University of Virginia Library

Notes on the Wynkyn de Worde Editions of the Boke of St Albans and its Separates [*]
by
Eloise Pafort

In 1496, when Wynkyn de Worde planned to reprint the editio princeps (1486) of the Boke of St. Albans, today often referred to as the Book of Hawking, Hunting and Heraldry, it was his intention to include some new material and to make certain physical improvements. The latter consisted in adding a title-page and a number of woodcuts[1] and in modernizing the phrasing and spelling. But on the whole, De Worde followed his model closely, even, one might say to a semblance of type, since he employed a rather heavy square letter obtained from Govaert van Ghemen (Godfried van Os), a printer of Gouda in South Holland, about 1491 when the latter removed to Copenhagen.[2] In later years, the initials and woodcuts reappeared frequently but the type, apparently considered unsuitable for English books,[3] was not used again by De Worde or by any other sixteenth-century English printer.

Although De Worde launched his 1496 first edition in a small folio, he seems to have changed the format subsequently, for all later recorded texts of the Boke of St. Albans from his press were brought out in a handy quarto, a size increasingly favored by the establishment "At the Sign of the Sun." For the most part, the texts of these quartos inevitably contain some slight alterations in spelling but suffer chiefly from omissions of words and phrases in printing.

Since De Worde was a popular printer, he must have reckoned the practicality of a pocket-sized edition soon after 1496, but there is a gap of approximately nineteen years before we can pick up the thread of De Worde's printing of the Boke of St. Albans. The earliest recorded quarto is preserved only as a fragment of three leaves and is Bodleian Rawl. 4° 598.8, catalogued as a separate printing of The boke of huntynge, the text of the fragment. Fortunately, one of the leaves has the signature E.i. and the catch-title "Huntynge," two workable clues for tracing this edition. As there are 33-34 lines to a page, we may start with the text on E1 and work backwards, in comparison with the 1496 edition,[4] to conjecture that this is a quarto edition of the whole work and that presumably "Huntynge" was the catch-title throughout as found in the Schwerdt quarto described later.

From type criteria, the only basis offered, this Bodleian quarto might be dated circa 1515[5] an assignment determined by (1) fig. 6 of Isaac's[6] classification of De Worde's types; (2) a close examination of the type[7] of De Worde's dated publications 1513 to 1518, a range limited by Isaac's Fig. 6; and (3) by its closest resemblance to the type-pages of the Chronicles of England dated 1515.

The 1515 edition must have gone well, for not long afterwards, some three years perhaps, another quarto appeared "At the Sign of the Sun." This, fortunately, is extant in a perfect though undated copy, the unicum formerly in the celebrated collection of sporting literature formed by C.F.G.R. Schwerdt[8] of Alresford, Hants. The extreme importance of the Schwerdt quarto is determined by the fact that we become acquainted

for the first and only time, with a complete text of a De Worde quarto of the Boke of St. Albans; and since no other perfect De Worde quarto of this text is known to exist, its status is that of a bibliographical monument.

The title of the Schwerdt reads: The boke of hawkynge | and huntynge | and fysshynge. This might well have been the wording of the Bodleian quarto, from which it could have been printed, unless there was a lost intermediate edition. The colophon adds a little more to its contents: "Here endeth the boke of hawkynge hūtynge and fysshynge | and with many other dyuer maters. Inprȳted in Flete strete at ye sygne of ye sonne | by Wȳkyn de Worde." The text is an abridgement, for the Schwerdt quarto indicates that when the change of format was under consideration, from a folio containing 74 leaves, to a quarto size, two extensive treatises on heraldry occupying some 33 leaves were dropped, presumably because they would have made the volume too bulky to be taken into the field by falconers, hunstmen, and anglers. In fact, the heraldic tracts, Liber armorum and The blasynge of armes with its numerous woodcuts of shields, never again made their appearance over De Worde's imprint or device[9] though the "importance of heraldry as a subject of polite study and speculation" was of absorbing interest in the fifteenth and even more so in the sixteenth centuries considering the remains dating from this early Tudor Age.

