, was always pro- vided with slabs of fine plastic clay, sufficiently moist to take an impression easily, but also sufii- ciently firm to prevent the inscriptions from becoming blurred or effaced. The writing, of course, was done with the stilus. The Greeks and Romans used wooden and ivory Greece and tablets covered with a thin layer of wax; the wa^^tat- l6tS instrument was stiU the stilus, made of metal, bone, or ivory. The tablets were sometimes fastened together with wire. They were employed for memoranda, accounts, school exercises, corre- spondence, literary composition, and legal docu- ments. The stilus was sharpened at one end for the purpose of writing, and was left blunt at the other, to make erasures when necessary. Wax tablets continued to be used to a limited extent in Europe until the fourteenth or fifteenth century. In Egypt inscribed potsherds have been found inaoribed in great numbers. The inscriptions are some- potsherds. Digitized by Microsoft® 126 MATERIALS USED BY ANCIENT PEOPLES times scratched with a pointed instrument; gener- ally, however, they are written in ink with a reed. In Greece this material seems to have been used only on rare occasions or from necessity. Such inscribed fragments have received the name of ostraka, a term which we associate with the ostracism practised by the Athenians, in which the votes were recorded on pieces of broken ves- sels. In Egypt the ostraka were generally receipts for taxes or letters or orders to officials. Graffiti. Graffiti, or wall-scribblings, abounded in nearly all places under Roman domination. They have been discovered in the ancient cities of Italy, but in the greatest numbers at Pompeii. The scribblings and rude drawings are generally scratched with a sharp instrument or scrawled with red chalk or charcoal, and were evidently traced by idle loxmgers or triflers; inscriptions of a more serious nature were drawn with a brush. We find doggerel and amatory verses, caricatures, quotations from the poets, idle words, names to which opprobrious epithets were attached, pasquinades, and satirical remarks; among the tracings of a serious import were notices of house- hold events, advertisements and announcements of games, appeals to the public, prayers, and invo- Digitized by Microsoft® MATERIALS USED BY ANCIENT PEOPLES 127 cations to the martjT^. These inscriptions dis- close the current life of the people, afford material for the study of the Roman cursive writing, and are often of historical and archeological importance. The Egyptians covered with inscriptions the stone walls of their buildings, — their palaces, temples, monuments, the walls and ceilings of sub- terranean passages, and even the interiors of their tombs. The history of the nation was thus writ- ten in hieroglyphics, and on stone walls and tablets kings recorded their exploits, their campaigns into distant lands, their victories, and their triumphant returns. In the earliest ages of their history the Hebrews, in common with other primitive peoples, engraved teriaie of the ^ I r ) o Hebrews. the record of their important events upon stone; they also wrote with the stilus on rough tablets of wood, earthenware, or bone; at a later period they employed the skins of animals. The Law was written in golden characters on skins in the form of a scroll. Leather is still used by the Jews for their synagogue rolls. Parchment was also employed by the Hebrews as a writing surface. Among other materials used by primitive peo- pies to receive writing, besides the skins of animals, ^^^i^y"^^ ^^ the most common were the bark of trees, and ''^®^' Digitized by Microsoft® 128 MATERIALS USED BY ANCIENT PEOPLES leaves, principally those of the palm. The Latin word for bark, liber, came to mean also book. Linen cloth was employed as a writing surface by the ancient Egyptians, also by the Romans for certain rituals in their history. The Ojibwa Indians of North America still make records on birch-bark, and own scrolls which they say have been in their possession for centuries. The Indians have also painted on skins of animals, but of recent years they have employed muslin and canvas as a writing surface. The Oriental traveler, Mr. F. Jagor, observed in India and elsewhere the use of birch-bark and palm and similar leaves to receive writing. The characters are usually in- scribed with a finely-pointed instrument of steel or other hard substance, after which a composition of grease and powdered charcoal is rubbed into the indentations. The calamus, With ink the writing implement was the calamus, or reed, sharpened and spht like the pens of the present day. The reed pen was employed for writing upon papyrus or parchment. This instru- ment was made from the tubular stalks of grasses growing in marshy lands and from the hollow joints of the bamboo. The calami.is is the true ancient representative of the modern pen. In or reed. Digitized by Microsoft® MATEniALS USED BY ANCIENT PEOPLES 129 Greece and Rome the reeds in conunon use were obtained from Egypt, but persons of wealth often wrote with a silver calamus. Some of the ancient reed pens are still preserved ; one found in a papyrus at Herculaneum is now kept at Naples. The natives of Persia and of some neighboring countries still employ the reed, as the metal pen is not adapted to their mode of writing. The Japanese and Chinese use a hair pencil or small brush. The ink of the ancients was made from the black Ancient inks. fluid of the cuttle-fish, or of lampblack or char- coal and gum. The thick inks were applied with a brush; for the reed a thinner ink was made of gall-nuts and sulphate of iron. Red and blue inks were employed for titles and initial letters. The ancient inks were thicker and more durable than those of the present day. The writing on the ancient Egyptian papyri is legible even now after the lapse of several thousand years. Gold and silver have both been employed as goi^andsii- writing fluids. Manuscripts of pxu'ple-stained aScSf^''"^ vellum were written in gold, and ordinary white vellum was also so inscribed, particularly during the reigns of the Carlovingian kings of the ninth and tenth centuries. The practice of gold writing 9 Digitized by Microsoft® 130 MATERIALS USED BY ANCIENT PEOPLES survived until the thirteenth century, after which date only a few isolated examples are to be found. Silver would produce little effect on a white groiuid; its use as a writing fluid therefore ceased with the disuse of stained velliun. Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER n PAPYRUS rrHE Cypenis Papyrus of Linnseus was a plant -*- extensively cultivated in ancient times in the p^nt!*''^™^ Delta of Egypt. It is now extinct in Lower Egypt, but is found in Nubia and Abyssinia. It is said to grow also in Western Asia and in Sicily. One of its ancient names was P-apu, from which the Greek title papyrus was derived. The Greeks called it also hyblos and deltas. Its Hebrew name was gome, a word resembling the Coptic gom, or "volume.". Inmodern Arabic its name is berdi. In hieroglyphic writing the papyrus plant is \ised as the symbol of Lower Egypt. On the ancient Egyptian monuments, the papy- rus is represented as a plant about ten feet in height. Theophrastus gives the first accurate de- scription of it, and says that it grew in shallows of about three feet or less, its main root, which lay horizontally, being of the thickness of a man's wrist and ten cubits in length. From this main root, smaller roots extended down into the mud; (131) Digitized by Microsoft® 132 PAPYRUS the stem of the plant rose to the height of six feet or more above the water, being triangular in form with a tufted head of niunerous droop- ing spikelets. The papyrus plant was used for many pur- poses, both useful and ornamental. Of the tufted head, garlands were made for the shrines of the gods. Its roots were dried for fuel and its pith was boiled and eaten. Of the stem, were made sandals, boxes, boats, sails, mats, cloth, cords, and writing material. In sculptures of the period of the fourth dynasty^ workmen are represented in the act of building a boat of stalks cut from a neighboring plantation of papyrus. Isaiah prob- ably refers to boats of this kind when he speaks of "vessels of bulrushes upon the waters" (xviii., 2). The widespread use of papyrus as an ancient wnSn^i^°' writing surface is attested by early writers and by numerous documents and sculptures; the material was employed in Egypt at a remote period. The names of the plant, given above, were applied to the writing material, which by the Greeks was called also charta. Papyrus rolls are represented in the sculptures of Egyptian temples, and numerous examples of the rolls themselves are still in exist- terlal. I From about 3998-S721 B. 0. Digitized by Microsoft® PAPYRUS 133 ence. The dry atmosphere of Egypt has been peculiarly favorable to the preservation of these documents; in many instances they remain un- touched by decay, and are as fresh as when first written. Pliny's account of the manufacture of the writ- , . 