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I. The Printer of Section 1
In the Beaumont and Fletcher Folio of 1647, Section 1, in fours collating B-K4 L2 and containing The Mad Lover, The Spanish Curate, and The Little French Lawyer, and Quire b, four leaves in the preliminary section containing commendatory poems, were printed by Thomas Warren senior. His identification depends primarily upon a block which appears in the Folio on sigs. E1 and b2v as well as in A collection of all the publicke Orders Ordinances and Declarations of both Houses of Parliament . . . by T. W. for Ed: Husband, 1646 and in Dugdale's History of St Paul's Cathedral . . . Printed by Tho. Warren, MDCLVIII; in addition, two ornamental initials from Section 1 are found in books printed by T. W. in 1649 and 1651.[1]
Warren had been granted his freedom on 2 April 1638 and had registered his first book for publication on 1 August of the same year, having set up as a stationer in partnership with Joshua Kirton. [2] Over the next seven years his name appeared as bookseller of some twenty items, but in 1645 twenty-two titles appeared as printed by T. W., fifteen of which issued Parliamentary ordinances for Edward Husband, who styled himself Printer to the House of Commons.[3] T. W., as the
Wing A 10, C 1214, E 3443, F 2355, G 488, H 3808, and S 6126 (Aglaura only)
1647
Wing A 1391, B 1071, E 1180, F 461, G 254, H 3096, M 355, S 2355, and S 5198.
I have seen five of them. Three (A 10, C 1214, and F 461) are of modest size, but one (H 3808) is a folio in fours running to 943 pages of text and a 24-page appendix. Its manufacture may have begun soon after it was ordered printed by Parliament on 5 August 1644, but, as it concludes with an ordinance of 17 November 1646, it apparently was in press along with Section 1.[5] The book is printed in a variety of founts, including, I believe, the Folio fount. Warren's work on Aglaura (S 6126) is a subject to which we shall return.
There is no evidence to indicate how many presses Warren operated or how many workmen he usually employed, but at the time of his engagement on Section 1 he clearly was equipped to undertake printing jobs of substantial size. The fact that at least one of his books evidently was produced over a period of some two years, during which other works bearing his imprint were published, is indication enough that he did not throw all the resources of his shop into the manufacture of one book, completing it before commencing another. None of
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