Now if these copies of Donatus were not printed by means of movable type, why should they be mentioned rather than the many other works equally fitted to give a hint to Gutenberg? Why, in going back to the origin of the discovery, should his pupil say nothing of those illustrated legends which were xylographically cut and sold in all the Rhenish towns, and which the future inventor of printing must have seen hundreds of times? For the attention of Gutenberg to have been thus concentrated on a single object, there must have been some peculiar merit and some stamp of real progress in the mode of execution to distinguish the copies of Donatus printed at Haarlem from other contemporary work. Laurence Coster – the name attributed to the inventor of the process which Gutenberg improved – must have already made use of a method more closely allied than any other to the improvements about to follow, and destined to put a term to mere experiments.
To suppose the contrary is to misunderstand the words of Ulrich Zell and the influence which he attributes to the Dutch edition of Donatus, from which Gutenberg derived "the first idea of his invention." It is still more difficult to understand how, if the Donatuses are block-printed, reversed letters are sometimes found in the fragmentary specimens which survive. There is nothing the least extraordinary in such a mistake when it can be explained by the carelessness of a compositor of movable type, but such a mistake would really be incredible on the part of a xylographic workman. What possible caprice could have tempted him to engrave occasional letters upside down? One could only suppose he erred, not from inadvertence, but with voluntary infidelity and in calculated defiance of common sense.
The discovery which has immortalised the name of Gutenberg should be recognised and admired as the conclusion and crown of a series of earlier attempts in printed type. Taking into account the inadequacy of the movable type, whether of wood or of any other substance, first employed by the Dutch, and the perfection of the earliest specimens of German printing, it can and should be admitted that, before the publication of the "Letters of Indulgence," the "Bible," and other productions from the workshop of Gutenberg and his fellow-labourers attempts at genuine typography had been already pursued, and to a certain extent rewarded with success.
From the very confession of Ulrich Zell, a confession repeated by the anonymous author of the "Chronicle of Cologne" printed in 14996 the first rude essay in the art (prefiguratio) was seen in the town of Haarlem. We may, in short, conclude that the idea of combining designs cut on wood with a separate letterpress in movable types, belongs in all probability to Holland.
One of the oldest collections of engravings with subject matter printed by this process is the "Speculum Humanæ Salvationis," mentioned by Adrian Junius in his "Batavia" – written, it would seem, between the years 1560 and 1570, but not published till 1588, many years after his death. Therein it is expressly stated that the "Speculum" was printed before 1442 by Lourens Janszoon Coster. It is true that Junius is speaking of events which occurred more than a century before the time to which he ascribes them: "on the testimony," as he says, "of very aged men, who had received this tradition, as a burning torch passed from hand to hand." And this belated narrative has appeared, and may still appear, somewhat doubtful. We ourselves consider the doubt to be exaggerated, but we shall not insist on that. The specimens survive which gave rise to such legends and commentaries; and it is fitting they should be questioned.
Four editions of the "Speculum" are known, two in Dutch and two in Latin. It must be understood that we only speak of the editions which have no publishers' names, no dates, nor any sign of the place where they were published: the "Speculum," a sort of Christian handbook, much used in the Low Countries, having been frequently reprinted, with due indication of names and places, during and after the last twenty years of the fifteenth century. The oldest Dutch edition that is dated, the one of 1483, printed by John Veldenaer, reproduces certain engravings which had already embellished the four anonymous editions, with the difference that the plates have been sawn in two to suit the dimensions of a smaller volume. Hence, whatever conjectures may exist as to the date of the first publication, we have, at least, a positive fact: as the original plates only appear in a mutilated state in the copies printed in 1483, it is evident that the four editions where they appear entire are of earlier date. These questions remain: – first, whether they are earlier, too, than the second half of the fifteenth century – earlier, that is, than the time when Gutenberg gave to the world the results of his labour? and second, whether they originated, like the edition of Donatus, in a Dutch workshop?
Doubt seems impossible on the last point. These four editions are all printed with the same cuts, on the same paper made in Brabant, and under the same typographical conditions, with the exception of some slight differences in the characters of the two Dutch editions, and the insertion of twenty leaves xylographically printed in one of the two Latin editions. Is it, then, likely, or even possible, that these books belong, as has been supposed, to Germany?
The thing might, indeed, be possible, were it merely a question of the copies in Latin; but the Dutch ones cannot be supposed to have been published anywhere but in Holland; and the origin of the latter once established, how are we to explain the typographical imperfection of the work if not by ignorance of the process which Gutenberg was to popularise? According to M. Paeile, a competent judge in such a matter7 the letterpress of the Dutch "Speculum" is written in the pure dialect of North Holland, as it was spoken in those parts towards the end of the fourteenth century and the beginning of the fifteenth. Armed, therefore, with but a few particulars as to printing and idiom, it will not be too bold in us to fix the date of publication between the first and second quarters of the fifteenth century. It may be added that the costume of the figures is of the time of Philip the Good; that the taste and style of the drawing suggests the influence of the brothers Van Eyck; and that there is a decided contrast between the typographical imperfection of the text and the excellent quality of the plates. Art, and art already well on its way and confident of its powers, is thus seen side by side with an industrial process still in its infancy: a remarkable proof of the advances already accomplished in wood engraving before printing had got beyond the rudimentary period. For our present purpose, this is the chief point, the essential fact to verify.
The discovery of printing, therefore, is doubtless a result of the example of relief engraving, and there is no doubt either that the first attempts at printing with type originated in Holland. Whilst Coster, or the predecessor of Gutenberg, whoever he was, was somewhat feebly preparing the way for typographical industry, painting and the arts of design generally had in the Low Countries attained a degree of development which they had not before reached, except in Italy. Amongst the German contemporaries of Hubert and John van Eyck, what rival was there to compare with these two masters? – what teacher with so notable an influence, or so fertile a teaching? Whilst, on the banks of the Rhine, artists unworthy of the name and painters destitute of talent were continuing the Gothic traditions and the formulæ of their predecessors, the school of Bruges was renewing, or rather founding, a national art. By the beginning of the fifteenth century the revolution was accomplished in this school, which was already distinguished by the Van Eycks, and to which Memling was about to add fresh lustre. Germany, too, in a few years was to glory in a like success; but the movement did not set in till after the second half of the century. Till then everything remained dead, everything betrayed an extreme poverty of method and doctrine. If we judge the German art of the time by such work, for instance, as the "St. Christopher," engraved in 1423, a single glance is sufficient to reveal the marked superiority of the contemporary Flemings. It is, then, far from unnatural that, at a time when painters, goldsmiths, and all other artists in Flanders were so plainly superior in skill to their co-workers in Germany, the Flemish engravers should likewise have led the van of progress and taken their places as the first in the history of their art.
It may be said that the proofs are insufficient. Be it so. We shall not look for them in the "Virgin" on wood, belonging to the Brussels Library, and bearing the date 1418, as the authenticity of this date, to our thinking perfectly genuine, has been disputed; nor shall we seek for them in the anonymous examples which it seems to us but just to ascribe to the old school of the Low Countries.8
Up to now we are willing to admit that only Germany is in a position to produce a piece of