История письма и чтения. Асафова Г.К. - 122 стр.

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increasingly harsh. The Inquisition was restored, and it was decreed in 1543 that no

book might be printed or sold without permission from the church. Lists of banned

books were drawn up, and the first general Index Librorum Prohibitorum (Index of

Forbidden Books) was issued in 1559. Dutch printers in particular suffered under

the Inquisition and a number went to the stake for publishing Protestant books. To

avoid such a fate, some resorted to the fake imprint, putting a fictitious printer or

place of publication on the title page, or omitting that information.

Censorship also began to be exercised in varying degrees by individual

rulers, especially in England, where church and state had been united under Henry

VIII after his defection from Rome. The Tudors, with little right under common

law, arrogated to themselves authority to control the press. After about 1525,

endless proclamations were issued against heretical or seditious books. The most

important was that of 1538 against “naughty printed books,” which made it

necessary to secure a license from the Privy Council or other royal nominees for

the printing or distribution of any book in English.

In this attempt at control, an increasingly prominent part came to be played

by the Stationers' Company. Since its formation in 1403 from the old fraternities of

scriveners, limners, bookbinders, and stationers, it had sought to protect its

members and regulate competition. Its first application for a royal charter in 1542

seems to have gone unheeded; but in 1557, an important date in the English book

trade, the interests of the crown (then the Roman Catholic Mary Tudor), which

wanted a ready instrument of control, coincided with those of the company (under

a Roman Catholic first Master), and it was granted a charter that gave it a virtual

monopoly. Thereafter, only those who were members of the company or who

otherwise had special privileges or patents might print matter for sale in the

kingdom. Under the system of royal privileges begun by Henry VIII, a printer was

sometimes given the sole right to print and sell a particular book or class of books

for a specified number of years, to enable him to recoup his outlay. This type of

regulation now came into the hands of the Stationers' Company. After licensing by

the authorities, all books had to be entered in the company's register, on payment