Chapter Ten

on fakes and facsimiles

THE subject of faked copies of early books is one which may be at times of great importance to an editor, and it seems therefore necessary to say something about them here, although it may with some reason be argued that it is really the duty of a librarian to discover the fakes in the library under his charge and to warn readers against them ; not of the readers to discover them for themselves. It is indeed, as a rule, only a person familiar with large numbers of early printed books who will readily detect a good fake, and he will do it more by a sort of instinct than by any knowledge that can be formulated. It is thus very difficult to say anything about them which will be of much use to those for whom these pages are primarily intended, and some general warnings must suffice.

Fakes are of many kinds. There are in the first place complete reprints of early books which appear to be original editions. There must surely be very few of these, for it is difficult to see how it can have paid any one to attempt such a deception ; but there is one notorious example, namely an edition of the play Soliman and Perseda, purporting to have been printed by E. Allde for E. White in 1599, but actually printed about 1815.¹ I believe that nothing is known of the circumstances in which it was printed, whether it was intended to be passed off as an original edition, or whether it was merely an honest ‘facsimile reprint’. When once it is suspected, it is easy to see that it is not a genuine sixteenth-century print ; the type is too regular and the paper is evidently of much later date ; but it has deceived very competent scholars in the past and will in all probability deceive others whenever it turns up in circumstances which prevent it from being placed side by side with a genuine old edition.

I know of no other English book of the period that has been completely reprinted in such a way that it could be taken for an original by any one with an elementary knowledge of early work,¹ but it is quite possible that the Soliman and Perseda does not stand alone, and any ‘original’ of suspiciously modern appearance, either in type, ornaments, or workmanship, should be carefully scrutinized with this example in mind.

The most numerous class of faked copies consists of those which, having been at one time imperfect, have been ‘perfected’ by the insertion of leaves or of parts of leaves, either in facsimile or from another genuine copy—sometimes, unfortunately, from another edition.

When such insertion takes the form of an honest and unconcealed facsimile from another copy of the same edition, it is a clear gain, for none but the most uncompromising of bibliographical purists would prefer an imperfect copy of a book to one so made-up. When such facsimiles are photographic, they may often serve an editor as well as originals, provided of course that he is certain that they are taken from the correct edition. It is indeed only when there is a question of variant readings in different copies that difficulties will arise. A genuine leaf from another copy of the same edition is of course, in all save this matter of variants, as good for editorial purposes as the original one.

It is, however, quite a different affair when a leaf has been inserted from another edition, and it is the possibility of this which makes it so important to examine all inserted leaves with the utmost care. I need hardly say that I am not referring to the cruder sort of made-up copies that one often finds in the second-hand market.¹ Many of these are made up of editions which, though usually corresponding page for page, are so obviously different that they would not deceive a child. There were, however, a number of books which passed through two or more editions identical in general appearance and in signatures, and the insertion of a leaf or two from one of these into another may be exceedingly difficult to detect.²

The best guide in discovering inserted leaves, whether in facsimile or genuine old ones from other copies, is generally the paper. In a facsimile the paper seldom corresponds exactly with that of the other leaves, save in the rare cases in which a blank leaf from the book itself has been used. In a genuine old leaf the paper may be identical in quality, and so far as this is concerned our only guide may be that want of proper correspondence in chain-lines, watermarks, & c., which, as we have already seen, may aid us in the detection of cancels.

In the case of fakes we have, however, as a rule, far better means of detection than we had in the case of cancels. Cancels have generally been in their place in the book from the date of the original binding, but facsimiles or leaves from other copies have been inserted in modern times, since the book came to possess a certain value. Now a book that requires to be perfected has of necessity been subject at some time or other to neglect or ill-usage. In nine cases out of ten it has suffered from damp or from the ravages of insects, and it is likely to have suffered most in those parts which have to be made good. Any reasonably competent faker who inserts a leaf into a book will of course take care that if there happen to be worm-holes in the adjacent leaves there shall be holes to correspond in the inserted leaf, for this is a simple matter ; but if the inserted leaf is one from another old copy, or a facsimile on old paper, there may be worm-holes in that. In such cases an attempt is generally made to fill them up, but it is very difficult to do this well and they may usually be detected on careful examination, especially if the leaf be held up to the light.

