Franz Dingelstedt - John Gutenberg, First Master Printer

A wedding! how much joy is contained in that word! but even more in the thing itself! You, however, who live in these days, can hardly form an idea of what a wedding was in the good old times, for you possess only the shadow, and even that is of the palest hue. Guests, among whom the husband and the minister appear dressed in black from head to foot, a large room furnished in the modern style, a very prosaic square table, on which, after the marriage contract is signed, the repast is served up, the whole accompanied with the stalest and most common-place compliments, the coldest ceremonies… No, no! a fig for your modern weddings!

Reader, you ought to have found yourself at the appointed hour at the great St. Humbert at Maïence, in the street now called La Rue des Savetiers, and which then bore the name of St. Quentin, for that which I relate to you happened in the year of our Lord fourteen hundred and sixty-one, before Maïence became a federal fortress. That was indeed a wedding in the true sense of the word! A grand, a noble wedding! At the moment when the clock struck twelve, the procession, attired in most superb garments, came out of the church of St. Quentin, and, having turned the corner of the Rue des Savetiers, took the road to the house of the great St. Humbert. All along the route it was accompanied by the joyous acclamations of the crowd; citizens, their wives and daughters, opened their small casements, and put out their heads to gaze, and the little boys in the street maliciously ran behind the wedding guests, trying to jeer and to mock at the bridegroom, as is still the custom in these days – one, indeed, of the only customs left us of olden times.

The sun shed his brightest and warmest rays on the house of the great St. Humbert, for it was on the 14th day of August that Christine Fust, the worthy daughter of the printer John Fust, espoused her father’s partner, Peter Schoeffer of Gernsheim. On that day, too, the house of the printer was open to all comers; those presses, generally so black and so mysterious, were now crowned with flowers; the screws, the levers, the timber, groaned no longer under the brawny arms of the workman, and the paper and parchment remained neglected in a corner. All the inmates were gone to the church of St. Quentin to be present at the marriage; the workmen, dressed in their finest clothes, stood ranged in a goodly group around their chief, who held firmly aloft the banner of the Corporation, ornamented with the Imperial Eagle. The Burgomaster himself, Jacob Fust, a master goldsmith, brother of the printer, and rich beyond belief, had come in person to do honour to the wedding of his niece. And how can we find fault with the father of the bride, who walked proudly at the head of the band, arm-in-arm with his brother the grandee and the renowned goldsmith, if he cast now and then on the assembled crowd looks in which disdain was somewhat mingled. It is true that he smiled more benignly at the windows from whence certain silvery voices were heard to cry out as he passed, “We wish you much happiness, Master Fust!” Or again, “May peace and a blessing rest on the house of the printer!”

To speak truly, it must be confessed that the couple who had just been united were not in their first youth, and if the bridegroom had nothing in common with Adonis or Apollo, the bride on her side was far from representing that type of beauty which the ancients have bequeathed to us, and which may still be seen in the gallery of the Medici. Let not this surprise you, reader! Peter Schoeffer in 1449 was already renowned in the Academy of Paris for his skill in caligraphy; he had even then rendered great services to Master Fust, who chose him for his son-in-law; so you perceive that at the time of which we are speaking there was no longer any question of youth or sprightliness for Schoeffer. Christine, on her part, had no doubt chosen her husband for his moral qualities; she had declared herself ready to bestow her hand on the homeless stranger on the day on which he, who was then only her father’s workman, should lay at her feet, reposing on a velvet cushion, a copy of the admirable Psalter of the year 1457. Yes, it was not until then that Christine consented to surrender her hand to that of Schoeffer – to that hand which had designed the initials of the Psalter, which had illuminated them in such brilliant colours, and had arranged the beautiful types, the ink of which, it is maliciously said, still clung to his fingers more or less.

The betrothal dated from the year 1457; but, as the father had insisted on proving the character and the talent of his workman, he had made it a condition that the two volumes of the great Latin Bible should be completed before the fulfilment of the marriage. On St. John’s day, 1462, the finishing touch was put to the work. Peter Schoeffer wrote upon the last page to the effect that the task was ended; he printed his father-in-law’s arms alongside, and on the following 14th of August the book was exposed to the public, at the same time that the marriage was announced; John Fust slyly remarking that he brought on that day two treasures to light, the one conjointly with Schoeffer, the other he generously made over to him.

To the two treasures were allotted their separate place of honour. Christine dazzled the eyes of the public, robed in rich crimson velvet, such as was seldom worn in those days by citizens’ daughters. Her little white wreath was attached to her hair by a string of Venetian pearls, presented on that very morning by her uncle the Burgomaster, and it must be allowed the pearls became her well. The Bible, on its part, had its silver clasps well rubbed and polished, and, being placed on a table, it shone, to the edification and admiration of all beholders.

If at the end of the table where the Burgomaster presided, dividing the wedding guests on his right and left, there reigned a certain degree of solemnity, it was made up for at the lower end, round the long board prepared for the workmen, where the most noisy and expansive gaiety prevailed. That patriarchal custom which required that the head of the family, after having tasted of a dish, should join in a prayer with all the guests, that custom, at the time of which we speak, had even in the richest families fallen into disuse, only when, as on the present occasion, a dignitary happened to be at table, a special gravity was observed, and a great decorum maintained. “Noblesse oblige,” says the proverb, so we must not be surprised if the Burgomaster, instead of taking part in the joyous hilarity of his relatives, and especially of his workmen, looked around him with anxious and pensive eyes. The cares of government clouded his countenance, and occasionally wrinkled his fine lofty brow.

In truth, alarming days were hovering over the good city of Maïence. Two crosiers were clashing rudely for precedence, both being competitors for the Archi-episcopal throne; and, as generally happens in such conflicts, the blows fell less heavily, and in less number, on the backs of the actual combatants than on those of the victims who were the objects of contest. A year previously the Archbishop Dietrich d’Isembourg had been deprived of his see for failing in proper respect towards his spiritual pastor, and Adolfe of Nassau, appointed Archbishop in his room, was preparing seriously, arms in hand, to expel a predecessor who seemed far from disposed to yield his post with a good grace. All the Rhine country, the Palatinate, Bavaria, Würtemberg, and even Brandenberg itself, had taken part in the quarrel, for one side or the other; in the city of Maïence Dietrich d’Isembourg reckoned partisans who were still holding office side by side with those who secretly favoured the new order of things, and rivals and enemies met together full of an animosity which they took but little pains to dissimulate.