Niiiii^tiSjiiaiiA PLANTIN AND THE PLANTIN- MORETUS MUSEUM i i Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2007 with funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/christopherplantOOdevirich The Publication Committee of the Grolier Club certify that this is one of three hundred copies on paper, and of three copies on vellum, of a special edition of "Christo- pher Plantin and the Plantin-Moretus Museum," in the form of a broad octavo, all of which were printed in the month of December, 1888. CHRISTOPHER PLANTIN AND THE PLANTIN-MORETUS MUSEUM AT ANTWERP BY THEO. L. DE VINNE WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY JOSEPH PENNELL, AND OTHERS FEINTED FOR THE GROLIER CLUB NEW-YORK 1888 Copyright by Theodore L. De Vinne, 1888. By permission of The Century Co. CHRISTOPHER PLANTIN. ( Reproduced from an Eitgruving by Henri OoltziuB.) CHRISTOPHER PLANTIN AND THE PLANTIN-MORETUS MUSEUIVI HE modem printing-office is not at all picturesque. Whether it be old, with grimy hand-presses and dingy types, or new, with huge iron machines and long lanes of cases and stones, it does not invite the artistic pencil. Without doubt the cradle of books, but can one see any poetry about the cradle ? The eye is confused with strange sights ; the ear is jarred with harsh noise ; the air itself is heavy with odors of ink and oil and wet paper. Nor does the imagination expand in the office of the manager, in which the prominent objects are 10 ^lantin^99orctus^ ^ii^cum. always chairs and desks, and a litter of ragged papers and well-thumbed books — all prosaic and factory-like. Was it always so? No one knows of the interior of Gutenberg's office in the Zum Jimgen Gutenberg's Office at Mayence. house at Mayence, for no artist in his day or ours has found in it any beauty to be preserved; but we do know that this birthplace of a great art is now a beer-shop, in which for a few pfennigs one may get a refreshment for the body not to be had for the mind. The fate that fell on Gutenberg's office has fallen on the offices of Aldus and the Stephens and the Elze- The Front of the Museum. pimxtin^ ^titttn^ a^isciim. 13 virs. Not a vestige of office fittings or working material remains. The Plantin-Moretus Museum at Antwerp is the only printing-house that has been left intact as the monument of a great departed business. How well it was worth having may be inferred from the price of twelve hundred thousand francs paid for it by the city, in 1876, to the last member of the family of the founder. How well it is worth seeing is proved by the steady tide of visitors that pass through it every day. Here is a printing-house that is not a factory — a house that has been as much the home of art and education as a place for work and trade. It is not an imposing structure. No public building in Antwerp is more unpretentious as to its exterior. Its dull front on the Marche du Vendredi gives but one indication of the treasures behind the walls. To him who can read it, the little tablet over the door is enough to tell the story ; for it is the device of Christo- pher Plantin, "first printer to the king, and the king of printers." Here is the hand emerging from the clouds, holding a pair of compasses, one leg at rest and one describing a circle; here is the encircling legend of Lahore et Constantia. Heraldry is overfull of devices that are as arro- 14 ^imtm^^tjttni^ ^u$mm* gant as they are absurd, but no one dare say that Plantin did not fairly earn the right to use the motto of labor and patience. II ^^^^0 LANTiN deserved remembrance from Antwerp. He did much for its honor, although he was not of Flemish birth. Bom in France, about 1514, taught printing and book-binding at Caen, he should have been by right, and would have been by choice, a worthy successor to the printers of Paris who did admirable work during the first half of the sixteenth cen- tury. But his most Christian Majesty Heniy II. of France had begun his reign in 1547 with the announcement that he should punish her- esy as worse than treason. What a drag-net was this word heresy for the entanglement of printers ! Stephen Dolet, most promising of all, had been recently burned at the stake ; Robert Stephens, weary of endless quarrels with med- dlesome ecclesiastics, was meditating the flight A Trade-Mark. he soon afterward made to Geneva. To those who could read the signs of the times, there were even then forewamings of the coming massacre of St. Bartholomew. France was a good country for a printer to leave, and Plantin did wisely to forsake Paris in 1548 and to make his home in Antwerp. Not so large as Paris or London, Antwerp was superior in wealth and commerce, as well as in its artistic development. Printing was under restraint here, as it was everywhere; but the restraints were endurable, and printers were reasonably prosperous. Antwei'p encour- aged immigration. One of the most interest- ing of the many paintings in its Hotel de Yille is that of the ceremonious naturaUzation of an Itahan and his family in the sixteenth century. It was as the principal in a similar ceremony that Plantin became a citizen in 1550, and was enrolled as a printer. With httle money and few friends, Plantin had to struggle to keep his foot-hold in a city that had already been well served by many master printers. It did not appear that he was needed at all as a printer. So Plantin must have thought, for he avoided printing, and opened a shop in which he sold prints and 18 ^lantiii^sr^oretiijsf SK^ujefauti* books, and his wife sold haberdashery. To fill up unemployed time he bound books and deco- rated jewel-boxes. At this work he prospered, and soon earned a reputation as the most skill- ful decorator in the city. Before he was fairly established he met a great misfortune. En- countered on a dark night by a ruffian who mistook him for another, Plantin was danger- ously stabbed, and forever disabled from hand- ling gilding-tools. The possible rivalry that might have arisen between him and the artistic book-binders of Paris was effectually pre- vented. He had to begin anew, but it was more as a publisher than as a printer, for it is not certain that in 1555 he owned a printing-office. In that year he pubhshed two little books, cau- tiously dividing the risk with other pubhshers. It must have been difficult to get books that were salable, for his first book* was in Italian and French, his second in Spanish, his third in French — clear evidences all that there were in Antwerp already printers before him who had published all the books called for in Flemish. * "• La Institvtione di vna hundred years after his death Fandvlla nata nobilmente.