Broadly, the Schwerdt quarto can be placed between the years 1518 and 1521;[10] the earlier date is more acceptable to Mr. F. S. Ferguson, for whose examination Mr. Schwerdt personally brought the little volume up to London: "As a result I am able to tell you that the book was printed [c. 1518-1521]. . . . Personally I incline to the earlier date, but I have no unalterable reason for doing so—it may have been printed as late as 1521, but I should think this must be the limit."[11] Since the

volume is perfect it offers various typographical "points" for arriving at a year of publication: (1) the wording in the colophon: "In Flete strete at ye sygne of ye sonne," dates it after 1501,[12] for at the turn of the century De Worde moved to this new address; (2) the device beneath the colophon is McKerrow no. 25[13] who has determined its use from 1508 to 1531; (3) the state of the large title-cut[14] representing the falconer with his attendants demonstrates that the original block freshly cut for De Worde's folio in 1496 had been cut down to fit the quarto page; moreover, this block shows signs of cracking in two places, a condition never seen in the folio cut, but which might indicate its use in other lost quartos before the surmised date 1518, and finally (4) the letter-press is Isaac's 95 textura[15] as reproduced in his fig. 7 and is precisely the same as the types in publications dated 1517 and 1518.[16]

The little Schwerdt volume concludes this review of the known De Worde quarto editions of the Boke of St. Albans. After the printer's death in 1534, to 1596 when this book of sport appeared for the last time in the sixteenth century, there were issued upwards of fourteen editions.[17] It is probable that two or three of these are, instead, issues for different stationers, each having his name attached to his quota of copies from the same edition.[18] They all bore the same wording in the title: "The boke of hawkynge huntynge and fysshynge with all the properties and medecynes that are necessary to be kept," or the same wording in the colophon: "The boke of Haukynge, Huntynge and Fysshynge, with other dyuers matters." And the progenitor of all these texts was, of course, the singularly popular De Worde quarto.

Since the Boke of St. Albans contained practical information on the several pastimes extensively practised, De Worde saw the good sense of issuing each "manual of sport" in a size convenient for the pockets of each genus of sportsman. Whether this was done simultaneously with his issuing of the quartos of the whole work, there are no records to substantiate.

But after 1518, the assigned date of the latest known quarto, two examples of "separates" whose texts originally appeared in De Worde's folio of the Boke of St. Albans, are known. In point of time, the first separate quarto is the unique[19] imperfect copy in the University Library, Cambridge, Sel.5.57 (formerly AB.5.378). Sayle[20] supplied the title Treatise of Hunting by Juliana Berners since it lacks the title-page and there is no colophon from which a title might be extracted. The versified text is the book of hunting followed by the miscellanea including the poem "A Faythfull frende wolde I fayne fynde", the same which occupies leaves c6 recto to e5 verso of the folio, but here (at this late date) either reprinted from an earlier lost quarto "separate" or a missing quarto edition of the folio later than the Schwerdt. On the verso of the title-page of the Cambridge quarto, the text must have begun with an introductory paragraph, and the beginning of the hunting treatise itself had the heading "Bestys of Venery."

Sayle dates the Cambridge quarto [1530?]; accepted by STC under no. 3318. According to Isaac's classification it might be dated slightly earlier, circa 1526 to 1530 as determined by the letter-press: the sole use of s3 with the curling serifs, which was the only s used after 1521; w3 frequently employed in the middle and at the end of words as well as at the beginning, precisely in the manner seen in the type-pages of two dated books: The thre kynges of coleyne, 1526 (Morgan 20896) and The destruccyon of Jherusalem, 1528 (Morgan 21134), and the infrequent use of y1 which became rare in 1530.

The full title of De Worde's folio partially discloses the divers subjects treated: This present boke shewyth the manere of hawkynge & huntynge: and also of diuysynge of Cote armours It shewyth also a good matere belongynge to horses: wyth other cōmendable treatyses. And ferdermore of the blasynge of armys: as here after it maye appere.[21] In this long intitulation, we find the treatises on Hawking, Hunting, and the two on Heraldry are named, but an extensive new addition is not mentioned, though it may be covered by the phrase "wyth other cōmendable treatyses". This unnamed tract, however, is itself conspicuously entitled: Here begynnyth the treatyse of fysshynge wyth an Angle and

it is accompanied by a lively woodcut: Hodnett's English Woodcuts, 897.

