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Typo: A Monthly Newspaper and Literary Review, Volume 2

Gutenberg Dethroned

Gutenberg Dethroned.

Ever since the publication, last year, of Mr Hessels' Haarlem, not Mentz, we have met with numerous references in our trade contemporaries to its important bearing on the controversy regarding the invention of printing. But these references have been so vague and indefinite, that without the book itself, we did not care to touch upon the subject. We find, in the Printers' Register for October, an excellent review of the whole subject, which we quote. It is to be regretted that Mr Hessels' discoveries are entirely of the negative order:—

The latest views as to the. invention controversy are contained in the article on the origin of printing in the new volume of the Encyclopædia Britannica, issued a few weeks ago. The « record » of Mr Jan Hendrik Hessels, as a contributor to the literature and bibliography of printing, is a peculiar one. He is a native of Holland, and was first brought into notice, in this line of research, at least, by his translation of Dr Van der Linde's De Haarlemsche Costerlegende. Mr William Blades published this as The Haarlem Legend, in 1871. Dr Van der Linde was also a Dutchman, but, notwithstanding his nationality, his treatise was generally regarded, especially by his English translator, as completely exploding the « myth » which ascribed the honor of the invention of printing to L. J. Koster, of Haarlem. It was supposed to have refuted seriatim all the claims of the Dutch, and to shew that the Koster story rested on nothing else than ignorance, presumption, and mendacity. No future historian of printing, as Mr Hessels considered, need concern himself with it except as a literary curiosity or a remarkable imposture. Dr Van der Linde brought out a later book, Gutenberg, and the editor of a contemporary, Mr Charles Wyman, induced him to write a review of it for his journal. The review extended over some four monthly numbers, and then suddenly stopped short in the middle. The cause was afterwards explained: Mr Hessels discovered that he had been quite wrong in being so « cock-sure, » as the boys say, as to the claims of his German hero. He made a journey through certain parts of the Continent, and returned to write his Gutenberg: Was he the Inventor of Printing? published nearly two years later. This embodied, as the title-page stated, « a criticism » of Van der Linde's Gutenberg, and the result arrived at was, that there was little or no real evidence of Gutenberg being anything more than one of the first printers. This was Mr Hessels' position when the task devolved upon him of writing the article for the Encyclopaedia Britannica. As German thoroughness is one of the characteristics of this Dutch bibliographer, he determined to make a new investigation of the origines typo-graphics. The result was published in a series of articles in the Academy last year, which have been reprinted with additions, in Haarlem not Mentz, published by Mr Elliot Stock in December last. Hessels' refutation, in 1887, of Hessels' theory of 1871, is one of the curiosities of literature. Koster is resuscitated, Haarlem is awarded the honour which it was thought only bigots blinded by a false notion of patriotism could possibly ascribe to it. Unmeasured sarcasm was in 1871 showered down upon all who at any time gave credence to or supported the « Haarlem legend; » now the partisans of Gutenberg are treated to the same denunciation. The article in the Encyclopedia is of great importance, written with the utmost care, and is the result evidently of a most earnest desire to probe the subject to its very foundation. The conclusion is, however, not entirely satisfactory. This can be said without casting any shadow on the fame of the author. It settles nothing; it unsettles everything. Our previous histories of the invention are nevertheless clearly shewn to be full of errors. Mr Hessels declares, « As the case stands at present we have no choice but to say that the invention of printing with [unclear: moveab'e] types took place at Haarlem about the year 1445 by Lourens; Jaus-zoon Coster. »