1 J r J. ii. Mannfac- mg material from papyrus refers to the process ture of pa- followed in his time, but it is probable that the same general method of treatment had been prac- ticed for many centuries. The stem was cut into longitudinal strips, those from the centre being, of course, the broadest and therefore the most valu- able. The strips were laid on a board, side by side, until the desired width was obtained; across the layer thus formed another layer of shorter strips was laid at right angles. The two layers were soaked, Pliny says, in water of the Nile. It is supposed that they were joined either by the juice of the plant or by a thin gum. The layers were then pressed and dried in the sun. Any inequalities in the surface were removed by the use of ivory or a smooth shell. Newly-made papyrus was white, or brownish white, and flex- ible, but the papyri which have been preserved imtil the present day have become of a light or dark brown color and so brittle as to break at the Digitized by Microsoft® 134 PAPYRUS touch. The sheets varied from four or five inches to nearly eighteen inches in width; the usual width was about eight inches. Any required length could be obtained by fastening a number of sheets together, end to end. The sheets were put together in the order of their quality, the best sheet on the outside of the roll and the worst sheets in the centre. They were thus arranged, not for the piu-pose of concealing the bad material, but that the strongest sheets should be placed where there was most wear and tear. Besides, if the entire roll should not be needed, the poorest sheets could be better spared and easily cut off. The papyrus roll, as a rule, was written on one side only, and was fastened to a wooden rod or roller, around which it was wound. Papyrus The roUs were of various lengths. A fairly full copy of the ritual of the dead, the whole or a part of which was buried with every person of consequence from the eighteenth dynasty^ to the Roman period, required a roll fifteen inches wide and from eighty to ninety feet long. The Harris papyrus, in the British Museum, is the longest known, having a length of one hundred and thirty- three feet. The most ancient of the papyri now ex- > From about 1587-1328 B. 0. rolls. Digitized by Microsoft® vfrB'^ s^ r?^i2 -i": 'A ni k I ID a. 5. Lf 9LI ^ FFr M I rrr V II © SI ■p /H of ^ r? rrr s Ll I ^ 1^ 'si ^f ^ am /2f r? -- v£ :5J ■if. t (E: A. 1 f ^ Mi Mi s? * rti -fe 4fe SELECTION FKOM THE BOOK OF THE ])EALI— TUKIN (HIEKOGLYPHIC) PAPYRUS. [From Davis. By permission of G. P. Putnam's Sons.] Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® PAPTBU8 135 tant is the Prisse papyrus, so called from the name of its former owner, and is preserved at Paris. It is supposed to date from about 2400 b. c, or earlier, and contains a work composed during the reign of a king of the fifth dynasty.' The papyri of Egypt have usually been found in tombs, or in the hands, or wrapped with the bodies, of mummies. Besides the ritual of the dead, which is most frequently the subject, and religious rolls, there are civil and literary documents, in the hieratic style of writing, and the demotic or enchorial papyri, relating generally to sales of property. The discovery of papyri containing works of ' Discoveries of dassical Greek authors, begun about the middle papyri. of the nineteenth century, has resulted in a great gain to literature. There were brought to light four or five quite complete orations of Hyperides, an orator who before had been known only by name. Additions were made to the works of Euripides and Alcman, and early manuscripts were found of parts of Homer, Plato, Thucydides, Demosthenes, and Isocrates. In the great dis- covery in 1891, of more than one hundred and sixty ancient mummies in a subterranean passage at 1 Fiom about 3721-3503 B. 0. Digitized by Microsoft® 136 PAPYBUS Deir el Bahari, near Thebes, many Egyptian papyri were given to the world. These contained the usual ritual passages and extracts from the Book of the Dead. In the same year the British Museum obtained from Egypt papyrus rolls con- taining almost the whole of a lost work of Aristotle on the Constitution of Athens. There were four of these rolls, the longest seven feet, the shortest three feet in length. They date from about the end of the first century a. d. It has been thought that the early Chaldeans had a knowledge of papyrus paper, and either made it themselves or had it brought from Egypt, but if they possessed papyrus writings they have entirely disappeared. Egypt was the true home of this plant, where paper was manufactured from it at least 2000 years b. c. It was for a long time an article of export and in great demand. It is sup- posed that the manufacture of papyrus in Egypt ceased about the middle of the tenth century. Papyrus was used among the early Greeks but it &reeoe'and ^^^ ^°* come into general use until after the time of Italy. Alexander the Great, when it was exported from the ports of Egypt. It is not known when papyrus was first used in Italy, but under the Empire there was a great demand for it. It was then employed not Use of pa- Digitized by Microsoft® PAPYRUS 137 only for making books, but for domestic purposes, correspondence, and legal documents. It is said that during the reign of Tiberius the failure of the papyrus crop almost caused a riot. Although the plant was cultivated in Italy, the staple was doubtless imported from Alexandria. It is thought by some that papyrus paper was never manufac- tured from the native plant anywhere except in Egypt. Papyrus continued to be employed to some ex- tent as a WTiting material in Europe until the tenth century; by the twelfth century it had entirely disappeared. Its use for books ceased sooner than for documents. Dm^ing the later period of its use in book-making, it was no longer made in rolls but was cut into square pages and bound like a modern book. To the square form of book, the name codex was given. [See Codex, page 183.] Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER III PAECHMENT AND VELLUM npHE skins of animals were employed as a writing -*- surface at a very early period. The word parch- ment is derived from Pergamum, the name of a city in Mysia, where it is said the material was first used. The story as told by Pliny is that Eumenes II., King of Pergamum (b. c. 197-159?), wishing his library to rival that of the Pharaohs at Alexandria, was forced to develop the manufac- ture of parchment in consequence of the prohi- bition of the exportation of papyrus from Egypt through the jealousy of Ptolemy Epiphanes. Papyrus was used as a writing surface in Italy as late as the tenth century, but parchment was also employed. From the tenth century until the fourteenth, when paper became generally known, parchment was the ordinary writing material. It was the influence of the Christian Church that eventually caused vellum to supersede papyrus as a writing surface. Because of its durability, it was used for new volumes, also to replace damaged (138) Digitized by Microsoft® PARCHMENT AND VELLUM 139 works on papyrus. When Contanstine desired copies of the Scriptures for his new churches, he or- dered the manuscripts to be inscribed on vellum. During the middle ages, veUum dyed purple, or other brilliant color, was used for valuable manu- scripts, such as the Gospels, the Psalter, and im- portant Codices. The entire surface of leaves of this material was sometimes gilded, but this mode of decoration must have proved too expensive to be very generally employed. Parchment ^ is skin so prepared that both sides Kinds of can be written upon. Ordinary parchment is made chiefly from sheepskin and sometimes from those of the goat. Fine parchment, or vellum, is prepared from the skins of calves, kids, and dead- born lambs. A coarse variety used for drumheads, tambourines, etc., is made from the skins of goats, calves, and wolves; for battledores the skins of asses are employed; for bookbinders' use parch- ment is sometimes manufactured from pigskin. Sheepskins are often split so as to produce two sheets of parchment. The Eskimos make this parchment. 