Oddly enough, this treatise is found between two heraldic essays at the end of the volume. But this "insertion" may have been unintentional, for originally De Worde had planned not to print the second heraldic treatise but later changed his mind. This treatise Here begynneth the blasynge of armes with its numerous colored woodcut coats of arms and its own set of signatures (a-c in 6's plus d in 8's), the printer may have intended to handle as a separate (see also footnote 9).

The obvious appeal of the special subject matter to all classes would have made a profitable business venture to bring out in pocket-size editions. But the records, meager in the extreme, yield up only one separate printing of the Treatise on Fishing in a handy quarto size, which is to be dated as late as circa 1532 to 1534. This edition is today represented by the unique perfect copy in the Pierpont Morgan Library (Morgan 20894) and it occupies therefore a niched position among the separate printings from the De Worde folio of the Boke of St. Albans as the Schwerdt copy occupies among the quarto editions of the whole work. In a sense, the Morgan separate is of slightly greater magnitude, for it is the only proof, thus far, of De Worde's separate printing on fishing and the earliest known pocket manual on that subject in all the literature of sport in England.

It is, then, as a new addition to De Worde's folio 1496 reprint of the Boke of St. Albans that the celebrated Treatise on Fishing with an Angle made its first appearance and became the earliest printed essay in English on the subject.

The original text took up some 12 folios. De Worde, or his editor, must have thought the subject fully covered, for he described it as a "compendyous treatyse," whereas the author said "this symple treatyse" and wrote it for "al you that ben vertuous: gentyll: and free borne", the same public for whom the compilation was first conceived.

The treatise is devoted to the art of "anglynge wyth a rodde: and a lyne and a hoke" as against all other manner of fishing. It is introduced by some general observations on the sport, but on the whole its character is technical, with seventeen woodcuts illustrating the making of fishing tackle. A comparison of these with the woodcuts in the 1496 folio discloses that the first, a representation of the fishing rod (B1 recto) is new in this separate edition; two instruments, the "Hamour" and "Knyfe" are missing from the original row of eight "for to make of your hookes" (B3 verso); a whole new set (four instead of five) of fishing-lines were cut to illustrate them (B4 verso); and the set of fish-hooks has been entirely omitted.

The title of the Fishing quarto remained unchanged from its first printing: Here begynneth a treatyse of fysshynge with an Angle, reiterated in the colophon: "Here endeth the boke of Fysshynge | With other dyuers maters. Imprynted at London by Wynkyn de Worde | dwellynge in Flete strete at the sygne of the Sonne." Once more we find an undated colophon necessitating dependence upon typographical particulars: (1) the printer's address places the publication after 1501; (2) De Worde's mark beneath the colophon is the tripartite device (McKerrow no. 21) used from 1528 to 1534; (3) the letter-press discloses the frequent use of w3 and the sole use of s3, which brings us up between 1522 and 1528; another letter y1 which Isaac states was rare in 1530 does not appear at all; and finally the textura type used in the first line of the title is first found in 1532, Isaac's fig. 9. Resolving these minutiae, we may assign the date of the Morgan quarto to circa 1532 to 1534.

The text of the Morgan separate quarto was the one that was reprinted with minor differences many years after De Worde's death. In modern times, however, it is the pure text as it was first published in 1496 that has been reprinted and facsimiled in extenso at various periods.

De Worde's long title for the folio also exhibits another misleading promise: "It shewyth also a good matere belongynge to horses." Since the other treatises mentioned in the title are of considerable length, one is led to expect that a "good matere belongynge to horses" indicates a more extensive text on the horse than only the nine lines on folio e3, with the rubric "The proprytees of a good horse", listing simply fifteen essential conditions. It does not seem likely that De Worde would have singled out these nine lines from all the other just as fragmentary and miscellaneous pieces in the middle of the volume to be specified in his title had he not under consideration more comprehensive matter relating to horses.

