Open Press 1700-1800

The Influence of the Romain du Roi was evident throughout the eighteenth century and into the nineteenth. 
Influence of calligraphy as a model for letters forms, and with it the association of formats from the influence of manuscripts.

William Caslon (pic)
Upon the first Caslon death in 1766, William Caslon II succeeded to the leadership of the English foundry.
1734 Completed Caslon Typeface Specimen

John Baskerville (pic)
Baskerville’s letters belong to the group called transitional.
One of his special contribution was the development of hot-pressed papers.
1757 Baskerville Typeface Specimen

The Fourniers (pic)
France 1764, Pierre Fournier the youngest published the ‘Manuel typographique’ the first part of which covered subjects of type and type-founding established a scale.

The Didots (pic)
F.A. Didot was a french type-founder/printer, he was comissioned by the king himself to produce a series of French Classics.
1780 he adapted the point system for sizing type system by width.
His two sons carried on the work of the printing plant and the type foundry.

Giambatista Bodoni (pic)
Son of an Italian printer he early experimented with type-cutting
1818, ‘Manuale Typografico’ represent great technical advances, better casting, fitting, better ink and press work.
1798 Bodoni Typeface Specimen

Newspaper in England
New periodicals in England which introduced a significant dimension into journalism: 
The spectators, 1711 (pic) or New England Courant, 1721 (pic),

Thomas Bewick (pic)
Bewick made blocks for several books before he began his association with William Bulmer.
Wood engraving as practiced by Bewick represented a new technique and it played an important role in every kind of illustration printed on letterpress from the end of the 18th century until the successful introduction of photoengraving nearly a century after.

Restricted Press 1600-1700

Scientific Publication
Tuscan physicist/mathmatician/astronomer, Galileo Galilei’s early work:
Le Operazioni del Compasso Geometrico 1606 (pic)

in 1614, the Religious denounced his theories on the motion of the Earth, judging them dangerous and close to heresy.
Galileo’s presentation of heliocentrism as proven fact resulted in the Catholic Church’s prohibiting its advocacy as empirically proven fact, because it was not empirically proven at the time.
Galileo was eventually forced to spent the last years of his life under house arrest on orders of the Roman Inquisition.

Censorship in England
In 1637 the number of print shops and foundries in England had been limited by decree.
In addition to law and decrees that threatened the press, there were great upheavals disasters, from 1642 to 1646 the civil war between the Royalists and the Parliamentarians divided the country.

In the first quarter of the century, the 2 most often printed books in English were 
The King James Version of the Bible (pic) published in 1611
and the first folio of Shakspeare Plays (pic) published in 1623

John Milton’s speech for the Freedom of Press: Areopagitica (pic)
‘A speech of Mr. John Milton for the liberty of unlicensed printing to the Parliament of England’, 1644. Prose polemical against censorship. 
Areopagitica is among history’s most influential philosophical defences for the free expression.

The First Newspapers
the world’s first newspaper, ‘Avisa Relation oder Zeitung’, printed in Germany by Johan Carolus,1609.
17th was a time of serious censorship in England, John Archer’s ‘first coranto’,1621 landed him in jail.

In 1665 the London Gazette (pic) was especially favored for such American circulation. 
In several instances, issues of the Gazette were reprinted in the colonies.
The first american newspaper appeared in September 1690, Publick Occurrences (pic) published in Boston by Benjamin Harris.

The Imprimerie Royale
Romain du Roi Louis XIV, (pic)
Types of the Imprimerie were reserved to the king use only, under stiff penalties.
The master designs for this alphabet were engraved by Louis Simonneau.