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Edwin Eliott Willoughby, in The Printing of the First Folio of Shakespeare (1932), first suggested the importance of marginal-rule evidence to group printing sequences (p. 17), to determine the order of sheets (p. 42), and to detect interruptions in the printing process (p. 44). In The Printing and Proof-reading of the First Folio of Shakespeare (1963), Charlton Hinman's detailed analysis of evidence provided by "centre rules" (I, 138-150) and "box-rules" (I,154-171)[1] markedly expanded the usefulness of such evidence beyond Willoughby's original suggestions and remains by far the most thorough treatment of marginal-rule evidence; however, because the Shakespeare Folio rules are a special case, his treatment of marginal-rule evidence should not be generalized without knowledge of its limitations. Furthermore, since his comprehensive description of the Shakespeare Folio printing often utilizes many kinds of significant evidence, it does not emphasize that marginal-rule evidence alone can solve a variety of bibliographical problems or that, in some fairly common circumstances, important problems cannot be solved without such evidence.[2] Using the quarto first edition of John Donne's Biathanatos (1647), I shall discuss some kinds of problems (initial point of composition, priority of different settings of the same sheet, partial-sheet imposition, and order of imposition
Marginal-rule evidence occurs in three forms: (1) changes in the individual marginal rules; (2) changes in the marginal-rule skeleton, the pattern of marginal rules on a single page; and (3) changes in the rule skeleton-forme, the marginal-rule skeletons comprising an entire forme. The changes involve either a change of state or a change of arrangement, with changes of state, such as a break in a rule, the introduction of new rules into a skeleton, or of new skeletons into a skeleton-forme, generally providing the more reliable evidence.
Each skeleton on every page (except sigs. ¶1-¶2v) of the first edition of Biathanatos contains three vertical lines (one edging the text and running list of contents, another edging the other side of the text and running list of contents and separating them from the page number and marginalia, and a third outside the page number and marginalia) plus four horizontal lines (one connecting the tops of the three vertical lines; two 10-12 mm. below this top line: the first, 85-88 mm. long, under the running list of contents and between the two vertical lines edging the text; the second, 17-18 mm. long, underneath the page number and between the two vertical lines which mark the outer edges of the text and marginal material; and one, beneath the signature and connecting the vertical line bottom ends). The compositors had twelve such basic skeletons but nearly always used eight of them in two skeleton-formes. The collation for most copies of the first edition reads: ¶4 (*)2 πA4 [A2 mis-signed g2], A-Z4, Aa-Dd4 Ee2, 120 leaves.[3] The usual arrangement of the contents is: ¶1: [blank]. ¶2: Title [verso blank]. ¶3: Epistle Dedicatory. (*)1: List of Authors Cited. πA1: Table of Contents. C1: 'THE PREFACE.' D1: 'THE FIRST PART.' K2: 'Second Part.' V1: 'The Third Part.' Dd4: 'Conclusion.'
Marginal-rule evidence is ideal for determining where composition began. In the case of Biathanatos, different running-titles on sheets ¶, (*), πA, C, and D make running-title evidence irrelevant, and the different type fonts on sheets ¶, (*), πA, and C eliminate type-face evidence except for a decision between sheets C and D, where the evidence is inconclusive. Furthermore, the assumption that composition from a manuscript would begin with the text would lead to the mistaken inference that composition began at sheet C, where Donne's argument begins with "THE PREFACE Declaring the Reasons, the Purpose, the way, and the end of the AVTHOR."[4]
A change of state in a marginal rule, however, shows that composition began at sheet D with 'THE FIRST PART.' Comparison of the various skeletons on a Hinman collator proves the sig. T1v skeleton to be identical with that on Compositor B's[5] sig. S1v except that the top horizontal rule on sig. T1v has a series of very sharp bends in the first 35 mm. of its left end. Logically, of course, the mere existence of different states does not establish their printing order, and particularly with works possibly composed in a non-alphabetical sequence, great caution should be exercised in drawing conclusions about priority from such evidence;[6] however, in this case, the unbent state of the rule would certainly appear to be the earlier, and it also seems unlikely that composition would begin at sig. T1v in a work set from manuscript. Thus, all pages (and, because the skeletons show up on each sheet, all sheets) with the sig. T1v skeleton were printed after Compositor B composed and printed sig. S1v.[7] Since the sig. T1v
Evidence from marginal rules can solve another problem of compositional order such as the priority of variant settings of the same sheet: in Biathanatos, the order of the two settings of sheet S cannot be determined without such evidence.[8] Changes of state in skeletons and skeleton-formes establish that Compositor A reset Compositor B's setting of sheet S and that he did so after beginning, but before finishing, the composition of sheet T. Examining Compositor A's S setting in DLC copy ND 0332947, we find that he set both formes in a single skeleton-forme,[9] only two rules of which had definitely appeared in previous sheets. These two previously used rules, the top horizontal rule (characterized by a bump in the middle and a hook at the right end) on sigs. S1 and S2 and the longer middle horizontal rule (having a broken bump 17 mm. from its right end) on sigs. S1v and S2v, both occur on Compositor B's sig. S4v. Since this sig. S4v skeleton appears in sheets D-R, it must be the earlier skeleton, and those skeletons on Compositor A's sigs. S1-S2v must have been created from its rules.