1 In modern times the term parchment has given place to that of vellum. The true vellum is made from calf-skin or from the skins of kids or dead -born lamhs, but the name is now applied to a medieval skin book of any kind. The use of the word parchment is generally lestrieted to sheepskin or a skin on which law deeds or other formal writings are engrossed. Digitized by Microsoft® 140 PARCHMENT AND VELLUM Preparation of tne skins. Vegetable paichment. material from the entrails of seals, and manufac- ture from it blankets and clothing. The skin of the fur-seal is sometimes converted into parch- ment, which is used for making cases for holding valuable papers or other articles. With some slight differences, all the skins are pre- pared in the same way. They are first soaked in water and then in milk of lime for the purpose of re- moving the hair. They are shaved, washed, and gone over with a sharp knife to remove superfluous parts. The skins are then stretched on a stout wooden frame, called a herse, and dried in the air. The finer varieties are dusted with chalk and rubbed with pumice-stone. Parchment intended for the use of bookbinders is planed, in order to produce a rough surface capable of being dyed or written upon. Vegetable parchment, or parchment paper, is made by dipping ordinary unsized paper for a few seconds in dilute sulphuric acid and immediately removing all traces of the acid. Paper thus acted upon undergoes a remarkable change': it becomes translucent, horny, and parchmen1>-Uke, and ac- quires about five times the strength of ordinary paper. It is impervious to water, but becomes soft and flaccid when dipped into it; it is not affected Digitized by Microsoft® PARCHMENT AND VELLUM 141 by boiling water. The same efifect is produced by subjecting paper to a solution of chloride of zinc. Stout varieties of vegetable parchment have been employed for book-covers and as a writing surface for deeds; its chief use, however, is for covers of vessels, such as preserve-jars and bottles. Thin sheets of it are employed for tracing plans and charts. Parchment for printing purposes is imported into the United States from Europe and is sold in rolls of sixty skins. It is made in Hanover, at Augsbmrg, Breslau, Dantzic, and Nuremberg, and in Holland, England, and France. Digitized by Microsoft® Paper made by th -"--■• nese. T CHAPTER IV PAPEE HE earliest material which resembled the paper of the present day was made from the Egyp- tian papyrus. From the Eg3^tian word P-ajm were derived the Greek and Latin terms papyrus, and from these all similar writing material has been named. The Chinese seem to have had a knowledge of nese^^*^^^ the art of making paper many centuries before the material was introduced into Western Asia and Europe. At a very remote period they made paper of sprouts of bamboo, of Chinese grass, and of the bast of a special mulberry-tree. Fang Mi-Chih, author of an encyclopedia, states that at first the Chinese wrote on bamboo boards; but that for a long time, both before and after the Christian era, the usual writing material was paper made of silk waste. The manufacture of paper from fibrous matter and from the wool of the cotton-plant, reduced to a pulp, has been traced back by some writers to the second century b. c. The invention of paper made of (142) Digitized by Microsoft® PAPER 143 vegetable fibre is attributed to the statesman Ts 'ai Lun. It is said that in 105 a. d. he had succeeded in making paper of bark, of hemp, of rags, and of old fish-nets. By the Chinese the art was made known to the Hindus, the Persians, and the Arabs. A a^*;^™^"!', paper manufactory was established at Samarkand Arabs. in the latter part of the sixth or early in the sev- enth century of the Christian era. The Arabs conquered this city in 704 a. d., and there learned the use of the material. From this time paper became available for the rest of the world. At Bagdad its manufacture was carried on from about 795 a. d. until the fifteenth century. The art was practised also in Damascus, Egypt, and the North of Africa. From the large quantities made at Damascus, paper received the name of charta Damascena, a term by which it was generally known in Europe in the middle ages; the titles charta and papyrus were transferred to it from the Egyptian writing material; cotton paper was called also during the middle ages charta bombycina, gossypina, cuttunea, xylina, Damascena, and serica. Paper was probably introduced into Greece „^ through trade with Asia, and thence carried to ^p^^^ other countries in Europe. It seems not to have Greece. Digitized by Microsoft® 144 PAPER been used very extensively in Greece before the middle of the thirteenth century. The first paper manufactured in Europe was Germany, ' made by the Moors in Spain. In 1154 there was and France. , - • i- ■ a paper-mill at J ativa ; factories were also estab- hshed at Valencia and Toledo. The Arabs intro- duced paper-making into Sicily; from Sicily it passed over into Italy, where there is evidence, in the city of Genoa, of a trade in this material as early as 1235. In Germany the first factories seem to have been established between Cologne and Mainz towards the end of the thirteenth century, and in Mainz itself about the year 1320. Mills were started also at Nuremberg, Ratisbon, and Augsburg. Paper was introduced from Spain into France, where it is said to have been manufactured in the district of H6rault as early as 1189. The Nether- lands and England first obtained their supply from France and Burgundy. It is believed that the first paper-maker in England was a per- son named Tate, who is said to have had a mill in operation in Hertford early in the sixteenth century. Very little is known of the manufac- ture of the material in that country, however, until about the middle of the sixteenth century, when there was a paper-mill at DartforcJ Digitized by Microsoft® tuOOm quM popemutatroiaf loau^iibt m^ vtBxmda emejiitmuf qfua^^at^^mmin oi tmtimn JAmi mnimtmd ffl (£d (i^mmn^ lie tllis caxuiittititfmptitm mxf^m^intsml ,-i&^flf eutf iiirte mmikn matnmi^^fa toti mafti8^£Ui?inaaa ctajpljf etiwtiataair tqmluftmitem i}tmntnligebat.'in;ctt mofii ctpida.Cor matn:tua.itr^tllkl|qia aitcpif tammlclplau«mfl^|i9oamirmls!tc&l6r^ ttma otmenmfiunafefimf i.4if CDufihiumf toipttua Ijmt.jlttio .%fafi?aiife poiiiuaaf aomD plmujfmmiimtqiangtani plena aic6> PART or A PAGE FKOM A MANVSCRIPT JIISSAL WRITTEN IN GER- MAKY— ABOUT THE PERIOD OF GUTENBERG'S FIRST BIBLE. [From Humphreys.] Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® PAPER 145 In America paper was first manufactured by America. William Bradford, the printer, in 1690, at Ger- mantown, near Philadelphia. Having discovered a paper-maker among the immigrants to the colony, with the help of some of his neighbors, he started a paper-factory, which was operated by the Rittenhouse family for several generations. The paper first manufactured in Europe was made from the cotton-plant; rags were afterwards mixed with the raw material or substituted for it. Many early Arabic manuscripts on paper, dating from the ninth century, are still in existence, mlnmo^ts Among the earUest dated documents is the Gharibu °°p*p®'- 'l-Hadith, written in the year 866 a. d. This is a treatise on the rare and curious words found in the sayings of Mohammed and his companions, and is preserved in the University Library of Leyden. The oldest dated Arabic manuscript on paper in the British Museum is of the year 960, and is a treatise by an Arabian physician on the nourishment of the different members of the body. In the Bodleian Library (Oxford), is preserved a manuscript of a grammatical work of 974. As this was written at Samarkand, the paper was probably made at that seat of early Arab manufactm-e. 10 Digitized by Microsoft® 146 PAPES Of the documents on cotton paper written in Early docu- '■ "er^wmten^ Europe, the oldest is the deed of King Roger of mEuropI" Sicily, of the year 1102; other deeds of Sicilian kings of the twelfth century are recorded. The oldest known imperial deed on paper is a charter of Frederick II. to the nuns of Goess in Styria, of the year 1228, now kept at Vienna. This emperor, however, in 1231, forbade the vise of paper for official docimients, which he desired inscribed on vellum. The British Museum pos- sesses astronomical treatises written on paper, in an ItaUan hand of the first half of the thirteenth century. Examples of Spanish-made paper are the letters addressed from Castile to Edward I. of England, in 1279 and subsequent years. Manufacture of paper- first paper- macnlnes. At first, paper, both ancient and modern, was made entirely by hand. In 1799 a paper- machine was invented by Louis Robert, a clerk employed by the Messrs. Didot of the celebrated Essonnes mills near Paris, and this caused a great development of the in- dustry. The manufacture was introduced into England, through the agency of the Messrs. Fourdrinier, and the first paper-machine in that Digitized by Microsoft® F difta-t-umpetict^ilia/nonat^ H oti (erts ttlfiia: perfc' H cmtanajmptiope+'ttttiicnorti. fij H o»cj.