sequently made by Schœffer. The great initials in colors are of the same design as the initials of the Donatuses shown by Fischer, and by him attributed to Gutenberg. The careful manner in which they were engraved indicates experience as well as skill on the part of the engraver; but it is not possible that the engraver was Schœffer, or any workmen attached to his office, for Schœffer never after printed any engravings on wood of equal merit.[1] The sumptuous style of the Psalter is unlike that of any book afterward made by Schœffer; it is in a style which he did not originate, and could not sustain. He reprinted it in 1459, in 1490, and in 1502, but the later editions were not printed so well as the first.[2] The inferiority of the later workmanship is evidence that the master mind who planned the work was not at the head of the printing office.
On the sixth day of October, 1459, Fust published the Rationale Durandi, or the exposition, by Durandus, of the services of the church. It is a folio of 160 leaves, 2 columns to the page, in types on English body, 63 lines to the column. It has many rubricated letters and lines, and ends with a colophon, in red ink, worded like the Psalter of 1457, but with the addition of the words, "clerk of the diocese of Mentz," after the name of Peter Schœffer. The statement in the colophon, that it was made without the writing of a pen, is not entirely true. There are two kinds of copies: one has printed capitals like those of the Psalter, the other has illuminated initials. To provide suitable spaces for these written initials, which are of large size, the types were overrun and re-arranged.
If Schœffer had been an able calligrapher, he would have
- ↑ Fournier thinks that all the letters of the Psalter were cut on wood, De l'origine, etc, de l'imprimerie, p. 231. But Bernard says: "After a careful study of many copies, I declare that this book is certainly printed with types of founded metal, and founded, too, with admirable precision." De l'origine et des débuts, etc., vol. i, p. 224.
- ↑ The last edition of the book, printed by his son, John Schœffer, in 1516, shows the great initial B entirely in red ink. It proves that the letter previously printed in two colors was engraved on one block. It proves also that the original meth-od of painting the letter in two colors had been found expensive and impracticable.
