The printers, stationers and bookbinders of Westminster and London from 1476 to 1535 — Inside the Classic

Evidence from Wills and Colophons

Duff relies heavily on primary documents such as wills, colophons, and type comparisons to reconstruct the careers of early printers. For instance, Wynkyn de Worde's will, dated June 5, 1534, and proved on January 19, 1535, is described as a valuable document never reprinted in full; published abstracts omit important names. The will lists bequests to apprentices, servants, and fellow stationers, including Henry Pepwell, John Gowghe, and Robert Copland, as well as “Nowell the bokebinder in Shoo lane”—identified as Noël Havy, a Frenchman who became a denizen after 1523. Such details illuminate the networks of obligation and craft that sustained the trade.

Production Practices and Shared Work

Duff's analysis of type and colophons reveals that printers often collaborated or subcontracted work. He notes that an edition of the Mirror of Golde (1522) bears de Worde's name in the colophon but was actually printed by John Skot, as type evidence shows. Similarly, several of de Worde's books from this period were produced by Skot. In his final years, de Worde printed books for other people, including his former apprentice John Byddell, for whom he produced two editions of Erasmus' Enchiridion Militis Christiani. This pattern of shared labor and overlapping identities complicates any simple attribution of early printed books.

Shifts in Output and Market Demand

Duff observes that after 1530, most of de Worde's work consisted of reprinting earlier editions, with only about one in twenty books being new. He also notes that Erasmus' works began appearing among de Worde's output—Colloquiorum formulae, De copia verborum, Good manners for children—but that the printer did not produce many editions, despite booksellers' accounts indicating a large demand. This discrepancy suggests that market forces and production capacity did not always align. De Worde's last book, a poem titled The Complaint of the too soon maryed, is noted with dry irony: Duff remarks that de Worde's own marriage had occurred more than 55 years earlier.

Duff's lectures reward readers who attend to the granular evidence of type, colophons, and legal documents. The book's structure—two distinct lecture series bound together—mirrors the historical break it describes. Readers interested in the material conditions of early printing will find a wealth of specific detail, though the work assumes familiarity with bibliography and does not provide a general history of the period.

There’s something tender about leafing through E. Gordon Duff’s old lectures, watching tradesmen’s names surface from wills and colophons—each a small life spent setting type by hand. It reminds me of the quiet diligence in the old newspaper manuals, where precision was a kind of devotion. The Style Book of the Detroit News — Reading Notes carries that same humble, careful spirit. I miss those days, honestly.