&profert>sluatus&facris I titer tocofi tnun^ta libcri • k ^ C utn ptx>le matrcmi^a: nrTs J R ret dtos pruts idptecaa, V atatcfvitieros tnorepatrunvduccs 1- icbs rctnvco carmnnetilnis ^T rotatna: ajendrnfcn 4-alitjr T roffetuetn ucnms canctnus i fcC^' H f Cj»-nnmTwi hbwtj'jarOB ecuJnuim Bis Ubmnts tnteraUa-nau&tv A mi^propupnacim Paratus atrmc lyfens pcrtculnnv ubtrrnvecenas tuo q Old nos <}uibui re tuta fiaperftiw I ocuti (Ja fi contta. jmous V trutnncianiptr(c(iuetnarotiutm ^ H cti dijce ni-tecuMi fiitiul A nbuncUbcn'antn«tnwUtun4eoee: ^ ucmferre ti(>ii vfMtf racmil]an Company.] Digitized by Microsoft© Digitized by Microsoft® MEDIEVAL BINDINGS 199 stamping the leather in relief. Examples of Italian cameos are those found on the books once belong- ing to the library of Demetrio Canevari; the sub- ject of the central oval stamp, which is in gold, silver, and colors, being invariably Apollo driving his chariot over the waves. Digitized by Microsoft® The Eves. CHAPTER III MEDIEVAL BINDINGS — MODERN BINDINGS npHE Eves were a family of binders who worked for -^ the kings of France from about 1578 to 1631. Nicholas, the first, is said to have bound books about 1565, for the famous mistress of Henry II., Diane de Poitiers, who possessed some of the most beautiful bindings ever produced. In the Eve style of work the compartments of the geometrical designs are surrounded by scrolls or spirals and branches of palm and olive. In their earlier work the designs were graceful, but the com- partments were not filled in; after a time their binding became very elaborate, and they finally abandoned the geometrical designs altogether, using only the wreaths and palm branches. The name fanfare was afterwards given to this flom-- ishing style of ornament. The bindings of Oxford and Cambridge Uni- Oxfordand ... Cambridge versities were distinguished for superior workman- UnlversitieB. ° ^ ship, although they were not noticeably artistic. (200) Digitized by Microsoft® MEDIEVAL BINDINGS 201 The materials adopted by Sir Thomas Bodley for the Oxford bindings were leather, velliun, and occasionally velvet. The later bindings of these universities are marked by improved taste and are prized by some modern collectors. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries binders continued to beat their books on a stone with a and sixteenth centuries. wooden hammer, to give them the proper sohdity. They often made use of a slip of parchment around the end-papers and the first and last sheets, to protect the backs from injury and to strengthen the joint. Parchment or stout paper was used to strengthen the last leaf, as the inside lining of the boards, and sometimes for the entire binding of ordinary books; it is owing to this practice that, in later times, fragments of early manuscripts, before imknown, have been discovered; but many valuable works, thus applied to binding purposes, must have entirely disappeared. The sheets were sewed on strong slips of white leather, placed equally distant from each other, which form the four, five, or six raised cords or bands seen on the backs of volumes encased in these early bindings. In these two centuries board covers of wood were still used, generally of oak or beech, but thinner than those of the Digitized by Microsoft® 202 SEVENTEENTH CENTURY BINDINGS Sixteenth century. Jacques Au- guste de Thou. preceding period. Three kinds of commercial bindings were known, — ^board, leather, and parch- ment. For the use of the noble and the rich, books were bound in more costly materials; for volimies of special interest or value, velvet was generally employed. In the sixteenth century wooden boards were finally discarded for pads of paper and sheets of cardboard. In this century the "plough," vised to cut the leaves even, made its appearance. In the sixteenth centmy bookbinding attained its highest degree of development on the Conti- nent. For artistic taste and thoroughness of work- manship, it has never since been equaled. Beau- tiful covers were produced not only in Italy, Germany, and France, but in Spain and even in the Slavonic provinces of the East. In the seventeenth century the French pro- duced many fine bindings; in the eighteenth century their work retrograded. In Italy, during this period, the art was rapidly decUning. A famous collector, whose labors extended into the seventeenth century, was Jacques Auguste de Thou (1553-1617), who became keeper of the royal library under Henry IV. of France. His bindings were generally plain and substantial, the Digitized by Microsoft® 8EVENTEENTH CENTURY BINDINGS 203 only ornament being a gold armorial stamp in the centre; for choice volumes he used an elaborate gold ornament in the fanfare style. His materials were red, green, and lemon morocco, fawn-colored calf, and white vellum. The National Library of Paris possesses the earliest known example of a doublure, or inside lining of the cover of a book; it is an ItaUan binding of 1550. Florimond Badier, one of the binders of Louis XIV., is said to have been the first to make any extensive use of this innova- tion. Mac6 Ruette, who bound books for Louis XIII. between 1606 and 1638, is credited with the introduction into France of yellow marbled moroc- co and marbled paper. This marbled paper was sometimes used for the inner leaves of books, and almost universally for the doublures. The inside lining, as well as the cover, of fine volumes is often of leather, which is artistically decorated. Le Gascon is regarded as one of the foremost of bookbinders. M. Marius-Michel thinks he may have been a pupil or an apprentice of the binders who worked for De Thou. He made use of grace- ful curved fines, formed by the repetition of countless gold dots or points, which produced a brilliant effect on the scarlet morocco ground. SovMures. Le Gascon. Digitized by Microsoft® 204 MODERN BINDINGS Seventeenth century- England. Eighteenth century- France. In England, in the seventeenth century, httle encouragement could be given to the art because of the unsettled condition of the country, owing to the civil wars of Charles I., the influence of the Puritans, and the profligacy of the reign of Charles II., whereby the patronage of the wealthy was removed. Oaken boards were discarded, a thick but flimsy pasteboard being now used for covers; the bands of hempen cord were drawn through holes pierced through the boards. The process of beating books to produce solidity was still continued, and the sewing and backing were well done. In the eighteenth century bookbinding flourished in France, and we find a long array of names of those who practised the art. Among the distin- guished binders were Padeloup, Derome, Le Mon- nier, Boyet, Du Seuil, Douceur, Anguerrand, and Dubuisson. The first two names represent each a dynasty; it is said that there were twelve Pade- loups and fourteen Deromes, aU booksellers and bookbinders. The most noted were Nicholas and Antoine Michel Padeloup and James Anthony Derome. During the time of the Revolution and the First RepubUc, the art naturally sank to a low Digitized by Microsoft® MODERN BINDINGS 205 ebb. This period of degradation lasted until about 1830, when binders began to be inspired with higher ideals. Modern French work is characterized by perfect forwarding and finishing, but is lacking in originality of design. Among the names of celebrated modern binders may be mentioned Trautz, Bauzonnet, Purgold, Cap^, Duru, Lortic, Hardy-Meunil, Belz-Niedr6e, Thibaron, Thouvenin, Cuzin, Mari US-Michel, and L^on Gruel; the latter two have written valuable works upon the history of bookbinding in France. In the beginning of the eighteenth century large and valuable libraries began to be estab- Eighteenth century — lished in England. As a consequence of the England, increased demand for books, more attention was given to their bindings. Morocco, russia, and brown calf were the chief materials used. The improvements