^'' It a copy of this book would be was a small 12mo (now rated sold for more than one hun- an 18m o). It would have dred dollars. He had to be greatly cheered him if he content with one sou and a could have known that three, quarter. •a h5 I- « .s But Plantin went to Antwerp to stay. In 1556 he published four more books, two of them original; in 1557 eight books, six of them original; in 1558 fourteen books, many of them of large size and of marked merit. The foui* years that followed show steady increase in the nimiber and improvement in the quahty of his publications, among which were several Latin classics, a Greek text, a Latin Bible, and a dic- tionary in foiu' languages. His ability was fully recognized in 1562, but his business life was henceforward a succession of great misfortunes as weU as of great achieve- ments. By leaving Paris he did not escape, he only postponed, the conflict that had begun between the press, the State, and the Church. The country that promised to give him hberty was to become the chosen battle-field of the contestants, and the result of the battle was to be undecided even at his death. In 1562 the regent, Margaret of Parma, ordered search for the unknown printer of a heretical prayer- book, and it was proved that the book had been printed in Plantin's printing-office. Fore- warned of coming danger, Plantin escaped to Paris, where he staid for twenty months. When he could safely return, his business had 22 C[)n0top6a: pantiii aitb tijc been destroyed, and his printing-office, and even his household property, had been sold at auction to satisfy the demands of his creditors. Thirteen years of labor had been lost. He was down, but not to stay. Plantin was strongly suspected of comphcity in this matter of heretical printing, but he had not been condemned. He overcame the preju- dices, if there had been any, of ecclesiastical authorities, and made them active friends for- ever, although he was frequently afterward denounced as a Calvinist. Four wealthy men lent him money to found a printing-house, in which he worked hard. At the end of the next four years he had seven presses and forty work- men in his employ, and had published 209 books. What to him was of more consequence, he had established friendly relations with the authorities of the State. The city of Antwerp gave him special privileges as printer; the Eang of Spain in 1570 made him " Prototypographe," the ruler of all the printers in the city. He was in correspondence with many of the great scholars and artists of his time, and was by them, as well as by every one, regarded as the foremost printer of the world. The King of France invited him to Paris; the Duke of Savoy offered to give to him a great printing- house and special rewards if he would go to Turin. But he kept in Antwerp, and enlarged his business. He not only worked himself, but made all his household help him. His daugh- ters kept a book-store in the cloisters of the cathedral; he established an agency in Paris under the direction of his son-in-law. Grilles Beys. Another son-in-law, Moretus, was his chief clerk, and a regular attendant at all the German book fairs, while another, Raphelen- gius, was his ablest corrector of the press. Even the younger daughters were required to learn to read writing, and to serve as copy- holders, often on books in foreign languages, before they were twelve years old. His season of greatest apparent prosperity began in 1570. His printing-house was soon after one of the wonders of the hterary world. Twenty-two presses were kept at work, and two hundred crowns in gold were required every day for the payment of his workmen, recites an old chronicler with awe and astonish- ment. His four houses were too small. He had to buy and occupy the larger property which now constitutes the Plantin-Moretus Museum. Before he occupied his new office 24 pantin^St^ormi^ SJ^is^eum, lie had printed the largest and most expensive book then known to the world, the "Royal Polyglot," eight volumes foho, in four lan- guages, with full-page illustrations from cop- per-plates. It was an enterprise that earned him more of honor than of profit, for the King of Spain, who had promised hberal help, disappointed him. Plantin had incurred enor- mous expenses and was harassed by creditors, and had to sell or pledge his books at los- ing prices. At that time the patronage of the king was a hindrance, for when he was in the greatest straits the king commanded him to print new service books for the Church that would be of great cost and of doubtful profit. The king's habitual neglect to pay his obhga- tions provoked his soldiers to outrages which nearly ruined Plantin. Antwerp had been for years in practical mutiny against the king. To repress this mutiny the citadel was filled with Spanish soldiers who were furious because they had not been paid, and were threatening to plunder the city by way of reprisal or as com- pensation. On the fourth day of November, 1576, when Plantin was no more than fairly set- tled in his new office, the threat was executed. Jean Moretus I, son-in-law of Plantin. (From a Painting by Rubens.) panting Ur^orctu-sf lH^uis^ami, 27 Joined by an army beyond the walls, and by treacberous allies that the civic authorities had hired as defenders, they began the sack of the city. Eight thousand citizens were killed, a thousand houses were burned, six milhon florins' worth of property were burned, and as much more was stolen, amid most atrocious cruelties. The prosperity of the great city, which had been the pride of Europe, received a blow from which it never recovered. The busi- ness of Plantin was crushed. "Nine times," he said, " did I have to pay ransom to save my property from destruction ; it would have been cheaper to have abandoned it." But his de- spondency was but for a day. In the ruins of the sacked city, surrounded by savage