Royston was a prolific bookseller and publisher in the seventeenth-century. Over a long career in the trade, he published over 800 books, including the works of notable writers such as John Donne and Thomas Heywood. He served his apprenticeship from 1617 to 1627, initially to Josias Harrison before being turned over to John Grismond. Royston was a staunch royalist throughout the Civil Wars and Interregnum and was periodically imprisoned for publishing pamphlets critical of parliament. His loyalty was rewarded after the Restoration when the King granted him the monopoly for the works of Charles I. Moreover, it was the King’s intervention that saw Royston admitted to the Company Court of Assistants in 1663. To reflect his elevation in the Company, Royston was also admitted to the livery around this time. He proved a problematic figure for the Stationers’ Company, and was often reprimanded for infringing Company printing rights, and others’ copies. Royston enjoyed the affluent post of stationer to the court of Charles II.
The famous author loved letters from an early age and so, when his limited schooling meant he must choose a trade to learn, he decided to train as a printer. Richardson was apprenticed to the printer John Wilde in 1706 and freed of the Stationers’ Company in 1715. He initially stayed on with Wilde as a compositor and corrector until his former master’s death in 1720. Ricardson married Wilde’s daughter, Martha, the following year. Martha, however, died young, and Richardson married another printer’s daughter, Elizabeth Leake, in 1733. Both the Wildes and Leakes proved useful business partners to Richardson. In 1722 he was elected a liveryman of the Stationers’ Company and throughout the 1730s, Richardson was largely engaged with the printing of periodicals, journals, and newspapers. In 1742, he was awarded the contract to print the Journals of the House of Commons. It was while composing the commissioned Letters Written to and for Particular Friends, on the most Important Occasions (1741) that Richardson drafted Pamela (1740). Richardson’s first novel was a commercial success, though critical reception was mixed and a great rivalry commenced with Henry Fielding. Two more novels followed, Clarissa (1748) and Sir Charles Grandison (1753). In his later years, Richardson became especially active within the Stationers’ Company, serving as Upper-warden (1753-1754) and Master (1754-1755) in successive years. He died a wealthy man in 1761 and his novels went on to inspire the likes of Jane Austen, Honoré de Balzac, and Anna Laetitia Barbauld.
John Playford was one of the most important publishers of music in the seventeenth century. He was born in Norwich and served seven years as apprentice to London stationer John Benson 1640-1647. Playford quickly specialised in music publications and established a bookshop by Temple Church. He took the livery in 1661, and it is from that year we find him supplying the Chapel Royal. Playford continued to enjoy royal favour, and it was the King’s influence which saw him elected to the Court of Assistants in 1681. Playford held shares in the English Stock from 1675. He was a close friend of the age’s finest musicians, including John Blow and Henry Purcell, the latter of whom composed an elegy for Playford on his death. He is buried in Temple Church.
Norton served his apprenticeship to his uncle, the London bookseller, William Norton from 1578 to 1586. From 1587, Norton was often found in Edinburgh, where he was importing books from Germany, especially after having secured a license to import books duty free into Scotland in 1589. The Scottish business weakened, however, after losing legal cases against other Edinburgh booksellers and Norton sold the business off entirely in 1596. Meanwhile in London, his first publication was a tract by Beza in 1590. Some of Norton’s more notable later publications included John Gerard’s Herbal (1597) and James I & VI’s Basilicon Doron (1603). John Bill was bound as an apprentice to Norton in 1592 and would go on to become his lifelong business partner, often travelling to continental Europe as Norton’s agent. In 1605, Norton, Bill and Norton’s cousin, Bonham Norton, formed an official publishing partnership under the imprint Officina Nortoniana. As a member of the Stationers’ Company, Norton was elected to the livery in 1598. He rose through the ranks of the Company after being elected an Assistant in 1602, serving as Upper-warden and Master for terms apiece. By the time of his death in 1612, Norton was an incredibly wealthy bookseller and left £1000 to the Company in his will.
Newcomb was born in Dunchurch, Warwickshire. He was bound to the printer Gregory Dexter on 8 November 1641 and freed by Dexter and Richard Cotes after serving seven years apprenticeship. After attaining the freedom of the Company, Newcomb married the widow Ruth Raworth and succeeded to her deceased husband’s business on Thames Street. He was elected to the livery in 1653. After the Restoration, and despite printing extensive Commonwealth literature during the Interregnum, Newcomb was appointed to manage the King’s Printing House. His print output included such notable texts as the first printed English translation of a work by Descartes, A Discourse of a Method (1649), but Newcomb was known predominantly for his printing of newsbooks and periodicals. Newcomb printed, for example, Mercurius Politicus (1651-1660), the Public Intelligencer (1655-1660), Mercurius Publicus (1656-1660), the Parliamentary Intelligencer (1656-1660), and the London Gazette (1665-1688). The Fire of London forced him to relocate to the Savoy in 1666. In 1675, he was elected to the Stationer Court of Assistants and in 1677 Newcomb was formally recognised as King’s Printer. He died on 26 December 1681, and his body was laid in state in Stationers’ Hall before being taken to Dunchurch for burial.