However, De Worde did not cast aside altogether the "good matere belongynge to horses," for that may well be the quarto bearing the title Here begynneth the Proprytees and medycynes for hors extant in the unique imperfect copy in the Huntington Library (no. 59359).[22] On folio A3 in that edition is a similar list of the fifteen points of a good horse which De Worde printed in his folio of 1496.

The Huntington quarto may be dated circa 1504 to 1506. A specific test

is found in the letter-press which is Isaac fig. 2, the 95 textura for 1501.[23] However, to Isaac's determinant letters in this textura must be added a small k with a large top loop brought in 1500 to the Sign of the Sun but not found in the Huntington quarto. This archaic k was used exclusively after 1500 in dated publications such as Alcock's Mons perfectionis, 27 May 1501; Thordynary of crysten men, 1502; and Le Fevre's Recuyles of Troye, 1503. After 1503, it drops out entirely.[24] By other typographical standards,[25] such as the type used in the chapter-headings and the state of the Crucifixion woodcut, De Worde's treatise on the horse has heretofore been wrongly dated from 1500 to 1502.

The Huntington "separate" quarto contains the first twelve leaves out of an original sixteen and therefore lacks the end of the text including the colophon-leaf which contained a device. Ames[26] saw a perfect copy, for after quoting the above title he gives the colophon: "And here we shall leue to treate ferthermore in this sayd mater whyche is dylygently corrected and made after a sufficyent copy directed vnto me by a certen person whyche as hym thought rygt necessary to be knowen to gentlemen and men of honour as to seruysable and rustyck people." The wording of that colophon clearly places the Proprytees and medycynes for hors in the same category as the other treatises which make up the Boke of St. Albans.

It remained for another Tudor printer, Robert Wyer, to prove what De Worde set out to do: knowledge of horses belonged in a book compiled primarily for gentlemen. In Here be Certayne Questyons of Kynge Bocthus of the maners | tokyns | and condycions of men | with the answeres made to the same by the Phylosopher Sydrac, [27] Wyer brings together with this dialogue wholly based on the Boke of St. Albans, "The Propertyes of a good Horse" which, to every appearance, has as its archetype the De Worde quarto at Huntington. Even as late as 1567, De Worde's tract was

still in circulation in a text printed by William Copland with the title Mediciues (sic) for Horses, preserved in the unique imperfect copy at Trinity College, Cambridge.[28]

The small-format volumes, the quarto size De Worde found so profitable in the fields of romances and schoolbooks, and suitably adapted for his treatises on the sports, proved for the bibliographer of today le modèle fatal. Because of its size, works of this type were easily lost, and copies are either extremely rare or, as seen in this review, the record is narrowed down to unique copies; the whole class of De Worde's "sporting literature for gentlemen" almost perished.

One other branch of sport which might have appeared in a separate quarto by De Worde is the sport of flight—falconry, or the knowledge of and hunting with hawks, the first in the set of treatises in his folio. Assuredly compositions on this subject were in wide circulation in De Worde's own time. Some day perhaps a fragment will determine a quarto of his printing.[29]

Fowling is a sport mentioned by the author of the Treatise on Fishing: "And therefore now woll I chose of foure good disportes & honeste gamys | that is to wyte: of huntynge: hawkynge: fysshynge: & foulynge." The last subject, thus ranked among the four major field sports of England, was unfortunately not included in the compilation of the schoolmaster printer of St. Albans or "inserted" by Wynkyn de Worde.

TABLE
Boke of St. Albans
Wynkyn de Worde Editions

         

The whole book
1496	folio	STC 3309
Quartos of the whole book
[c. 1515]	Bodleian Rawl. 4°.598 (8)	STC 3317 [1515]
[c. 1518]	Schwerdt	quarto	Not in STC

               

Separate quartos from the whole book
[c. 1526-1530]	Cambridge University Library Sel.5.57	STC 3318 [1530?]
	Treatise of Hunting
[c. 1532-1534]	Morgan 20894	STC 24243 with date [1535?]
	Treatise of Fishing
Proposed quartos
[c. 1504-1506]	Huntington 59359	Not in STC
	Treatise on the Horse

Notes