soldiers, discouraged with a faithless king who would not protect his property nor pay his debts, ill at ease with creditors who feared to trust him, and alarmed at the absence of buyers who dared not come to the city, Plantin still kept at work. The remainder of his life was practically an unceasing struggle with debt, but debt did not make him abandon his great plans. To pay his debts he often had to sell his books at too small prices. Sometimes he had to sell his working- tools. In 1581 he went to Paris to dispose of 28 paittht^Ct^retuj^ sa^ismm. his library, costing 16,000 francs, for less than haK its value. Rich enough in books, in tools, in promises to pay, he had little of money, and slender credit. The political outlook was dishearten- ing. Alexander of Parma was menacing Flan- ders and Brabant ; there was reason to fear a siege of Antwerp and the destruction of his printing-house. With the consent of his cred- itors Plantin temporarily transferred his office to his sons-in-law, and in 1582 went to Leyden, to muse as he went on the warning, " Put not your trust in princes." There he was cordially received by the university, and at once ap- pointed their printer. There he founded a new printing-house, in which he remained for nearly three years. When the siege was over, Plantin returned to Antwerp, but it was never after the Antwerp of his earher days. Nor was Plantin himseK as active. The king had made Antwerp a Cathohc city, but its commerce was destroyed. Plantin died on the first day of July, 1589, and was buried in the cathedral. Although, by reason of his bold undertakings, he had been financially embarrassed for many years before his death, he left a good estate, at least on [. ^ r. f f Sill Bust of Balthazar Moretus, in the Court-yard. paper. By a will made conjointly with his wife, who soon followed him, he gave the man- agement of his printing-office and most of his property, then valued at 135,718 florins (equal to $217,000), to his son-in-law Moretus and his wife, burdened with legacies to children and other heirs, with the injunction that they, at their death, should bequeath the undivided printing-office to the son or successor who could most wisely manage it. If they had no competent son, then they must select a compe- tent successor out of the family. This injunc- tion was fairly obeyed. Under John Moretus the reputation of the house was fully maintained, although the publications were not so many nor so meritorious. But this falling off was large- ly due to the diminished importance of Ant- werp as a commercial city. His sons Balthazar and John Moretus II. carried the office to the highest degree of prosperity. To Balthazar I., more than to any other member of the family, the world is indebted for the treasures of art and learning which now grace the rooms of the Plantin-Moretus Museum. A very large share of the prosperity of the house came from the valuable patents and privileges accorded to Plantin and his successors by the King of 32 Pajmn^sr^rctiiJ^ a^isciuti. Spain. For more than two hundred years they were the exclusive makers of the hturgical books used in Spain and its dependencies. The dechne of the house began with the death of Balthazar III. in 1696. During the eight- eenth century it lost its preeminence as the first printing-house in the world, and was sim- ply a manufactory of rehgious books. In 1808 the special privileges they had for making these books for Spain and its possessions were with- drawn, and this great business of the house was at an end. In 1867 it ceased to do any business. Ill EENAED has told us, in his "Archeo- logie Typographique," of the deso- lation of the house as he saw it in 1850. Everything was in decay. That the types and matrices would soon go to the melting-kettle ; that books and prints, furniture and pictures, would find their way, bit by bit, to bric-a-brac shops ; that this old glory of Antwerp would soon be a story of the past — seemed inevitable. Fortunately there were in Antwerp men who tried to save the J^Iantnt^ iH^mujtf a^iismm, 35 collection. Messrs. Emanuel Rosseels and Max Rooses (now conservateur of the Museum), under the zealous direction of M. Leopold de Wael, the burgomaster of the city, induced the city and the State to buy the property, the transfer of which was formally made, as we read from a tablet in the wall, in 1875. The Museum, as it now stands, is not as Plantin left it. His successors, Balthazar I. especially, made many changes, additions, and restorations, but all have been done with pro- priety. The visitor is not shocked by in- congruities of structure or decoration. The difficult task of re-arranging the house has been done with excellent taste by the architect Pierre Dens. It is the great charm of the Museum that the house and its contents, the books, pictures, prints, windows, walls, types, presses, furniture, are all in their places, and with proper surroundings. They fit. To pass the doorway is to take leave of the nineteenth century; to put ourselves not only within the walls, but to surround ourselves with the same famihar objects which artists and men of let- ters saw and handled two or three centuries ago. Here are their chairs and tables, their books and candlesticks, and other accessories 36 ^Jaittm^^orctiijSf !3r^i.scum. of every-day office and domestic life. It is a new atmosphere. Standing in the vestibule under a copper lamp, facing a statue of Apollo, surrounded by sculptured emblems of art and science, the visitor at once perceives that he is in something more than a printing- house — in an old school of literature. Yet there is httle that is bookish in the first salon. One's attention is first caught by the httle octagonal window hghts that face the inner court, bright in colors, and with com- memorations of John Moretus II. and Baltha- zar Moretus II. and their wives. And then one has to note the heavy beams overhead, and the old tapestries on the walls, the great tor- toise-shell table, and the buffet of oak with its queer pottery, and the still queerer painting of an old street parade in Antwerp. Over the chimney-piece in the second salon is the portrait of Christopher Plantin as he appeared at sixty-four years of age, wrapped in a loose black robe, with a broad raff about his neck — unmistakably a man of authority, and of severity too. There is nothing dull, or im- passive, or Dutch, about this head. He is a Frenchman of the old school, — muscular, cou- rageous, enduring, — a man of the type of Conde Balthazar Moretus I. (After a painting in black and white by Eraenias Qaellyn.) or Coligny. Here too is Jeanne Riviere, his wife. How Flemish-looking is this French- woman of placid face, in her white cap and quilled collar! plainly one of the grand old women that Rembrandt loved to honor. The portraits of some of Plantin's five daughters are on the walls, but they can be seen together only at the cathedral, on a panel painted by Yan den Broeck. The eldest. Marguerite, was married in 1565, to Francis Raphelengius.