seem to have been made more in the forwarding than in the finishing of the work. The subjects of the ornamentation of the covers frequently bore no relation whatever to the con- tents of the voliime, and the tools were of the poorest design, without an attempt at convention- ality. The most distinguished collector of this century Eohert Har- was Robert Harley, Earl of Oxford, whose library, ley- Digitized by Microsoft® 206 MODERN BINDINGS known as the Harleian Collection, is now in the British Museum. The books are bound chiefly in red mofocco, with a broad border of gold round the sides, some having also a centre ornament. The sawn back is considered to have been in- baok°*^" troduced in the middle of the eighteenth century, but there is evidence of the use of something of this kind in the middle of the sixteenth cen- tury. By this method the bands are let into a groove in the backs of the sheets, and no projecting cords are seen, but the back is not flexible. It is not known just where this pro- cess was first employed, but the idea seems to have been derived from the Dutch bindings, the method was reluctantly adopted by the French and English binders. Raised cords were soon relegated to school-books. From the time of the introduction of the sawn back until the end of the eighteenth century, calf -gilt was generally employed for binding. The covers usually con- formed to one pattern, having marbled sides, brown backs, and colored lettering-pieces. The open or hollow back was rarely used, and the back was made sufficiently stiff to prevent the leather from wrinkling when the book was opened. Towards the close of the eighteenth century. Digitized by Microsoft® MODERN BINDINGS 207 bindings assumed an entirely different appearance, owing to the efforts of Roger Payne. He was Roger Payne, the first binder who attempted to harmonize the decoration with the character of the vol- umes themselves. Payne worked upon straight- grained morocco, stained dark blue or bright red, and also upon russia leather; his favorite color seems to have been olive. His ornaments were chaste, beautiful, and classical. So far as possible, Payne did all the various processes of the work with his own hands. Unfortunately he was in- temperate, but was given constant employment by the noble and the wealthy. Payne's best work went to the Spencer Library. His superior work- manship proved a stimulus to the trade, and introduced a chastened style of ornamentation among the binders of London. Charles Lewis, who ranks among the best of Enghsh binders, was at the head of his profession Charles " ' ^ Lewis. between 1802 and 1840. Dr. Dibdin thus speaks of him: "The particular talent of Lewis consists in uniting the taste of Roger Payne with a freedom of forwarding and squareness of finishing pecu- liarly his own. His books appear to move on silken hinges." Francis Bedford, born in London in 1800, was Digitized by Microsoft® 208 MODERN BINDINGS Francis Bed- ford. PeculiaritieB in bindings. considered the greatest binder of his time. His bindings are substantial and sober, but possess little originality or artistic merit. About 1830 the materials used in bindings of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries began to be revived. Velvet and silk became fashionable for drawing-room table books. Modern bindings of velvet were adopted for many large libraries, among which were the collection of King George III. and the libraries of Earl Spencer, York Minster, and Ripon Cathedral. Some peculiarities in bookbindings deserve special notice. In some instances the material of the cover was made to coincide with the nature of the book. Foxe's historical work was bound in fox's skin, and "Tuberville on Hunting," in deerskin, the cover being ornamented with a stag in silver. Eccentricities were carried even to the use of human leather for binding. It is said that M. Camille Elammarion, the great French astronomer, had a volume bound in the skin of a countess whose white shoulders he once admired, and who, on d)ang, made him the strange bequest of her integument, to be used as a cover for his work describing the world of stars. There are a number of other books in existence, said to Digitized by Microsoft® MODERN BINDINGS 209 be encased in this "human covering," so repug- nant to every person of refined taste. In England bookbinding has many patrons who have contributed much to the improvement of the art, and the number of master binders in London has, in consequence, greatly increased. Much of the success is due to the improvements in the machinery used, among which are the hydraulic mentsin . machinery. press, the rolling-machine, the arming- or em- bossing-press, and numerous appUances heated by gas or propelled by steam. Robert Leighton was the first to adopt nearly all the machinery now employed in large binderies. Leighton. He invented the backing- and trimming-machines, and was the first to employ aluminium and black and colored inks for cloth covers; he also intro- duced steam-power for embossing in gold. Many improvements to facilitate the work of binding have since been invented. On the Thames, between Chelsea and Chiswick, in a modest two-and-a-half-story house, is situated ^^der°T^' the famous Doves Bindery of Mr. Cobden-Sander- son. Mr. Cobden-Sanderson is the most distinguished Mr. Cohden- binder of his time. BeUeving handicraft to be the Sanderson. 14 Digitized by Microsoft® 210 MODERN BINDINGS salvation of humanity and that a man should toil with his hands, he abandoned the bar, which he had chosen as his profession, and studied the trade of bookbinding. At first he did all the work with his own hands, the only aid being given by his wife, a daughter of Mr. Richard Cobden, who took charge of the sewing. He designs his own tools, which are cut especially for his use. This master binder does not care to produce many covers, but it is needless to say that his best effort goes to each. Each design is thought out for the book itself, the decorative scheme being at times suggested by some representative passage of the author. Believing that "beauty is the aim of decoration, and not illustration or the expression of ideas," his bindings are decora- tive in character and not illustrative. Although the scheme of ornamentation may have been suggested by some passage in the book, we find on his covers no childish symbolism or mere label- ing, which have no decorative value. His bind- ings are generally ornamented with conventional- ized flowers which occur in geometrical precision. He studied the methods of Le Gascon, and pro- bably from him derived the idea of imparting brilliancy to his designs by the free use of gold Digitized by Microsoft® COBDEN-SANDEESON BINDING. [From " Bookbindings Old and New," Brander Matthews. By permission of Mr. Matthews and the Macmillan Company.] Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® MODERN BINDINGS 211 points, stars, single leaves, and like ornamen- tation. The work of the Doves Bindery is all done by hand on leather tooled in gold. Every detail is carefully thought out and executed in the most painstaking manner ; nothing is slighted or hurried over. The decoration is put on, not by the single impression of a stamp, but is built up step by step; the books, therefore, bear the impress of mind and not of mechanism. Mr. / Cobden-Sanderson no longer himself binds, but still designs; his assist- ants attend to the execution of the designs and the actual binding. Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER IV COMMEECIAL BINDINGS A LTHOUGH in edition work, many volumes ■^ have been decorated without regard to the principles of art, there has been an improvement in this direction of late years, and the designs occasionally attain a high degree of excellence. There must always be a difference between what is made by hand and what is produced by a machine; but a book-cover stamped by steam becomes pleasing to the cultivated taste when it bears the impress of a design which is truly artistic. Cloth binding, although originating in Great Britain, has been carried to much greater mechanical excellence by machines invented or improved in the United States. The distinction between special bindings and commercial or trade bindings arose soon after the introduction of the printing-press. The early printers were binders as well as pubhshers; their books which have come down to us attest to the thoroughness with which they did their work. When every touch of gold on a cover had to be (212) Digitized by Microsoft® The roulette. COMMERCIAL BINDINGS 213 made by the separate impression of a tool, the process was necessarily laborious and expensive; consequently, very early in the history of th^ art attempts were made to simphfy the work of the decorator. Among the first tools adopted was the roulette, or roll. This contained a complete pattern en- graved on the circumference of a wheel, the pat- tern reproducing itself as the wheel was rolled across the cover. The roulette was used for borders and frameworks. The next device was the combination of engraved blocks to form a pattern in some degree appropriate combination « of 6IISTQ1V6CI. to the contents of the volume. The binder kept Uooks. in stock a variety of blocks of different sizes and subjects, sometimes related in pairs or in sets of fours; these he rearranged to form corners, centre- pieces, and panels, to suit his books as they were successively issued. He was obliged, however, at times to make use of the roulette and of hand- work. In order to dispense altogether with handwork, and thus quicken the production of books, one Theengravea. design was engraved for the whole side of a vol- viae, and was stamped on the cover at a single stroke of the press. The Tory plate was com- Digitized by Microsoft® 214 COMMEBCIAL BINDINGS plete in itself, but some plaques still left details to be filled in by the hand of the workman. The roulette, the combination of blocks, and the engraved plate, were employed simultaneously for several centuries. The early commercial binding was an attempt to reproduce artistic work done entirely by hand; modern commercial binding is no longer a mere imitation of handwork and is developing along its own lines. Half-binding had its origin in Germany, and is Halt-binding a money-saving device. In this method leather is quarter bind- used Only for the back, with its necessary hinge, and the corners of the cover; a very deep back of leather with larger corners is termed three- quarter binding. The English binders carried this economy still farther, and, dispensing altogether with the leather, covered with paper both the sides and the backs of their books. A volume thus sheathed in boards was not desirable, as the back was liable to crack and come off and the sides to break away. This method proving unsatisfactory, plain glazed calico was substituted for the paper; this was the beginning of cloth binding. At first there was no attempt at decoration; the title was stiU Digitized by Microsoft® COMMEBOIAL BINDINGS 215 printed on a white paper label, which was pasted on the back of the book. Cloth binding arose in England, and is said to have been introduced by Archibald Leighton in PJ°"» '''°'^- 1822. At first the binding had a "smooth- washed" surface, but about 1831 or 1832 embossed cloth came into use. The first volume of "Lord Byron's Life and Works," published in 1832, was bound in green cloth, and had a green paper label on the back, with the title and coronet printed on it in gold. When, in the same year, the second volume appeared, the title and coronet were stamped in gold upon the cloth, the label being omitted altogether. This is supposed to be the first work issued with the title printed in gold directly on the cloth. It is thought, however, that some volumes of a series of "Oxford English Classics " mav have been so stamped before this " Byron." Stamping, at first, must have been done by a hand-press, or an " arming-press," as it was called, ^^"^n nu^. The cloth was dyed to any desired color, and was <=i"''«"7. run through rollers to give it the grain or texture that was wanted. Steam was soon used instead of fool^power, and other improvements enabled the binder to imprint the pattern on the cover Digitized by Microsoft® 216 COMMEBCIAL BINDINGS in as many colors as could be employed to pro- duce good work. Binding is now d"one with great speed; a modern bindery can turn out several thousand copies of a cover in twenty-four hours. In artistic handwork the leather case is attached to the book, after which the ornamentation is added. In cloth binding, or edition work, the cover is made and decorated before it is affixed to the volume. In edition work the process is wholly mechanical, with the exception of the de- signing of the stamp. Although countless nimabers of volumes have Commercial been clothed in undesirable covers, still much ma- thS Doite™ chine binding has been done which is chaste and GreatBritain. beautiful. In the decoration of commercial bind- ings the United States seems to surpass Great Britain. For the higher class of books, the Eng- lish still regard the cloth cover as a mere tem- porary case, each collector binding his books according to his own taste. In America, on the contrary, the cloth cover is more generally retained, and more attention is therefore given to the taste- ful decoration of bindings. Among distinguished American American binders may be mentioned Mr. William Matthews, the Bradstreets, Mr. Stikeman, and Mr. Otto Zahn. Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER V FORWARDING rpHE various processes employed in the binding -^ of a book are known by the general term of forwarding. The decoration of the cover is called the finishing. In artistic leather binding, the book is covered and embellished by hand, each volxmie being treated individually. The method outhned in the following paragraphs is that em- ployed in cloth binding, or edition work. When the flat, dry sheets arrive from the printer, they are first folded by machinery, one fold giving y^j^j^ four pages, two folds eight pages, three folds sixteen pages, and four folds thirty-two pages. Folding is seldom carried farther than this, as the constant doubUng of the paper causes the sheets to be of unequal size. On the gathering table, the sheets are arranged in piles, in the order of the signatures, which are Gathering, the figures or letters foimd at the foot of the first page of each sheet or section of the book. The girl who gathers begins at the last pile, and placing a sheet on her left arm, takes in due order one (217) Digitized by Microsoft® 218 FOBWABDINO Collating. Pressing. Preparation for sewing. sheet from each pile until she has formed one complete book. By another method, the girls sit around a revolving table, and as the piles pass, each girl takes one sheet from each pile. The book is then collated, or examined, to see that only the proper sheets have been taken and that none have been misplaced. Great care is required in collating books with insets, such as plates, maps, or a part of a sheet inserted when the whole sheet has been divided into multiples of threes, as in twelves, eighteens, and twenty-fours. Solidity was formerly given to books by beating them with a hammer on a stone or piece of iron; they are now rendered compact by the use of the hydraulic press or the signature press. When screwed down tightly, a volume is sometimes reduced to one-half its original size. The next step is to prepare the book for sewing. If the sawn back is to be employed, grooves are made in the backs of the sheets. In flexible binding the cords are placed on the outside of the sheets; in the sawn back they are sunk into the grooves, and the book, consequently, will not be entirely flat when opened. The back is generally marked off by a pencil into six parts which are equal, with the exception of the lowest; this is made a little Digitized by Microsoft® FORWARDING 219 longer than the others, because if it were of the same length, an optical delusion would cause it to appear shorter. The depth of the groove and the thickness of the cords depend upon the size of the book; if the cords are too large the book will not open well. The sawing is done by a machine. A sewing-press is used to attach the sheets to the bands or cords. The sewer places the back sewing. edge of the sheet in contact with the cords, opens the sheet in the middle, and a needle and thread passing to and fro sews it to the cords. The thread passes twice as many times through the back of each sheet as there are cords, in order to twist the thread around each cord and to unite the cords and the sheet. The threads are all fastened to the cords and to each other. The stitch by which the thread passes from one sheet to another is known as " kettle-stitch.". After the end papers, or the papers which are to brimming form the inside of the cover, are attached, the book is passed through the trimming-machine, to make the edges true. Many books are now left with imcut edges; in others the sheets are trimmed only at the top. The