Page:De Vinne, Invention of Printing (1876).djvu/379

Rh unrecognized member of the noble family of Brederodes. But he is, certainly, not the man, described on the pedigree as the Coster who brought the first print in the world. He is not the man described by Junius who lived "about one hundred and twenty-eight years ago," or in 1440, for the records of the church of St. Bavo prove that Laurens Janszoon died and was buried in 1439. It is not at all probable that Thomaszoon or Junius made any mistake in the name, and that it was this Louwerijs Janszoon who brought the first print in the world. There is no more evidence in favor of Janszoon as an inventor of printing than there is in favor of Coster. The most careful searching of the records fails to bring to light any evidence that he was engaged in the practice of printing.

That Lourens Coster kept a tavern may also be inferred from the fact that the house he lived in was always known as a tavern. The engraving of this house on the following page shows how the edifice appeared in 1740. Junius said that it was a house of some pretension in 1568, and that it stood on the market-place near the royal palace; but Van Zuren had previously noticed it as a house falling to decay. In 1628, Scriverius said that the house had been "changed and was divided among three masters:" the part supposed to be the Coster residence was called The Golden Bunch of Grapes, and it was even then used as a tavern. When John Bagford first saw the house, in 1706, it was a cheese shop. In 1761, Moses Van Hulkenroy, a printer, lived in part of it, and the other part was occupied as an inn, then known as The Golden Fleece. In 1813, the centre building was used as a public house. It fell into ruins on the 13th of May, 1818, but it has since been rebuilt, and a tablet inserted in memory of Coster. It is probable that this house was an inn when Junius wrote Batavia, and that he refrained from mentioning this circumstance lest it might degrade Coster. But we now know that Coster, and Pieter Thomaszoon, his son-in-law, who succeeded him in business, and that Gerrit Thomaszoon, the author of the pedigree, were all innkeepers. The wine-flagons, to which