* Martine, the second daughter, in 1570 married John Moretus, who was Plantin's trusted man of business during his life, and his heir and successor. Madelaine, the fourth daughter, brightest of all, in 1572 married Egidius Beys, * The wedding festivities valued at 4 florins 2% sous, lasted one week, for which red and black cherries, straw- Plantin made this provision, berries, oranges, capers, olives, which has a fine medieval apples, salads, and radishes flavor : three sucking pigs at valued at 3 florins 8>^ sous, 17 sous each, six capons at 22 confectionery valued at 4 flor- sous, twelve pigeons at 6 sous, ins 9 sous, two pounds of sugar- twelve quails at 4 sous, five plums, one poxmd of anis, and legs of mutton at 1 florin, three pounds of MUan cheese, twelve sweet-breads at 7>^ The gifts to Raphelengius sous the dozen, three beef amounted to 32 florins 5 sous ; tongues at 8 sous, four almond to Plantin (for this was the cakes, six calves' heads, three custom of the period), 90 flor- legs of mutton browned, six ins 16 >^ sous. Plantin gave (16-lb.) hams at 2^ sous the to his workmen on this occa- pound, Rhine wine valued at sion a pot of wine valued at 12 florins 5 sous, red wine 7 florins. 40 3^Iantm^9[^rctu^ liir^uiefmm. who was Plantin's agent in Paris. " My first son-in-law," wrote Plantin, "cares for nothing but books ; my second knows nothing but busi- ness." Not a kindly criticism of Moretus, who was learned and wrote well in four languages; but Plantin must have been well content with these sons-in-law who complemented each other and fully served him. Beys* was not an es- teemed assistant, nor was his son. * In 1587 the eldest son of Beys, then fourteen years of age, lived with his grand- father. At the close of a day of alleged misconduct, Plantin required of him the task to compose and write in Latin a description of the manner in which he had spent that day. This is the translation: "The occupations of Christophe Beys, February 21, 1587. I got up at half -past 6 o'clock. I went to embrace my grandfather and grandmother. Then I took breakfast. Before 7 o'clock I went to my class, and well recited my lesson in syntax. At 8 o'clock I heard mass. At half-past 8 I had learned my lesson in Cicero and I fairly recited it. At 11 o'clock I returned to the house and studied my lesson in phraseology. After dinner I went back to the class and properly recited my lesson. At half-past 2 I had fairly recited my lesson in Cicero. At 4 o'clock I went to hear a sermon. Before 6 o'clock I returned to the house, and I read a proof [held copy for] Libellus Sodalitatis with my cousin Francis [Raphelen- gius]. I showed myself re- fractory while reading the proofs of the book. Before supper, my grandfather hav- ing made me go to him, to repeat what I had heard preached, I did not wish to go nor to repeat ; and even when others desired me to ask pardon of grandfather, I was unwilling to answer. Finally, I have showed myself in the eyes of all, proud, stubborn, and wiUful. After supper I have written my occupations for this day, and I have read them to my grandfather. The end crowns the work." Jeanne Riviere and her Daughters. Jolin tluj Baptist at the top. (From a Painting in the Cathedral by Van den Broeck.) Here too are the portraits of many of the learned friends of Plantin. The somber face of Arias Montanus, the learned confessor of Phihp II., who was commissioned by the king to superintend the printing of the great poly- glot, glows with all the color that Rubens could give. By the same painter are the por- traits of Ortehus and Justus Lipsius and Pan- tinus — grave, scholarly, dignified faces all. Of greater attraction is the portrait, so often copied, of Gevartius, the clerk of the city of Antwerp. A show-case in the middle of the room contains designs by Martin de Vos, Van den Broeck, Van der Borcht, Van Noort, Van der Horst, Rubens, Quellyn, and other illustra- tors of books for the Plantin office, all famous in their time. Not the least curious is Rubens' bill of sale, dated 1630, to Balthazar Moretus I., of 328 copies of the works of Hubert Goltzius, the great archaeologist, for 4920 florins, and the further sum of 1000 florins for the plates of the same, payable in books. The opportunity for "working off unsold remainders" was not neglected. Fronting on a side street is the old book- store, with aU its furniture, including the old 44 5^laimn^9[^ormi3^ iJt^uisfaim* scales by which hght gold coin was tested. A motley collection of books is on the shelves — prayer-books and classic texts, amatory poems and polemical theology. Posted up is a "Cata- logue of Prohibited Books," a placard printed by Plantin himseK in 1569, by the order of the Duke of Alva. Two of the prohibited books, the " Colloquies of Erasmus" and the " Psalms of Clement Marot," came from the Plantin press. What keen perception must have been exercised to find heresy in the Psalms ! This was not the only interference with the printer by the law, for there is also posted a tariff made by the magistrates of Antwerp, by which a fixed price is made for every popular book. Whoever dares sell a book at a higher price is warned that he shall be fined twenty-five florins. In the corner near the window is the chair in which the shop-boy sat and announced incoming customers to the daughters who were at work in the rear of the store, from which it was separated by a glazed partition. Plainly a room for work and trade, but how differently work and trade were done then! No doubt there was