backs are then glued. The glue holds the gjuing. sections together, increases the strength of the Digitized by Microsoft® 220 FORWABDINQ Bounding. Backing. The hollow back. volume, and keeps the back true during the pro- cesses of rounding and backing. The book, placed between two pieces of binders' board, is put into a press, with the back exposed; hot glue is appUed to the back with a brush. The volume is then left to dry, no artificial heat being used. Rounding is the next operation. The back is made convex, the front edges concave, the curve of the front corresponding exactly with that of the back. To round a book, it is hammered, and is changed from one side to the other mitil it has acquired the proper form. Books made with a flat back have a tendency to spring foi"ward. A thin bevel-edged board is laid on each side of the volume, parallel with the edge of the back. The book is then put into the backing-machine, and receives the two ledges against which the sides of the case are to rest. To give a book a hollow back, a double layer of paper or cloth is inserted between the back of the cover and the back of the sheets, the outer layer being glued to the cover, the inner layer to the back of the sheets. As these layers are connected only at their edges, they form a hollow when the book is opened. To strengthen the cover of a volume and also to Digitized by Microsoft® FOBWABDING 221 give it a neat appearance, a headband is placed at The head- the top of the back of the book. This may be of silk or cotton cord, or a strip of vellum or paste- board. A similar band is often placed at the bottom of the volume. When books are to be either whole or half bound, that is when the outer surfaces are to be entirely whole wnd- ing. covered or partly covered with leather, the boards are first attached to the book and the covers are put on afterwards. In cloth binding, or edition work, the boards are covered before they are added ^^ ^™'^" to the volume. The cloth is a special kind of cotton, woven for the use of bookbinders. By binders, the pasteboards which form the sides are known as the boards, the leather or cloth as the cover, and the two together as the case. In cloth binding, after the headband is attached and the lining paper put on the back, the case is Fasteniug , , , , . . the book to pasted to the end papers placed at the beginmng the case, and end of the volume. In leather binding, either whole, half, or three-quarter, the cords or strings which are left to hang loose a little distance be- yond the sides of the volume, are scraped thin and passed through holes pierced through the boards, and are fastened to the inner surface of the boards. Digitized by Microsoft® 222 FOBWABDING Case-making. After the books are attached to the cases, they Drying. ^^.^ |^j^ ^^ ^j^^ press and left to dry. This requires from eight to ten hours. When dry, they are taken out, examined, and wrapped. In case-making, the boards are first cut a little larger than the size of the sheets; the cloth is cut the proper size, somewhat larger than the boards, sufficient space being left between the boards to allow for the thickness of the book. Glue is appUed to the inner surface of the cloth, which is turned over the edges of the boards; the case is then run through rubber rollers to make it smooth. To stamp the case, it is first sized, if this is neces- sary, after which gold-leaf is laid upon it. A stamping. Workman, known as a stamper, feeds the cases into the embossing-press, which contains the die heated with five steam-heat. After the impression has been thtis embossed, the loose gold is cleaned off, leaving the design in gold upon the case. Printing- ink is also used for stamping covers, the impression being given by a powerful steam job-press. To decorate leather-bound books with fines of gold-tooling, the leather is first moistened with a mixture of white of egg and water; the gold-leaf is appUed with a hot metal wheel, which leaves a fine of gold as it moves across the cover. Digitized by Microsoft® FORWARDING 223 The brass stamp containing the design for the side of the book sometimes consists of only one piece, the design having been made especially for the volume; but a pattern is often made up by combining a number of small dies. The edges of books are sometimes cut smooth and left white. They are also finished in various nniaMng ways, either by coloring or by gilding. To color t*"^®^^^- the edges, a brush is dipped into a liquid containing some pigment, such as Venetian red or umber, and is struck lightly against a stick held over coJojJq the unbound volumes. This is the sprinkling process, which causes a shower of spots to fall on the edges of the book. An even tint is given by dipping a sponge into the liquid and passing it lightly over the edges. Marbhng is produced by a floating mixture of colors in a vat. In gilding, thin gold-leaf is appUed to the edges Gilding, before the case is fastened to the volume. The front edges, which have been made flat instead of concave, are first scraped perfectly even ; they are then moistened with a mixtm-e of white of egg and water; when the gold-leaf touches these damp edges, it adheres to them immediately. The mix- tiu'e is sometimes made of black lead and thin glair. To burnish the edges, they are rubbed with a hard stone. Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® INDEX (225) Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® INDEX Ada Diuma, 52 Adams, Isaac, 77, 80 Adams, Joseph A., 110 Adolph II., 29, 33 Alcman, 135 America, printing in, 49 American Daily Advertiser, The, 54 American Type-Founders Com- pany, 58 American Weekly Mercury, The, 53 Anguerrand, 204 Annunciation, The, 19 Apocalypse of St. John, The, 20 Applegath, Augustus, 81, 84 Appleton and Company, D., 70 Aquinas, Thomas, 32 Arnoux, 165 Ars Memarandi, 20 Ars Moriendi, 21, 24 Assur-bani-pal, 7 Assyria, 6, 125, 181 Babylonia, 6, 125, 181 Badier, Florimond, 203 Bark, 127 Barth, Henry, 64 Bauzonnet, 205 Bay Psalm Book, 50 Bedford, Francis, 207 Belz-Nildrde, 205 Bensley, 78 Berthelet, or Bartlet, Thomas, 196 Bibles^ Bamberg, or Pfister's, 30 Forty-two Line, 30 Mazarin, or Gutenberg's First, 30, 35 Thirty-six Line, 30 Bihlia Pauperum, 20, 22, 24 Bindings: Byzantine, 185 cameo, 198 cloth, 210, 212, 213 commercial, 202, 210 embroidered, 195 enameled, 189 half, 212 leather, 188, 192 monastic, 186 peculiar, 208 special, 191 three-quarter, 212 trade, 191 velvet, 188, 202, 208 Binny and Ronaldson, 58 Bla«u, William Janson, 73 Block-books, 17, 20 editions of, 22 Blocks, combination of, 211 Board covers, 186, 201 (227) Digitized by Microsoft® 228 INDEX Bodleian Library, 26, 145 Catholicon, The, 31 Bodley, Sir Thomas, 201 Caxton, William, 47 Body-height, 62 bindings of, 193 Borrowdale mine, 169 Cecilius Hermias, 10 Boston Gazette, The, 53 Century Magazine, The, printing Boston News-Letter, The, 53 of, 87 Boston Public Library, 70 color plates of, 102 Boyet, 204 Charlemagne, 11 Bradford, William, 50, 54, 145 China, paper made in, 142 Bradstreets, the, 214 printing in, 15 Branding, 11 Church, Dr. William, 66 British Museum, 10, 15, 134, 145, Cicero, 8 195, 206 Cincinnati Times, The, 86 Brown Paper Company, L. L, Climaco, San Juan, 49 158 Cluny Museum, 189 Bruce, David, 58, 108 Clymer, George, 74 Bruce, David, jr., 58 Cobden-Sanderson, Mr., 215 Bruce, George, 58 Codex, 137, 183 Brussels Print, The, 19 Cologne Chronicle, The, 35 Bullock, "William, 86 Constantine, 139 Continuous web, the, 85 Calamus, 128 Corvinus, Mathias, 190 Calendar of 1457, 31 Cotton, John, 51 Calendar or Almanac for 1460, 31 Counter-punch, 59, 60 Calenders, 154 Count of Paris, 169 Cambridge, Massachusetts, 49 Creusner, Frederick, 42 Cambridge University, printing Cromberger, Juan, 49 press erected for, 83 Curtis Publishing Company, 54, 89 bindings of, 200 Cuttle-fish, liquid of, 129, 171 Canlicum Canticorum (The Can- Cuzin, 205 ticles), 20 Cylinder machine, 153 Cap6, 205 Caro, 173 Daily Courant, The, 54 Caslon, William, 57 DaUy Graphic, The, 113 Digitized by Microsoft® INDEX 229 Dance of Death, The, 21 Dandy-roll, 152 Daye, Stephen, 50 Deckles, 152 Demosthenes, 135 Derome, 204 De Thou, Jacques Auguste, 202, 203 De Vinne, Theodore L., 87 De Worde, Wynkyn, 48 Dialogue between Cato, Hugo, and Oliver, 31 Dictes and Sayings of the Philoso- phers, 48 Dictionary of the Latin Language, 44 Didot, the Messrs., 146 Didot, St. Leger, 73 Diether, 33 Dioscorides, 171 Diptychs, 184 Doctrina Christiana, 49 Donatus, ^lius, 25 Donatus, The, 21, 25 Donkin, Bryan, 165 Douhlures, 203 Douceur, 204 