Stationers' register

The Stationers' Register is a directory of pamphlets maintained from 1577 to 1924 by the Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers , a City of London- based livery company .

The Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers was a guild of printers and publishersand booksellers, d. H. everyone who was involved in the production and sale of print products in the broader sense had organized themselves. Members who wanted to publish a book or a pamphlet were obliged to have the title entered on the list. With the entry in the register, for which a fee had to be paid per title, the printer or publisher secured the sole right to print for seven years. The printing privilege could be extended to a further seven years if the author was still alive at the time. However, an entry in this register does not mean that the text was actually printed. The author's rights to his book were not protected by the entry in the Stationers' Register. The register represents an early form of copyrightThe literary scholar WW Greg , however, estimates that only 60–70% of all works found their way into the Stationers' Register.

Entry from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream , October 8, 1600

In 1710 the Statute of Anne , also known as the Copyright Act 1709 , came into force, which is considered to be the first modern copyright law. This is the first time that the author's rights to his work were formulated, which had previously been held by the publishers (stationers), as well as the terms of protection for reprints. With the entry into force of the Statute of Anne , the Guild's exclusive right to print was definitively revoked.

The register is an important resource for historians studying the history of printing in England. It is also an important source for English theater from Elizabeth I to the time of Charles I (see Elizabethan Theater ) as, along with reports from the Master of the Revels, it dates the dramas by Christopher Marlowe , William Shakespeare , Ben Jonson and their predecessors and successors.

literature

William P. Williams: Index to the stationers' register, 1640-1708 beeing an index to A Transcript of the Registers of the Worshipful Company of Stationers from 1640-1708 AD Eds. Eyre, Rivington & Plomer (1913-1914). Toronto 1995. ISBN 0-91093885-7

Web links

A transcript of the registers of the company of stationers of London (Vol. 2) Ed .: Columbia University Libraries

Individual evidence

↑ Illustration of a page from the Stationers' Register .
↑ Excerpt from Stanley Wells: A Dictionary of Shakespeare , Oxford University Press , Oxford 1998, ISBN 978-0-19280-064-0
^ WW Greg : Some Aspects and Problems of London Publishing Between 1550 and 1650 , Clarendon Press , Oxford 1956 online in a summary by Maureen Bell
↑ Anno Octavo Annæ Reginae. The Statute of Anne, 1710 facsimile and transcript

[1] Illustration of a page from the Stationers' Register .

[2] Excerpt from Stanley Wells: A Dictionary of Shakespeare , Oxford University Press , Oxford 1998, ISBN 978-0-19280-064-0

[3] WW Greg : Some Aspects and Problems of London Publishing Between 1550 and 1650 , Clarendon Press , Oxford 1956 online in a summary by Maureen Bell

[4] Anno Octavo Annæ Reginae. The Statute of Anne, 1710 facsimile and transcript