enough of di'udgery, but to the young women who worked in the glow of the colored glass windows, and listened to the tick- ing of the tall Flemish clock, and saw above them on the wall the beautiful face of a stat- uette of the Madonna, hfe could not have had the grimy, stony face it presents to the modem shop-girl. In an adjoining room is the salon of tapes- tries, five of which represent shepherds, hunt- ers, market women, dancers, — Flemish idyls all. One has to make another comparison, between the value of old and modem needle- work, not to the credit of Berlin wools and South Kensington stitches. Curious furniture is in the room — a buffet on which rests fine old china, wardrobes in oak and ebony, chairs and tables of wonderful carving, all surmounted by a chandeUer of crystal. Most interesting of all is an old harpsichord with three tiers of keys, on the interior of which is painted a copy of Rubens' St. Ceciha. It bears the inscription, " Johannes Josephus Coenen, priest and organ- ist of the cathedral, made me, Roermond, 1735." Not at aU an old piece, — just midway between Plantin's time and ours, — but how old it seems by the side of a modem piano ! 48 ^iamn^^ovetn^ a^ui^ciuTi, lY [f severer simplicity is the room of the Correctors of the Press, in which is a great oak table that overlaps the two diamond-paned windows opening on the inner coiu^t. On the walls are paintings of two of the most famous of Plantin's correctors — Theodore Poelman and Cornelius Kihanus. Poelman is repre- sented as a scholar at work on his books in a small, mean room, in which his wife is spin- ning thread and a fuller is at work. And this was Poelman's lot in hfe : to work as a fuller by day, and to correct and prepare for press classic texts at night, for three or four florins per volume. Kilianus was corrector for the Plantin house for fifty years. Beginning as a compositor in 1558, at the very modest salary of five patards a day, not more (perhaps less) than two dollars and forty cents a week in our currency, he ultimately became Plantin's most trusted general proof-reader. Not so learned as Raphelengius, he was more efficient in super- vising the regular work of the house. He wrote good Latin verse, composed prefaces and made translations for many books, and com- piled a Flemish dictionary of whicli Plantin seems to have been ungenerously envious. His greatest salary was but four florins a week, but little more than was then paid to Plan- tin's expert compositors. The most learned of Plantin's regular correctors was his son-in-law Raphelengius, who had been a teacher of Greek at Cambridge. He began his work in the Plantin office at forty florins a year and his board. Montanus testified that he had thor- ough knowledge of many languages, and was an invaluable assistant on the Polyglot Bible. His greatest salary, in 1581, was but four hun- dred florins a year. As a rule editing and proof- reading were done at the minimum of cost. The wages paid to a scholarly reader, who had entire knowledge of three or four lan- guages, was about twelve florins a month. Ghisbrecht, one of these correctors, agreed to prepare copy for and to oversee the work of six compositors for his board and sixty florins a year. Besides the regular correctors of the house, Plantin had occasionally some volunteer or unpaid correctors, hke Montanus. His friend Justus Lipsius seems to have been the only editor who was fairly paid for Uter- ary work. 52 J^Jajttin^St^rctu^ St^ui^mm, The printing-room does not give a just idea of its old importance. What here remains is as it was in 1576, but the space then occupied for printing must have been very much larger. Plantin's inventory, taken after his death, showed that he had in Antwerp seventy-three fonts of type, weighing 38,121 pounds. Now seven hand-presses and their tables occupy two sides of the room, and rows of type-cases and stands fill the remnant of space. How petty these presses seem ! How small the impression surface, how rude all the apphances ! Yet from these presses came the great " Royal Polyglot," the Roman Missal, still bright with sohd black and glowing red inks, and thousands of volumes, written by great scholars, many of them enriched with designs by old Flem- ish masters. ^' The man is greater than the machine," and Plantin was master over his presses. From these uncouth unions of wood and stone, pinned together with bits of iron, he made his pressmen extort workmanship which has been the admiration of the world. Plantin had this work done at small cost. His account-books show that the average yearly earnings of expert compositors were one hun- u - X O dred and forty-two florins, and of the pressmen one hundred and five florins. The eight-hour law was unknown. Work began at 5 o'clock in the morning, but no time is stated for its ending. His rules were hard. One of them was that the compositor who set three words or six letters not in the copy should be fined. Another was the prohibition of all discussions on rehgion. Every workman must pay for his entrance a hienvenne of eight sous as drink money, and give two sous to the poor-box. At the end of the month he must give thirty sous to the poor-box and ten sous to his comrades. This hienvenue was as much an English as a Flemish custom, as one may see in Frankhn's autobiography. The presses cost about fifty florins each. In one of his account-books is the record that he paid forty-five florins for copper platens to six of his presses. This is an unexpected dis- covery. It shows that Plantin knew the value of a hard impression surface, and made use of it three centuries before the printer of TJie Cen- tury tried, as he thought for the first time, the experiment of iron and brass impression sur- faces for inelastic impression. 