Having determined the order of the settings, we can establish when the resetting took place. The fact that the rules on Compositor A's setting of S came from Compositor B's sig. S4v skeleton implies that Compositor A began his resetting after the sheets having Compositor B's setting had been printed. Sheet T, set by Compositor A in all copies, has the same skeleton-forme as Compositor B's sheet S;[10] hence the skeletons used on all previous sheets by Compositor A as well as on sheet S by Compositor B were available to Compositor A when he began to set sheet T—why did he not use these skeletons or skeletons scavenged from them (in addition to the two rules from Compositor B's sig. S4v skeleton), and why did he not continue using two skeleton-formes as usual? The answer to both questions is
The marginal rules, then, on sheets R, S, and T prove that Compositor A's sheet S is the resetting and that he began the resetting after he started composing sheet T and finished the resetting and its printing before he completed composing sheet T. Indeed, since both settings derive from the printer's manuscript, and are therefore not directly related textually, neither the priority of Compositor B's setting nor the time at which Compositor A's resetting occurred could be established without the marginal-rule evidence.
Marginal-rule evidence, as well as running-title evidence,[12] can solve problems involving partial-sheet imposition, particularly whether half-sheets were printed together or separately. For example, collation in a normal copy of Biathantos runs ¶4 (*)2 πA4, A-Z4, Aa-Dd4 Ee2; leaving the bibliographer to determine whether sigs. Ee1-Ee2v and (*)1-(*)2v were printed together on a single sheet or separately as half-sheets.[13] Examination of the skeletons shows that a single quarto skeleton-forme, composed of the skeletons from sigs. Dd4, Dd4v, Dd1, and Dd1v, was used for both formes: the outer forme contained Ee(o) and (*)(i), and the inner, Ee(i) and
Marginal-rule evidence should prove particularly useful in determining the order of composition and printing of preliminary materials: as Hinman says, "Rules, moreover, unlike ornaments and other kinds of typographical materials [excluding type faces] that occasionally provide evidence of order, are ubiquitous" (I, 157);[14] whereas type-font and running-title variation in most preliminaries limit their use in determining order. We have seen that half sheet (*), containing the List of Authors, was printed before the other preliminary matter, so the preliminaries could not have been composed and printed in the order in which they were usually bound. The remaining preliminaries whose order remains to be ascertained include the title page and Epistle Dedicatory (sheet ¶), the Table of Contents (sheets πA, A, B) and 'THE PREFACE' (sheet C). Because these preliminaries do not occupy overlapping sheets, any order of composition would have been possible, and the final determination of order is therefore rather complex, requiring a combined analysis of rules, skeletons, and skeleton-formes.
The skeleton-forme of the outer forme of sheet πA also appears on both formes of sheets A and B; hence the break 38 mm. from the left end in the top horizontal rule in the skeleton on sigs. A1, B1, and B2 proves that sheets A and B were printed after sheet πA. This same skeleton appears on sig. C1 (though the rest of the C outer skeleton-forme differs from the outer skeleton-forme on sheets πA, A, and B) with the top horizontal line unbroken, proving that the outer (and presumably, the inner) forme of sheet C was printed before any of sheet A.[15] Since a πA, C, A, B sequence
Even when running-title and type-face evidence was made useless by the different running-titles and type fonts in each part of the preliminaries, marginal-rule evidence determined the printing sequence for the preliminaries in Biathanatos. Furthermore, the printing sequence strongly suggests that logic or intuition may generally be insufficient to solve such problems: one would not expect that the first sheet of the body of the text (Preface, sigs. C1-4v) would be printed after the last sheet of the body of the text and even after some preliminaries (List of Authors, sigs. (*)1-2v) or that the preliminaries listed first in the collation (title page and Epistle Dedicatory, sigs. ¶2-4v) would be printed simultaneously with or after the preliminaries listed last (Table of Contents, sigs. πA1-4v, A1-B4v).
