Aldis, M.A.
Cambridge: at the University Press 1916
maintained its high standard of workmanship under the
direction of his son-in-law, Jean Moretus; but there was a
falling off in both the output and the importance of the books
sent forth, science and classical works giving place to
ecclesiastical history and books of devotion. The energetic
reign (161041) of Balthasar Moretus, son of Jean, brought a
revival of prestige; but after the death of Balthasar the
second, in 1674, attention was almost entirely confined to
the printing of liturgical books. The business continued to be
carried on by successive members of the family down to
1876, when this stately printing house was acquired by the
city of Antwerp, and, preserved as the Musee-Plantin, it is
one of the most fascinating and instructive extant examples
of an old-world printing office.
with which the name Elzevir is closely identified. The culmination of this fashion was in great measure due to the
enterprise of the Elzevirs, a family who for upwards of a century carried on business in Leyden, Amsterdam, and other
towns. In the Elzevirs we have parted company with the scholar-printers who themselves edited and revised the texts
which they presented to the learned world. We have, instead, intelligent printer publishers, excellent men of business,
anxious to produce books that both textually and typographically should sustain their credit for good work. To secure
correctness they employed scholars to edit their publications and see them through the press.
The origin of the house goes back to 1583, in which year Louis Elzevir, a migrant from Louvain, commenced publishing
in Leyden. But it is from 1626, when Bonaventura Elzevir, a son of the founder, was joined by his nephew Abraham
that the fame of the house really begins. It was then that, having acquired a printing office of their own, they began to
specialize in the issue of the characteristic small volumes, and the period from 1626 to the death of both partners in
1652 is the most notable in the history of the house. Bonaventura and Abraham were succeeded by their sons Jean
and Daniel. In 1655 Daniel migrated to Amsterdam to join his cousin Louis, and the fortuitously celebrated Pastissier
franrois (a mere reprint of a Paris edition of 1653) bears the imprint of these two in that same year. Thenceforth the
Amsterdam house took the leading place, and so continued until the death of Daniel in 1680. In all, some fifteen
members of the family had been engaged in the book trade before the house came to an ignoble end at Leyden in the
hands of the younger Abraham in 1712.
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Printer Book Part 4
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