56 ^m\tm^^otmi^ Sr^usciun, The proportion of readers or correctors to compositors was large. In 1575 Plantin had, besides Raphelengius and Moretus, five correct- ors for twenty-four compositors, thirty-nine pressmen, and four apprentices. Much of the work done by these correctors was really edit- ing, translating, re-writing, and preparing copy. With all these correctors, proof-reading proper was not too well done. Ruelens notes in Plan- tin's best work, the "Royal Polyglot," one hun- dred and fifteen errors of paging in the eight foho volumes. Yet this book was supervised by Montanus and Raphelengius, and in some portions by eminent scholars and professors of the Leyden University. To enable him to publish this polyglot with parallel texts in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Chaldee, Plantin got Granvelle and other ec- clesiastics to recommend it to the king and get from him a subvention. Plantin's first estimate for the six volumes which he then thought enough for the work was 24,000 flor- ins, exclusive of the cost of new types and binding. After much dehberation the king consented to advance 6000 ducats, for which he was to receive an equal value in books at The Press-room. trade rates. But the work grew on Plantin's hands; it made eight volumes instead of six, and it cost 100,000 crowns before it was com- pleted. Twelve hundred copies on paper were printed and announced to the trade in the style of the modem Parisian pubhsher. 10 on grand imperial paper of Italy. . . .price not stated 30 on grand imperial, at the price of 200 florins 200 on the fine royal paper of Lyons 100 florins 960 on the fine royal paper of Troyes 70 florins The king had twelve copies on vellum, which required more skins than could be had in Antwerp or Holland. It is of interest to note that Plantin, like all printers, had no enthusiasm for vellum. To an apphcation from a German prince who asked for a copy on vellum, Plantin answered that none could be furnished, but that the copies on the imperial Itahan paper were really better printed than those on the vellum. In the matter of clean, clear printing they were every way better. This "Eoyal Polyglot" was the beginning of Plantin's financial troubles, from which he never fairly recovered. The king would not allow the work to be pubhshed until it had 60 ^imtm^^otttn^ !3l^ij^mm» been approved by the pope, who refused his consent. Montaniis went to Rome to plead for a change of decision; but it was not until 1573, when a new pope was in the chair, that this permit was granted. Even then the difficulties were not over. A Spanish theologian de- nounced the work as heretical, Judaistic, the product of the enemies of the Church. Then the Inquisition made a slow examination, and grudgingly decided in 1580 that it might be lawfully sold. For more than seven years the unhappy book was under a cloud of doubt as to its orthodoxy. The damage to Plantin was severe. Before he reached the concluding vol- umes his means were exhausted, and he had to mortgage at insufficient prices two-thirds of the copies done. The king was fully repaid in books for all money he had advanced, but Plantin got no more. With the generosity of people who are accustomed to give what does not belong to them, the king granted Plantin an annual pension of four hundred florins, secured on a confiscated Dutch estate ; but the perverse Dutchman who owned the estate soon retook it, and as the king could not wrest it from him, the pension was forever ineffective. V Ieven rooms or lobbies in the Mu- seum are devoted to the exhibition of engravings as well as of their blocks or plates, of which there are more than 2000 on copper and about 15,000 on wood. It is a most curious collection of orig- inal work, more complete and more diversified than that of any printing-house before the nineteenth century. Indeed, it would not be easy to find a rival as to quantity and quahty among modern houses. Here are etchings by Rubens, Van Dyck, Jordaens, Teniers; engrav- ings by Bolswei"t, Vorsterman, Pontius, Ede- linck. One looks with more than ordinary attention on the St. Catharine, the only etching known to have been done by the hand of Rubens, as well as on the wonderful hne en- graving by Edehnck of the portrait of Philippe de Champagne. The prints that may be most admired were made to the order of Plantin's successors, who were contemporaries of the greatest Flemish masters, but their preference for the work of true artists was implanted by the founder of the house. "I never neglected," Plantin said, " when I had the opportunity and 64 ^imm^^tetn^ ^n^mm* the ability, to pay for the work of the best engravers." The sparsity of engravings in his earher books was, no doubt, caused by his poverty ; but even these petty books show that they were planned by a man of superior taste, by a printer whose heart was in his trade, and who loved his work for the work's sake. His early training as a book-finisher gave him decorative inchnations. What he could not do on book covers with gilding-tools he tried to have done on the printed leaves with wood-cuts from designs by eminent artists. He must have quickly earned good reputa- tion as a skillful printer of wood-cuts, for he was chosen by the authorities of Antwerp over all rivals to print a large illustrated book describing the recent obsequies of Charles Y. This book he pubhshed in 1559 in the form of an oblong foho, containing thirty-three large plates, at the cost of 2000 florins. These plates, although separately printed, were designed to be conjoined, and used as a processional frieze. In planning this book he did not repeat the folly of many of his rivals, who were still imi- tating the coarse designs and rude cutting of the obsolete " Biblia Pauperum " and " Specu- lum Salutis." He gave the work to a compe- The Entrance to the Engraving-roora— in Black and Gold. 10 tent designer, and was equally careful with the engraving and printing, and found his profit in the large sale of many editions and in five lan- guages. After this he made increasing use of engravings on wood. No printer of his time illustrated books so freely: in one book, the "Botany" of Dodoens, the cuts would be re- garded now as profusely extravagant. To this day they are models of good hne drawing and clean engraving. When the text did not call for descriptive illustrations he made free use of large initial letters, head-bands, and tail-pieces. The shelves and closets of the Museum contain thousands of initials remarkable for the vigor of their designs or the ingenuity of their back- grounds or interlacings. One series is about five inches square. One cannot refrain from expressing the regret that so many modern designers and publishers seem to be entirely ignorant