Doves Bindery, 215 Dubuisson, 204 Dunster, Henry, 50 Duru, 205 Du SeuU, 204 Dutartre, 81 Egypt, 8, 125, 127, 131, 181 Electricity, printing by, 90 Electrotypes, 110 Eliot, John, 50, 52 Indian Bible of, 50, 52 Elzevir, 40, 43 Endkrist, Der, (The Antichrist), 20 England, printing in, 48 Escala Espiritual para Llegar at Cielo, La, 49 Eskimo, 123, 139 Esparto, 147, 149 Essonnes paper-mills, 146 Estienne, 40, 43 Eumenes II., 138, 183 Euripides, 135 Eves, the, 200 Faber family, 170 Fanfare style, 200 Fang Mi-Chih, 142 Figure del Testamento Vecchio, 22 Films, 117 Flammarion, M. Camille, 208 Flat book, the, 183, 184 Forwarding, 185, 217 Foster, John, 50 Foucault, 26 Fourdrinier machine, 147, 151, 153 Fourdrinier, the Messrs., 146 Frankfurter Journal, 53 Frank Leslie's, 113 Digitized by Microsoft® INDEX Fratiklin, Benjamin, 53, 54, 55, Harper's Weekly, 113 58, 73, 74 Harrison, Mr., 165 Franklin, James, 53, 55 Havana, first printing-press in, 50 Freeman's Oath, The, 60 Hebrews, writing materials of the. Frisket, 79 127 Fust, John, 28, 32 Hessels, Mr., 37 Hill, Sir Rowland, 85 Game and Playe of the Chess, The, Hoe, Richard M., 83 48 Hoe, Robert, 80 Garamond, Claude, 57 Holbein, Hans, 196 Gazette [de France], 53 Homer, 135 Ged, WiUiam, 108 Horace, 14 Genoux, 109 Hyperides, 135 Gharibu 'l-Hadith, 145 Gilpin, Thomas, 147 Illustrated London News, The, 113 Gleason's Pictorial, 113 Image prints, 17, 18 Glover, Rev. Joss or Jesse, 49 Inks: Golden Legend, The, 48 ancient, 129, 171 Gordon, George P., 76 black, 171 Gothic letter, 35, 39 care of, 177 Graffiti, 126 colored, 173 Oreece and Rome, 125, 136 copying, 175 Green, Samuel, 52 eosin, 173 Greene, Mr. Friese, 90 gold and silver fluids, 129 Grolier, Jean, 196, 197 indelible, 175 Gruel, L^on, 205 India, 174 Gutenberg, John, 28, 35 printing, 173 later works of, 31 sympathetic, 175 tablets to memory of, 32 Inking-balls, 74 Inking-roUers, 82 Half-tone plates, 114 Inli-stains, removing, 176 Hardy-Meunil, 205 Intaglio printing, 45 Harley, Robert, 205 Isocrates, 135 Harper and Brothers, 70, 82 Italic letter, 38 Digitized by Microsoft® INDEX 231 Jagor, Mr. F., 128 London Journal, The, 110 Japan, printing in, 16 London Times, The, 54, 78, 80, Jenson, Nicolas, 38 84,86 John of Genoa, 31 Lortic, 205 John Rylands Library, 19 Johnson, Marmaduke, 52 MaoKellar, Smiths, and Jordan, 58 Johnson, William M., 68 Mainz, 28, 30, 32, 33, 35, 38, 144 Junius, 36 Maioli, Tommaso, 196, 197 Justinian, 10 Manual de Adultos, 49 Manuscripts written on paper. Keimer, Samuel, 54 145, 146 Kelmscott Press, 39 Manutius, Aldus, 38, 40, 196 Koberger, Anthony, 40, 42 Mapes's Magazine, 110 Koenig, Friedrich, 78 Marinoni, 86 Roster Legend, The, 36 Marius-Michel, M., 203, 205 Koster, Lourens Janszoon, . 55 Martial, 14 Mary Engraving, The, 19 Lead-pencils, 168 Maryland, 50 Leaves, 128 Master-type, 60 Le Gascon, 203 Materials for printing, lack of Leighton, Archibald, 213 suitable, 12 Leighton, Robert, 209 Matrices made by electrotyping. Le Monnier, 204 61 Letter of Indulgence, of Pope Matrix, 60, 61 Nicholas V., 29 Matthew of Cracow, 32 Letter of Indulgence of 1461 31 Matthews, Mr. William, 214 Lewis, Charles, 207 Mazarin, Cardinal, 191 Linen cloth, 128 Mazarin Library, 30, 191 Line-plates, 115 Medici family, 190 Lithography, 4 Mergenthaler machine, or Lino- Lloyd's Weekly London News- type, 67, 68 paper, 86 Mexico, printing in, 49 London Daily Universal Register, Milk for Babes, 51 The, 54 Mirabilia Bomce, 21 Digitized by Microsoft® 232 INDEX Mirror of the Clergy, 31 New York Sun, 81 Mitchel, William H., 66 New York Tribune, 87, 90 Mitchell, Gillott, and Mason, 166 Nicholas V., Pope, 29 Montevideo, 50 Nicholson, William, 79 Moors, the, 144 Nineveh, library at, 6 Moret or Moretus, John, 45 Nuremberg Chronicle, The, 42 Morris, William, 39 Mould, 60, 61 Offset, 89, 101 Moxon, Joseph, 57 Ojibwa Indians, 128 Ostraka, 126 Napier, 79 Oxford University, bindings of. National Library of Paris, 26, 31, 200 135, 203 Nelson, Thomas, 85 Pablos, Juan, 49 New England Courant, The, 53 Padeloup, 204 New England Primer, The, 51 Paper: Newspapers : classes of, 159 "collecting," 97 deckle-edged, 159 color-printing, 97 driers, 153 consecutive processes in print- laid, 156 ing, 94 loading, 154 driers, 100 loft-dried, 153 early, 52 machine-dried, 153 folders, automatic, 87 names of, 143 insets, 97 preparation of stock, 148 late news, 103 shading, 155 making ready, 98 sizing, 154, 158 offset sheet, 101 staples, 147 output in an hour, 96 surface-coating, 155 overlay, 98 water-marks, 152, 157 plates for, 117 wove, 156 register of the colors, 100 Paper-making, by hand, 156 regulating the flow of ink, 101 by machinery, 149 New York Gazette, The, 53 Papyri, discoveries of, 135 Digitized by Microsoft® INDEX 233 Papyrus: Harris, 134 manufacture of papyrus paper, 133 names of, 131 paper, 132 plant, 131 Prisse, 135 rolls, 134 Parchment; kinds of, 139 preparation of skins, 140 vegetable, 140 Patrie, La, 84 Payne, Roger, 207 Peking Gazette, 53 Pennsylvania Gazette, The, 54 Penny Magazine, 113 Pens: barrel, 165 fountain, 167 gold, 166 metal, 164 quill, 163 reed, 128, 166 steel, 165 Pergamum, 138, 183 Perry, James, 165 Peru, printing in, 49 Philip 11., 45, 191 Photography, printing by, 92 Pi Shing, 15 Pius II., Pope, 33 Plantin, Christopher, 40, 44 Plantin, Musfe, 46 Platen, 72 Plato, 135 Playing-cards, 17 Pliny, 124, 133, 138, 171 Polyglot Bible, 45 Poor Richard's Almanac, 55 Postboy, The, 54 Potsherds, 125 Precious stones, 185, 187 Priestley, Dr., 165 Printing-presses ; Adams, 77, 80 Blaeu, 73 Bullock, 86 Columbian, 74 Cottrell, 88 Cylinder, 77 Donkin and Bacon, 82 for book-work, 90 for illustrated work, 87 Pranldin, 74 Gordon, 76 Goss, 90 Gutenberg, 72 Hoe — Combination Octuple Multi-color, 101 Double-Supplement, 87 Electrot5rpe Multi-color, 98 Electrotype Rotary Per- fecting, 90 Digitized by Microsoft® 234 INDEX Printing-presses — Continued. Hoe — Improved Double Quad- ruple Combination Oc- tuple, 96 Octuple, 87 Quadruple, 87 Sextuple, 87 Single large cylinder, 80 Web-perfecting, 86 Job or Treadle, 75, 76 Koenig, 79, 81 Miehle, 89 of wood, 72 Perfecting, 80 Power, 75, 81 Ruggles, 76 Stanhope, 73 Stop-cylinder, 81 Treadwell, 76 Type-revolving, 83 Walter, 86 Washington, 74 Psalter of 1457, 33 Ptolemy Epiphanes, 138 Publick Occurrences, 53 Public Ledger, 83 Pugillaria, 182 Punch, 59, 60 Purgold, 205 Quintilian, 8 Recueil des Histoires de Troyes, 47 Reynes, John, 194 Ricardo, Antonio, 49 Robert, Louis, 73, 146 Rocks, 123 Roger of Sicily, 146 Rolls, Greek and Roman, 182 Roman letter, 38 Rosenberg, Frederick, 66 Roulette, 211 Ruette, Mac6, 203 Rust, Samuel, 74 St. Bridget, 19 St. Christopher, 18 St. Dorothea and St. Alexis, 20 St. Jerome, 25 St. Nicolas de Tolentino, 19 St. Sebastian, Martyrdom of, 19 Samarkand, 143, 145 Sardanapalus, 7 Saturday Evening Post, The, 54 Sauer, Christopher, 58 Sawn back, the, 206 Schoeffer, Peter, 33 Scientific American, 90 Sepia, 176 Skins of animals, 127 Smith, Peter, 74 Sotheby, 21 Speculum Humanw Salvationis, 21 Speech of Father Abraham, 56 Spencer Library, 18, 207 Digitized by Microsoft® INDEX 235 Stamps: Tooling, 195 heraldic, 193 Tory, Geoffroy, 196 metal, 9 Tory plate, 211 panel, 193 Trautz, 205 pictorial, 194 Treadwell, Daniel, 76 roll, 194 Treatise on the Celebration of the ■wooden, 9 Moss, A, 31 Stanhope, Earl of, 73, 108 Treatise cm the Necessity of Coun- Stephens of London, 172 cils, A, 31 Stereotype plates, curved, 84 Treatise on Reason and Conr- Stereotyping, 108 science. A, 32 papier-mach^ process. 109 Ts'ai Lun, 143 plaster process, 108 Tympan, 79 Stikeman, Mr., 214 Type-casting, by hand, 63 Stilus, 123, 125 by machinery, 58, 62 Story of the Blessed Virgin, 20 Type-founding, 57 Strasburg, 28, 35 Type-metal, of what made, 59 Summary of the Articles o / Faith, Type-mould, 28 32 Typesetting, by hand, 65 Supercalenders, 154 by machinery, 66 Typography, 3, 4 Tablets: invention of, 27 clay, 6, 125 spread of, 37 leaden, 124, 183 stone, 123, 127 wax, 125, 182 Van der Linde, Dr., 36 Tr__. TTi 1_ T -to wooden, 124 Tate, 144 Theodoric, 11 Theophrastus, 131 Thibaron, 205 Thouvenin, 205 Thucydides, 135 Vavassore, Giovanni Andreas, 22 Vellum, 139 Venice, printing in, 38, 40, 196 Virginia documents, 50 Digitized by Microsoft® 236 INDEX Watts, John, 108 WeeUy Newes, 53 White, Elihu, 58 Williamson, Peregrine, 165 Wood-fibre, 148 Wood-pulp, 148 Ximenes, Cardinal, 191 Xylography, 3, 4 Young and Delcambre, 66 Zahn, Mr. Otto, 214 Zell, Ulrich, 37 Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® I 1 11 IIHII 'iilll!!i!lll!!i !!liili'.i|!!!inii liil 1^ J