A. publishing business which. while of no great moment from the commercial point of view, exercised an enormous influence on public opin ion in Europe. was that instituted in Witten berg in 1517, at the instance of Luther and Melanchthon. Luther's first publisher was Johann \\'eissenherger, from Nuremberg,, who printed a tract by him at Lanschott, in Bavaria, in 1517, and later in the same year the treatise on the Seven Penitential Psalms. issues of the Lutheran press in Wittenberg followed each other with rapidity. The pamphlets that went out from this press, reprinted in other places by printers who were in sympathy with Luther's work, secured an enormous circulation. It is difficult at this time to understand how, with all the obstacles which existed at that tune in making announcement of publications issued, it proved to he possible to bring these pamphlets into the hands of so many thousands of interest ed readers. The question was also not merely one of making known their existence, but of overcoming the impediments placed by the Church authorities in the way of their distri bution. Thousands Of copies were sold in the market-places, not only by booksellers, but by dealers of all kinds, many of whom had never before handled books. Large supplies were dis tributed by traveling peddlers among readers out of reach of the book-shops and the market places. These popular tracts met the needs of all classes, educated and uneducated, and se cured a wider circulation than had heretofore been achieved by any religious works—or, for that matter, by any writings whatever. Luther made no profit from these sales. Every gulden that was paid for the books. every pfennig that came in for the fir-leaves or pamphlets. was at once expended in further printings and in insti tuting further distributing machinery.
One of the most noteworthy of the houses of the Sixteenth Century was that estab lished in 1555 by Christopher Plantin. in Ant werp. His publications were distinguished not only for the perfection of their typography, but for the beauty of the illustrations, chiefly pro duced by engraving on copper plates. The hooks produced in the Low Countries, even during the manuscript period, had always been distin guished by their artistic effectiveness. The illu minations in the manuscripts prepared in Bruges and in Lfte were the finest that the world had as vet seen. The same interest in the ornamentation of literature persisted in the Low Countries after the printing-press had replaced the work of the scriptorium. For a quarter of a century after 1555. Plantin's publishing house was the most considerable in Europe. In 1557 his consignment to the Frankfort Fair comprised no less than 1200 volumes, together with a large a4sortment of prints from copper plates. The publishing business founded by him continued in the hands of his descendants until 1867, and had thus a continuous existence of nearly three centuries. In 1867 the 'plant' was purchased by the city of Antwerp, and the Plantin Museum was instituted.
The Elzevirs of Leyden and Amsterdam, whose work continued during the century between 1587 and 1688, were the most noteworthy pub lishers of Holland. and the repute of the books issued from the Elzevir Press has continued to the present day. While the fame of Plantin had rested chiefly on his illustrated volumes, the reputation of the Elzevirs was connected more particularly with the classical publications produced by their press. They had the ad vantage of a community of scholars whose services could be secured at moderate cost for the editing of the long series of classical texts which bear the Elzevir imprint. Their cata logues presented also the names of a number of contemporary writers whose works have achieved an abiding fame, among them Deseartes.
Grains, Salmasius. Heinsius, Hobbes. Spinoza, and 31oliere.
The book trade of Germany was first or ganized by the institution, in 14:30, of a division of the Frankfort Fair for the sale of printed books. For many years before this date, this fair had been the centre of au active trade in many classes of goods, including nut only manu seripts produced in Germany. but also those from the Low Countries, France. and Italy. After 1480 the printer-publishers secured an apportionment of space in the building; assigned for the fair, which was utilized for semi-annual gatherings. It was not only the German book
sellers who made use of this machinery. The Etiennes and the other leading publishers of France, Plantin and his associates of Antwerp, the Elzevirs of Holland. and the leading dealers from Italy, all found it to then advantage to he represented there at least once, and frequent l• twice. a year. From the beginning of the Sixteenth Century Leipzig came into impor tance as a book-producing and bookselling cen tre, and the rulers of Saxony took an early in terest. through the encouragement of the book trade, and through liberal regulations concern ing censorship of the press and a recognition of property rights in the books produced, to further the undertakings of the printer -pub lishers of Saxony.
In the beginning of the bookmaking industry, it was understood without further specification that the printer was also the publisher of the works coining from his press. Soon, however, we find associated with his undertakings the names of partners, who had nothing directly to do with the book-manufacturing, but who con tributed their aid, either for the sake of literary development or for some other motives apart from that of business profit; and in the list of such associates occurred the names of nobles, ecclesiastics, and wealthy scholars. The period of 1650-1764 witnessed the growth of the system of book exchange under which publishers, in disposing of their productions, were obliged to accept in payment the stock of other publishers, so that the market value of books came to he measured in other books. This method, if it did not add very promptly to the receipts of the dealers, had at least the advantage of facilitat ing the distribution of books and of furthering the organization of the book trade. The first general catalogue of the books offered at the Frankfort Fair was printed in 1564; of the Leipzig Fair. in 1595. Catalogues of individual dealers, however, were published soon after the invention of printing, and more than a score from the Fifteenth Century are still extant, the oldest of which is that of Johann \lentelin (Strassburg. 1469). The operations and results of the Thirty Years' War (161S-1648) had much to do with the transfer of the 'centre of the book trade from Frankfort to Leipzig, but a large factor in the matter was the increasing intellectual activity of the Protestant States of north Germany, as compared with the southern, which remained under the restrictions imposed by the Catholic authorities. The German pub lishers and booksellers have all along had the advantage of a more effective organization than that of any other country. under which there has been, with the smallest po4sible tax on read ers, a larger return than elsewhere for the work of writers, and more stable and less speculative conditions for both sellers and purchasers of books. The Leipzig 'fairs' are still held annu ally; after they ceased to be actual oeeasions for exposing the hooks for sale. they were long the scene of the settlement of the year's business, and are still important reunions of all the pub lishing interests. Every bookseller in Germany, Austria. and Switzerland has a representative iu J.eipzig, as the centre of the trade for those countries, and an official organ has been pub lished there since 1831: daily since 1867. Other smaller gathering; similar to the Leipzig Fair occur in Stuttgart. for south Germany, and in Vienna. for Austria-Hungary. While the mod ern trade is nowhere so elaborately organized as in Germany, all the principal European countries have their associations. In England there are the Associated Booksellers of Great Britain 1374). the London Foreign Booksellers' Asso ciation (1895), and the Publishers' Association (1396). Stationers' Hall, in London, is the headquarters of the business, and the Publishers' Circular and the Bookseller are its recognized organs. The English catalogue has, since 1835, furnished an annual list of all books published in the United Kingdom. The principal French association is the (ercle de la Librairie, whose organ is the Bibliographic de la France (1811). Italy has its Assoeiazione Tipogratico-libraria Italiaua, publishing the Bibliografia Italiana.