of the beauty of some of the Plan- tin initials, and prefer elaborated distortions of the alphabet, which are every way unworthy of comparison. But Plantin soon found that there was a hmit to the effects to be had from engravings on wood when printed on his rough paper and by his weak presses. He began to develop on a grand scale illustrations on cop- 68 ^Imitin^^omu^ a^u^sfnim, per, of which the " Humanae Salutis Monu- menta " of 1571, with its seventy-one large plates, was his earhest and most noteworthy example. Two rooms contain the remnants of the type-foundry, which provoke reflection on the difference hetween old and new methods of book-making. The modern printer does not make his types ; he does not even own a punch or a matrix. Buying his types from many foundries, he has great hberty of selection, but, necessarily, a selection from the designs of other men. It follows that the text types of one printer may be — must be, often — just the same as those of another printer, and that there can be no really strong individuality in the books of any house. In the sixteenth century every eminent printer had some of his types made to his own order, which types he only used. This was the method: He hired an engraver to draw and cut in steel the model letters, or punches, and to provide the accom- panying mold and matrices. Keeping the punches, he took the mold and matrices to men who cast types for the trade, who fur- nished him all he needed. The founders who made Plantin's earher types were Gruyot and The Type-foimdry. Van Everbrocht of Antwerp. The designs for these types and the making of the punches and matrices were by skilled engravers in different cities at prices which now seem incredibly small — from twenty to forty sous for punch and matrix of ordinarj^ letter. Robert Gran j on of Lyons and Guillaume Le Be of Paris did much of his best work; Hautin of Rochelle, Yen der Keere of Tours, and Bomberghe of Cologne were also employed. Plantin had types cast in his office after 1563, but the foun- dry was not an important part of the house until 1600; at that date the collection of punches was very large. Here are some of the common tools of type- making, — the vises, grindstones, files, gravers, etc., — and rude enough they seem. When we go into the next room, and scrutinize the molds and punches behind the wire screens, and the justified matrices in the show-cases, we wonder that this excellent workmanship could have been done by these rough tools. Printed speci- mens of some of the types are shown on the walls, but they do not fairly show the full merit of the work. It is true that the counters are not as deep as a modern founder would require, but the cutting is clean and good. 72 C ■%i:>VM A Corner of the Court-yard. panting sr^oretii^ 2l9ii.^aim» 89 himself and his property. For the King of Spain had practically denied both rights, and the ques- tion was to he decided not by hooks hut by blows. Before the year 1567 he had printed many editions of the Bible in Latin, Flemish, and Hebrew. By far the largest part of the read- ing of the sixteenth century was theological, and Plantin saw that he would make his great- est success in getting an appointment as the recognized or official printer of the hturgical books of the Roman Cathohc Church. His earhest attempts were beset with difficulties. He had to solicit the help of Cardinal Gran- velle and Phihp II. The permit given by the pope and his cardinals was grudgingly allowed by the ecclesiastical magnates of the Netherlands. When he did begin to print, he had to pay ten per cent, of his receipts to Paul Manutius of Rome, who held the privilege. He had to petition the King of Spain to get the exclusive privilege he desired for the printing of the Church on Spanish territory. His friend Montanus told the king that Plantin's prices were more, but his printing was better than that of the Italian printers. It was this supe- riority in workmanship, as well as in business methods, that turned the scale in his favor. 13 90 €l)ri?top{|cir ^^lantht anti tfje Two of these service books, the great Psalter and the Antiphonary of 1571 and 1572, are admii'able pieces of rubricated printing. For many years the printing of these and other books kept him in financial embarrassment, but the result demonstrated the wisdom of his fore- sight. He never hved to enjoy the fruits, but his successors were made rich by a monopoly which they held for more than two hundred years. Plantin's printing was good, but it has been overpraised. He was named " King of Print- ers" at a time when the duties most admired in a printer were those of editor and publisher. Here he was grand. His purposes were always far beyond those of his rivals; great folios, many volumes, large types, difficult works in httle-known languages, " lumping patents " or privileges, profuse illustrations by eminent artists — every pecuharity of typography that dazzled or astonished. All his books are above mediocrity, but he did not attain the highest rank, either in his an'angement of types or in his press-work. He had obscure rivals in France and the Netherlands, who never made showy or imposing books, but who did better technical work, furnished more faultless texts, and showed clearer and sharper impressions from types. After Balthazar III. a decline set in. Some of the later books of the house are positively shabby — a disgrace to their patent and to the art. VIII <^^£^^^AS Plantin a Cathohc ? Prefaces written by him in some books are fervid with protestations of loyalty to the old Church. Montanus and Cardinal Granvelle, and many prominent eccle- siastics, were his personal friends, and vouched for his orthodoxy. The suspicious King of Spain seems to have never doubted him, not even when he went to Louvain, that home of heresy. These are strong assurances; yet he was often denounced as a Calvinist ; he printed books that were proscribed, and for which he lost his property. His correspondence with heretics, but recently discovered, proves beyond cavil that he was at heart a member of a non- resisting sect not unhke that of the Friends, — a sect which taught that religion was a personal 92 paittin^St^omuisf SJ^Uj^mm* matter of the heart and hfe, and not at all dependent on churches, creeds, or