From 1730, Newbery was working as a journeyman for the printer William Carnan in Reading. Upon Carnan’s death, Newbery took over the running of the Reading Mercury and married Carnan’s widow, Mary. The family moved to London in 1744. Newbery became an important early publisher of works for children. He was an innovative and intelligent businessman, issuing the first children’s periodical and the first children’s encyclopaedia, advertising widely, offering discounts to teachers buying in bulk, and publishing other bestsellers, from the annual Ladies Complete Pocket-Book to works by Samuel Richardson and Oliver Goldsmith. From 1751, Newbery also published the works of poet Christopher Smart, a bond strengthened when his stepdaughter Anna Maria Carnan married Smart in 1752. He died a wealthy man in 1767 and was succeeded in business by his son, Francis Newbery. In recognition of Newbery’s contribution to children’s literature, the Newbery medal, introduced in 1922 in the United States, is awarded every year to an outstanding book for children.
Christopher Meredith was a bookseller, specialising in theological books, who served as an Assistant of the Stationers’ Company from 1645 to his death in 1653.Born in Kempsey, Worcester, Meredith was apprenticed to stationer John Piper in 1616. Upon attaining the freedom in 1624, Meredith steadily rose through the ranks of the Stationers’ Company. He was clothed in 1631, and served as Renter Warden 1642-1644. Upon his death, Meredith left his two houses in St Paul’s Churchyard (the Crane and the Marigold) to the Company as well as a substantial charitable bequest to support poor men of the Company and gift Bibles and schoolbooks to the poor boys of Kempsey School and Christ’s Hospital.
See TSC/G/03/Meredith for more on the conditions of Meredith's bequest.
Mearne was born in Reading in 1624, served Robert Bates as an apprentice 1637-1646, and had set up his own book bindery in Little Britain by 1653. Upon the Restoration, Mearne was appointed Bookbinder to the King and enjoyed royal favour for the remainder of his life. In 1668, Charles II intervened to see Mearne appointed to the Company’s Court of Assistants. In 1675 Mearne’s position as Binder to the King was expanded to the life-long offices of Bookbinder, Bookseller, and Stationer to the King, which he held with his son Charles. At the same time, Mearne consolidated his influence in the Stationers’ Company, serving as under-warden for two terms (1672-1674), upper-warden (1676-1677), and finally Maser of the Company (1679-1680, 1682-1683). He was particularly known in both the Company and to the King for being involved in searches for illicit printing activity. Mearne remains famous in the book trade to this day for his elaborate and highly desirable bindings. He is credited with creating the “cottage style”, often found in red and black leather.
After the death of her husband, printer David Mallet, in 1683, Elizabeth became the operator of their two printing presses in Black Horse Alley, near Fleet Bridge. She specialised in lurid and sensational tracts, registering a great number of such works with the Stationers’ Company. Mallet also produced serial publications, such as The New State of Europe, and, most famously, the first ten issues of the Daily Courant, the first daily newspaper in Britain.
L’Estrange was born into landed gentry in Norfolk in 1616. He proceeded to Sidney Sussex College (1634) and thereafter Gray’s Inn (1637). Having fought on the Royalist side in the English Civil War, L'Estrange was arrested by the Commonwealth in 1644 and sentenced to death. This sentence was commuted to imprisonment in Newgate, from where he absconded in 1648. Following his involvement in the abortive Kentish uprising of May that year, he fled to Holland. In August 1653 he took advantage of an amnesty offered by Cromwell and returned to England. Cromwell's death in 1658 allowed L'Estrange to establish himself as a political pamphleteer for the Royalist cause. The Stuart Restoration of 1660 brought increased surveillance of the press, in the form of the 1662 Licensing Act, and in 1663 L'Estrange was appointed Royal Surveyor and Licenser. When the Act lapsed in 1679, he returned to political journalism. The changing political climate prompted him to flee England again that year, first for Edinburgh and then for the Hague. He returned in 1681, at a time when the Stuart dynasty was enjoying a brief respite from Whig opposition. L’Estrange experienced renewed royal favour under James II and was elected MP for Winchester and knighted in 1685. However, after the revolution of 1688, he was removed from government service, and his last years were blighted by poverty and failing health.