The previous analyses primarily used evidence from changes of state in rules, skeletons, and skeleton-formes. If one exercises some caution in conjecturing
Evidence from fixed rules and skeletons can, under certain conditions, identify pages or formes in the same printing sequences: sheets in alphabetical sequence having one rule positioned differently than on other sheets in another alphabetical sequence implies that all sheets having one arrangement were printed before or after all those having the other. If, however, either group of sheets is not in an alphabetically continuous sequence, then evidence from changed arrangement is not conclusive: a given arrangement of marginal rules, "X," for some forme, "A," could become a different arrangement, "Y," for forme "B," and still later randomly recur in the original arrangement, "X," in forme "C," causing the unwary bibliographer to place formes A and C in the same sequence. Hinman recognized this possibility, but dismissed it on the basis of his experience with the Shakespeare Folio: "Almost never, moreover, when rules took up new positions in a given forme did they resume exactly their former positions in some later forme. Hence a given arrangement of rules serves to define a group of formes belonging to the same printing sequence: we may ordinarily [he provides two counter-examples] be quite sure, that is, that all the formes showing exactly the same arrangement of their box rules were printed either before or after all the formes that show a different arrangement" (I, 157). "Almost never" is not "never," however, and even in a work with generally fixed rules like the Shakespeare Folio,[18] evidence from changes in arrangement of rules or skeletons needs corroboration conclusively to identify printing sequences. One should always remember that the more evidence of changed rule and skeleton arrangement found in a work believed to have fixed rules and skeletons, the less reliable that evidence is.
Moreover, the rules and skeletons in Biathanatos show that Hinman's affirmation of the reliability of evidence from changes in arrangement should not be generalized to works having partially fixed rules and skeletons. Previous discussion has shown that Compositor B's sheet S, Compositor A's sheet S, and Compositor A's sheet T belong to three separate printing sequences. The fact that the skeleton from Compositor B's sig. S4v appears on Compositor A's sig. T4v, then, proves that identical rule arrangements on pages in works with partially fixed rules and skeletons need not imply membership in a single printing sequence. Indeed, the number of rules and steps involved in Compositor A's tearing down Compositor B's sig. S4v skeleton to construct skeletons for sigs. S1-S2v and then dismantling them to build his sig. T4v skeleton make the odds against identical arrangements in the two skeletons high enough that one could speculate that Compositor A deliberately made his sig. T4v skeleton look like Compositor B's sig. S4v skeleton.
Just as identical arrangements of marginal rules can exist on pages belonging to different printing sequences in a work with partially fixed rules, so can identical arrangements of skeletons in skeleton-formes exist on formes belonging to different printing sequences, as the skeletons on sheets E to S in Biathanatos will show. The skeleton arrangement in the E outer skeleton-forme also appears in the F inner skeleton-forme and that in the E inner skeleton-forme in the outer of F. This skeleton arrangement continues through sheet O, but the skeletons are switched on P, making its arrangement of skeletons and skeleton-formes the same as that in E. The sheet P skeleton rules, however, show extensive deterioration not found in the sheet E rules but traceable in the sheets between E and P; thus E and P cannot belong to the same printing sequence. This sheet P skeleton arrangement continues through R, but when Compositor B began to work on sheet S, he reversed the sheet R skeleton-formes; as a consequence, his setting of S has the same skeleton and skeleton-forme arrangement as sheet O, but, obviously, sheets F-O and Compositor B's sheet S cannot be one printing sequence, and sheets E, P, Q, and R, another. Identical arrangements of rules, skeletons, or skeleton-formes, then, do not conclusively prove that pages, formes, or sheets having the identical arrangements belong to a single printing sequence in works with partially fixed rules, skeletons, and skeleton-formes.
Even though it requires certain precautions, evidence from changes in state or arrangement of marginal rules, skeletons, and skeleton-formes can be extremely useful not only because it may prove helpful or even necessary in solving a variety of problems, but also because it is readily available. Frequently, such evidence is immediately obvious to the unaided eye, but even very slight variations can usually be detected with a Hinman collator. If the analysis involves only a single volume or if the bibliographer cannot gain access to physical copies of necessary volumes, xerox copyflow made
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