confessions. How much this flexible, non-resistant faith was his justification for the insincerity of his pro- fessions he alone can answer. It is certain that he was insincere. He was not the stuff martyrs are made of. It is more pleasant to turn to another side of his character, in which his sincerity is above all reproach. To the last, Plantin was true to his trade. Too many successful traders make use of their success to indulge in unsuspected propensities. They kick away the ladder they chmbed up on; they forswear trade and plebeian occupations ; they take their ease and display their wealth; they build mansions and buy estates; they seek social distinction for them- selves and their famihes. From this vainglory Plantin was entirely free. His ambition began and ended in his printing-house. To form a great office worthy of the king of printers, in which the largest and best books should be printed in a royal manner, was the great pur- pose of his hfe. Neither the Spanish Fury, nor the siege of Antwerp, nor the destruction of the great city's privileges and commerce, nor the king's neglect, nor his failure to perpetuate his Statuette of Madonna and Child, over Candlestick in the Press-room. ( From an Etching made for this Article by Otto H. Bacher.) name in a son, nor the infirmities of old age, shook liis purpose. The future fate of the office for which he had labored was doubtful ; for his sons-in-law were not in accord with one another. He had little ready money and many obliga- tions. He had only the appearance of success ; his greatest bequest was the means by which an unreached success could be attained. The probabihties were that his name, fame, and estate would soon disappear in a struggle be- tween contentious heirs ; but with all the odds against him, he did carry his point. The will of the dying old man had more enduring force in it than there was in any decree or treaty then made for the perpetuation of the Spanish dynasty. The Plantin-Moretus house outhved the Spanish house of Hapsburg. For more than three centuries the printing-office was kept in the family in unbroken hne of descent ; for at least three generations it maintained its position as the first office in the world. The Plantin types and presses and office are still the pride of Antwerp, but the statue of the king's representative, the fierce Duke of Alva, which once dominated a square in the city, and who boasted on the pedestal that he had restored order and preserved religion and reconstructed 96 €^ti^^^et ^lantm anti tJje society, was long ago overthrown. No over- throw could be more complete. It was not merely the upsetting of statue or dynasty, but of the foundations of medieval ideas and princi- ples. Plantin, unwittingly no doubt, but not the less efficiently, did his share in bringing down this thorough destruction. The books which he and others printed aroused the men- tal activity and inspired the freedom which soon made the Netherlands the foremost State in the world. Kings die and behef s change ; the bronze statues made to be imperishable are destroyed, but the printed word stands. The book hves, and hves forever. Horace was right : it is more enduring than bronze. In walking through the Museum the eye does not weary of sight-seeing, but the brain does refuse to remember objects that crowd so fast. To remember, one must rest and think of what he has seen. It is a rehef to sit down under the cool arcade and look out on the quiet court, and think of the men who trod these stones. For here Plan- tin and Moretus used to sit in the cool of the day ; here they matured plans for great books, and devised means of borrowing money to pay fast-coming obhgations. Was the end worth the worry? Behind those latticed windows, obscured with rampant grape-vine leaves, the great Justus Lipsius wrote or connected the books that were the admiration of all the universities — books now almost forgotten. In the next room Poelman and Kihanus and Raphelengius plodded hke wheel-horses in di*agging obscure texts out of the muddy roads in which copyists and compositors had left them. Who thinks of them now ? Through that doorway have often passed the courtly Van Dyke and the dashing Rubens, gay in vel- vets and ghtteiing with jewels. They, at least, are of the immortals. Dignitaries of all classes have been here : patriarchal Jewish rabbis and steeple-crowned Pui'itans; the ferocious Duke of Alva and the wily Cardinal Grranvelle ; cowled ecclesiastics from Rome and black- gowned professors from Leyden. From upper windows not far away Plantin's daughters have looked out in terror, on the awful night of the Spanish Fury, as they heard the yells of the savage soldiers raging about the court, and hstened to their threats of "blood and flesh and fire," and shuddered at the awful fate that seemed before them. Truly a sad time for the making of books or the cultivation of letters. u 98 ^ImMin^^mn^ a^ii^sfciim. And even nine years after tMs, the boy Baltha- zar must have been stopped at study by the roar of Farnese's guns during that memorable siege, and by the shrieks of the starving defenders of the doomed city. The evening bell sounds its warning : it is time to go. At our request the obhging con- cierge gives us a few leaves from the grape- vine, and we take oui* places in the outgoing procession. Out once more in the steaming streets — out in the confused roar and clatter of modern city life. But the memory of the Mu- seum is hke that of the chimes of Antwerp's great cathedral — never to be forgotten. 21 -^- 18 17 16 15 14 19 20 ' — 1- 22 ,„, 2ti 22 25| 24 23 Z > X 13 ."iiU 30 1 29 J Plan of the Plantin-Moretus Museum. The Ground Floor : 1, 2, 3, Parlors. 4, 5, Shops. 6, Room of Tapestries. 7, Room of the correctors. 8, Office. 9, Room of Justus Lipsius. 10, Lobby. 11, Room for the letters. 12, Printing-room. X, Porter's lodge, Y, Staircase looking out on the court. Z, Servants' room, etc. First Story : 13, 14, Front rooms. 15, 29, 30, Library. 16, 18, 22, Wood-engravings. 17, Lobby. 19, Copper-plates. 20, 24, Parlors. 21, Room of the licenses. 23, Room of the Antwerp engravers. 25, Rear room. 26, Sleeping-room. 31, Hall of archives. X, Reading-room. Y, Office of the Director. Z, Staircase leading to the court. /