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 SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

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panied this title with a salary sufficient to sup- port it and his printine o&ce ; and a kind of {>atent for the printing of certain works, particu- arlv of the relifpous kind, with which, says Ballart, he almost exclusively served Europe and the Indies.

Besides his establishment at Antwerp, Plantin set up another at Leyden, and a third at Paris. The King of France would have fain persuaded him to return to his native country ; but he preferred remaining at Antwerp. The printing- office at Leydeu, he bestowed on his son-in-law, Francis Raphelengius, who had been one of his correctors ; and took into partnership, at Ant- werp, John Moret, who had married his second daughter. He gave likewise to Giles Beys, a Parisian, the office he had established at Paris, as a portion with his third daughter. After all this, and the constant expenses of his living and establishment, he was enabled to leave a con- siderable fortune to his daughters, for he had no son. He died in his seventy-fifth year, and was interred in the great church at Antwerp. His epitaph may be seen in Foppens, Maittaire, and others; it is terse, vigorous, and just — concluding with these lines :

ChrUtophonu tUtu hie Plantima, Regit Iberi TypograpkuM: ud Rut Tppograpkum ipte ftiU,

His device was a pair of compasses, with the motto, Labore et Constantia. A motto, says Dr. Dibdin, which is the surest road to the very pinnacle of the temple of Fame ; whether used ny great statesmen, great generals, great scholars, great divines, great architects, or great mechanics. Thomas Sourbon,a printer at Lyons, in 1614, used Plantin's Compasses in a very ela- borate border, with the motto metron ariston ; and Laurent Sonnius, at Paris, in 1619, intro- duced the same device, with a ship in the stride of the compasses, both upon copper and wood.

One William Pantin, (see Baillet, vol. I. pt. 1, p. 72) compares the office of Plantin " to the belly of the Trojan horse — adding, that many more heroes, (in the shape of Hebrew, Greek, and Latin books) issued from it, than there came Grecian warriors from the horse of Troy." A droll comparison, says Dr. Dibdin, and possibly unique. But of all these heroes, in the shape of a book, none was ever gifted with so colossal a stature, none ever achieved such stupendous deeds, and none received such unqualiiied eulogy, as the Bihlia Polyglotta, ^c. Antiverpia, 1561-1572, (see page 351, ante.) It has been called over and over again, the eighth wonder of the world.

Plantin's house at Antwerp stands in the Friday market, near the Scheldt. In the early half of the seventeenth century, it was visited by Goltzius, and from the description which he has given in his Itinerary, it seems that since his time, at lea.st, it has not undergone any altera- tion. John Moretus, the husband of Plantin's second daughter, succeeded to the printing office ai^er Plantin's death. M. Moretus, the proprie- tor in 1817, was his lineal descendant. Five

of Plantin's massy presses were then in the press room, in good repair ; the others were destroyed by the French when they took possession of the town. At a later period the French authorities put the remaining presses under seal ; the cause of this proceeding was not explained, but the seals had not been removed in 1815, notwith- standing that a change of government had taken place. Many relics are still preser\'ed of this extraordinary printer ; his writing desk — ^bis brass lamp — his high-backed smooth-worn arm- chair — his piles of ledgers — the matrices of hit types — and the copper-plates employed in the works he printed. Baillet savs, that a catalogue of the books printed in Plantin's office was pub- lished at Antwerj), in 1608, 8vo.

In the Bibliographical Decameron, vol. ii. p. 157, there is a view of Plantin's house, and two portraits, and from them the physiognomy of this eminent man appears truly noble.

Many books executed by the celebrated family of the Plantins omit the name of the place where

E'nted ; they proceeded either from Antwerp or yden, at botn which towns they had printing establishments.

A choice of emblemes, and other devices, for the most part gathered out of sundrie writers, Englished and moralized. And divers newly demsed by Geffrey Whitney. Imprinted at Ley- den, in the house of Christopher Plantyn by Francis Raphelengius. This book is dedicated to Robert earl of Leycester, at London 28 November, 1685. Many of the very neat wooden cuts, and verses, are inscribed to the greatest men of the age, both here and abroad. It contains 230 pages besides dedication, &c. and as many, or more devices.

1589. Frederick II. king of Denmark, re- solved that the Bible should be re-printed in the Danish language, according to the German bibles printed at Wittemberg, with the sum- maries of Vitus Theodorus, and Luther's marginal notes and concordances, yet so as that the Danish text should, in the principal places, be rendered agreeable to the Hebrew verity ; — That such scholia as differed from the text, thus corrected, were to be omitted ; but that such of Luther's notes as agreed with it were to be re- tained. In this vear the bible was published at Copenhagen, in large folio. On the back of the title-page is the portrait of Frederick II., and on the opposite page, are the Danish arms. The paper is of the same quality with that used in the former edition, but the type is considerably larger. The wood-cuts are retained, and the first letter of every chapter is likewise struck with a wooden engraving. Each page is divided into two parallel columns, on both sides of which are Luther's notes and references. It is divided into three parts; and at the end of each, the date when it was finished ; viz. the first in 1588, and the two last in 1589.

1589. The first edition entire of the whole Bible in the Hungarian language, was printed at Wysolyin, or Visoly, near Gonz, m 4to. Gaspard Caroli, or Karoli, pastor of the church

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