Order Nr. 19752 SURREPTITIOUS PRINTING IN ENGLAND, 1550-1640. Denis B. Woodfield.

SURREPTITIOUS PRINTING IN ENGLAND, 1550-1640.

  • New York: The Bibliographical Society of America, 1973.
  • 4to.
  • cloth.
  • ix, 203 pages.

Price: $25.00  other currencies

Order Nr. 19752

This book deals with those books, pamphlets and broadsides in contemporary foreign languages, including French, Italian, Spanish and Dutch, that were surreptitiously printed in England before 1640. Each of the 65 works is discussed in one of the six chapters. Printers and printing historians will also enjoy the reproductions of the titles pages and all 305 printer's ornaments and initials used in every work except for one.
The introduction of this book attempts to present the story of the origins and development of surreptitious printing in foreign vernaculars in chronological form. Woodfield distinguishes between the word "surreptitiously printed" and "secretly printed" to describe these books as not illegal, but having meant to mislead the average reader, English or foreign, into believing that the work had been published in the country in whose language it was printed. A book in a foreign vernacular which was printed for the private order of a customer would also be considered to have been "surreptitiously printed" if it lacks an imprint. Some books may also have been printed because the author or patron decided to subsidize a possibly uneconomic edition. Included is a section on typography as well as a bibliography.