Best of all, however, is the evidence to be derived from water-stains, rust-spots, and dirt-marks. Water-stains generally go through a number of leaves, or through the entire book, often increasing so regularly in size and intensity to a maximum at the point where the damp has entered, that if the leaves of the book were loose they could be rearranged in almost perfect sequence by the stain alone. If then, in a part of the book which is water-stained, we come across a leaf in which the stains (if any) do not correspond with those on the adjacent leaves, we may be quite sure that that leaf is in some way or other a fake. The correct imitation of a stain is fortunately a task that seems to puzzle even the most expert fakers, though no doubt it can be done. Rust or grease-spots and dirt-marks of various kinds will often run through several leaves and may afford us useful evidence of a similar kind.

The books in which faking is most difficult to detect are those which have been taken to pieces, washed, mended, and re-bound. Washing, especially if followed, as usual, by re-sizing, so alters the appearance of the paper and print, that it may be most difficult to tell what is genuine and what is not. In general, then, a washed book should be regarded with even more than usual suspicion.

Sometimes only part of a leaf is in facsimile. There may have been a hole in it or a corner may have been lost. Some of these patchings are very well done and when they are small are sometimes by no means easily noticed. The edges of the paper at the join are pared thin and attached by a minute quantity of gum, so that on the surface it may be impossible to see that there is any join at all. In most cases, however, this may be perceived as a darker line in the paper on holding the leaf up to the light.

Facsimiles can as a rule be more easily detected by such incidental evidence as that of the paper, the stains, &c., than by an examination of the letterpress itself.¹ Forgers are as a rule people of considerable skill, and though one may perceive that a page of brush- or pen-work does not look exactly like a page of print, it is generally hard to say wherein the difference lies. Pen-work may sometimes be detected on examination with a high-power magnifying glass, as the edges of the letters tend to be too even and to be free from the minute angular indentations, caused apparently by the fibrous nature of the paper, which are usually to be seen in print. There is, however, some facsimile work which it is extremely difficult to detect at all.

Lastly there is one peculiar kind of fake to which reference must be made here, though one hopes that it is rare. That, namely, in which what purports to be a facsimile is not a facsimile at all, but the mere invention of the man who made it. Such are those unique copies of books wanting title-pages which have been provided with a title-pages ‘in facsimile’. At first sight one is of course tempted to suppose that there are other copies in existence, though at present unknown, and that the ‘facsimile’ has been made from one of these, but in some instances it seems that this is not so. We must remember that the invention of a title-page from the half-title, head-line, and colophon, if there is one, together perhaps with the entry in the Stationers’ Register or an early mention of the book is by no means a difficult task.

Such a fake-facsimile occurs in a copy at the British Museum (C.57, b.43) of an entertainment to Queen Elizabeth at Woodstock, in 1575. To this is prefixed a title-page, ‘ The Queenes Maiesties Entertainement at Woodstock [ornament] At London, Printed for Thomas Cadman. 1585.’ The title at first sight appears to be in facsimile, but its arrangement and general appearance are suspicious, and when we find that the wording is made up from the head-line and the colophon (the imprint, even to the full stop after the printer’s name, being derived from the latter, from which also the ornament is copied), it becomes practically certain that it is false.