Hills came to prominence as a printer for the New Model Army at Oxford. At the request of Lieutenant-General Charles Fleetwood, he was made free of the Stationers' Company, and in 1655 he secured privileges to print English bibles and psalters, previously held by the king's printers and the Stationers' Company respectively. Although briefly imprisoned after the Stuart Restoration of 1660, by 1677 he had regained sufficient official favour to be appointed one of the king's printers alongside Thomas Newcombe. In 1678 he was elected to the Court (executive body) of the Stationers' Company. Hills reached the peak of his success and influence under James II. His conversion to Catholicism and loyalty to the King saw him rewarded with the new position of printer to the royal household and chapel. It was with James’s favour that Hills survived the purges of the livery companies in 1687 and rose to hold the highest Company office of Master. However, the deposition of the Stuarts in the 'Glorious Revolution' of 1688 heralded a reversal of fortune for Hills, who fled to St Omer in December 1688, leaving his premises to be raided and destroyed by an anti-Catholic mob.
Hayward was an English artist, known especially for his stained glass work. He was a fellow of the British Society of Master Glass Painters. Hayward's stained glass windows can be found across England, from churches in London to university colleges. Particularly notable examples of Hayward's work include windows at Sherborne Abbey and Norwich Cathedral, as well as sculpture and murals at Blackburn Cathedral.
The founder of Guy’s Hospital was by trade a bookseller. Age eight, Guy’s father died, and the family moved to his mother’s hometown of Tamworth. Here, Guy was likely educated at Tamworth Grammar School until, in 1660, he was apprenticed to London bookseller John Clarke. Guy was freed of the Stationers’ Company in 1668 and made a freeman of the City of London. In 1673, he was admitted to the livery of the Company. His early career was defined by a defiance of Company patents. He was found importing Dutch Bibles and in 1679, Guy and fellow bookseller Peter Parker were selected by John Fell, Bishop of Oxford, to set up a press for the university and produce Bibles. A long legal battle ensued between Guy, Parker and the university and the Stationers’ Company. However, in 1691 the Company were triumphant, having removed Guy and Parker from their Oxford contract. Nonetheless, Guy was a highly successful bookseller and businessman, aided by successful investments in the South Sea Company. He turned his wealth to philanthropy, particularly aiding his childhood home of Tamworth. Here, he founded an alms house with a library, donated to the grammar school, and workhouses. Guy served as MP for Tamworth 1695-1708. In 1704, he became a governor of St Thomas’s Hospital and in 1721 bought land to build a new hospital in London, which would become Guy’s Hospital. Thomas Guy died in 1724. His remains were later interred in the crypt at Guy’s Hospital.
Field was born in Stratford upon Avon. He was apprenticed to George Bishop in 1579 but spent the majority of his apprenticeship serving the Huguenot printer, Thomas Vautrollier. Field was freed by Bishop in 1587. He hired the now deceased Vautrollier’s widow, Jacqueline to print his first publication. Field and Vautrollier soon wed and through this union Field inherited the substantial business of the Vautrolliers and its courtly contacts. Field printed the works of Sir John Harrington, Sir Philip Sidney, George Puttenham, and Edmund Spenser, and secured the rights to King James’s Poeticall Exercises. Yet the most famous author associated with Field is none other than William Shakespeare. Field published Shakespeare’s first printed work, Venus and Adonis (1593) and printed its following three editions as well as The Rape of Lucrece (1593). He was a respected member of the Stationers’ Company, elected first to the livery in 1598 and then the Court of Assistants in 1604. Field served as Upper-warden in 1613 and was elected Master twice, in 1619 and 1622. His former apprentice George Miller inherited the business after Field’s death.
John Day was a leading member of the Elizabethan book trade. His early years remain obscure, but he was printing in London from 1546. Working in partnership with William Seres, Day seized upon the opportunities presented by the accession of Edward VI. With the regulations against Protestant and evangelical works removed, Day and Seres published authors including John Hooper, Hugh Latimer, and John Calvin. In 1550, Day dissolved his partnership with Seres and transferred from the Stringers’ Company to the Stationers’ Company. In 1553, he secured the patent to publish works by Thomas Becon and John Ponet. The reign of Mary proved challenging for the evangelical printer and he was briefly imprisoned in 1554, but Elizabeth’s accession saw him restored to prominence. Under Elizabeth, Day collected major printing patents so that he controlled the publication of some of the period’s most lucrative works, including the ABC with Little Catechism and English psalter. His most ambitious and significant publication was John Foxe’s Book of Martyrs. Day’s success and ever-growing monopolies of lucrative books did not make him a popular figure in the trade. In 1573, there was an attempt on his life and in 1584 he was forced to hand the rights to thirty books to the Stationers’ Company. He died whilst travelling to visit his wife’s family in Suffolk, leaving a hefty and complex inheritance for his son, Richard Day, who inherited his business.