An even more dangerous species of fake consists in the insertion into a defective copy of parts apparently in facsimile but really made by transcribing the text of another edition in the type and style of the one to be completed. Thus in an account of the lithographer John Harris, one of the most skilled of (honest) facsimilists, in R. Cowtan’s Memories of the British Museum, p. 335, the author tells us, on Harris’s own authority, that ‘he supplied on one occasion the 97th folio of a rare edition of the “Spanish Chronicle of Don Rinaldu’s ”,¹ where he had no perfect copy to make it from, but parcelled out the words from a later edition of the work’. He was paid, it appears, £12 for the leaf. This is indeed a most insidious kind of fake, and it is fortunate that there have probably been few men sufficiently skilled to engage in such work.

The faking which we have had under consideration has for its object the making good of a defective or damaged copy of a book, but a word must be said as to an even more objectionable procedure which seems to have been much practised in recent times since the cult of collecting first issues of modern authors found so many and such wealthy followers, and which has for its purpose the transformation of an ordinary and comparatively valueless copy of a book into one belonging to a much rarer issue.

There are a number of modern books in which alterations were made after a few copies were bound up ; sometimes the wording of the title-page or the date on it was changed, sometimes a dedication was added or revised, sometimes even alterations were made in the text itself, the original leaf or leaves being suppressed and new ones substituted. These first few copies were in certain cases not intended for sale to the public, but were merely advance copies for the author and the publisher, and should therefore rank rather with proofs than as an actual issue ; but, nevertheless, they are regarded by collectors as the original issue and may command a high price. As the difference between the copies in question and the regular issue is often limited to one or two leaves, and similar type and paper to that used in modern books is generally obtainable with little difficulty, it may be profitable to print in facsimile the leaves characteristic of such ‘first issues’ for insertion into ordinary copies, and these leaves may be almost indistinguishable from the original ones even by the expert. It goes without saying that the fraud can only be worth attempting when there is a considerable demand for the rare issue and when a reasonable number of copies of the commoner one are available for transformation.

Fakes of this sort can sometimes be detected by the existence in them of slight deviations from the original in spelling or in punctuation, but direct comparison with a genuine examplar is frequently necessary. It is sometimes easier to detect a fake after a few years than when it was first made, as paper which at one time matched that of the original perfectly may so change with age as to be quite different from it.

¹ On the back of the title some copies have an imprint (? stamped in) : ‘J. Smeeton, Printer, St. Martin’s Lane.’ In others this imprint has perhaps been erased. The book is a page-for-page reprint of the genuine quarto dated 1599, the ornaments of which have been somewhat roughly reproduced (one being reversed). Smeeton also printed [in 1807?] in apparent facsimile [Luke Shepherd’s?] John Bon and Mast Person, 1548. On a separate leaf there is a note by Richard Forster, from whose copy the reprint was made, and this bears Smeeton’s name and address, but the four leaves of text bear no indication that they are not the original edition, for which indeed they might easily be taken by any one unfamiliar with early printing.

¹We learn from Sir Sidney Lee’s introduction to the Clarendon Press facsimile of the First Folio of Shakespeare that several possessors of the 1807 reprint have mistaken it for an original, in spite of the modern imprints at the back of the title and at the end, and of the date 1806 in the watermark of the paper. Some of the facsimile reprints of the Shelley Society have also, I understand, been mistaken in the same way. There are fraudulent editions of a few early foreign books such as the Letters of Columbus.

¹ There seems to have been a good deal of very clumsy making-up of copies in the early part of last century—to judge at least from the apparent date of bindings.

² Those who wish to get some idea of the extent of this practice of ‘making-up’, and the difficulty of dealing with it, may profitably glance at Francis Fry’s Description of the Great Bible, 1865.

¹ There are several different ways of executing these facsimiles, from direct brush or pen work to photographic methods. Some of the best are, I believe, produced by a process of lithography, but the details are probably a ‘trade secret’.

¹ I must confess my inability to identify the book referred to, unless it is the Libro del noble … cauallero Renaldos de Montaluan (B.J. Gallardo, Biblioteca Española, No. 1074), but it does not seem even to have been called a ‘Crónica’.