From Strassburg to Trent: Bishops, Printing and Liturgical Reform in the Fifteenth Century*
Year: 2011
Type: article
Abstract: In 1879, the director of the Royal Library in Stockholm, Gustaf Klemming, published a major study of medieval Swedish liturgy into which, somewhat unconventionally, he incorporated single leaves of rare incunabula.1 Among these were fragments of the Breviarium Scarense, a liturgical handbook containing the office (or daily prayer cycle) as said by the clergy of the southern Swedish diocese of Skara in the fifteenth century, printed in Nuremberg in April 1498 on the orders of Bishop Brinolf Gerlaksson (r. 1478–1505).2 Its frontispiece depicts Gerlaksson in episcopal regalia, kneeling alongside Mary and St John before the crucified Christ, with a devotional speech bubble emerging from the prelate's mouth (see Plate). In a pastoral letter which served as the book's preface, the bishop addressed the rectors, curates and all other priests of Skara, setting out his reasons for committing the local liturgy to the still relatively new industry of the printing press. On recent episcopal visitations of the diocese, Gerlaksson explained, he had been shocked to find that clerics prayed from inaccurate breviaries and, in order to bring concord to the community's prayer, he had engaged the services of a printing workshop.3 Frontispiece, Breviarium Scarense (Nuremberg, 1498), commissioned by Bishop Brinolf Gerlaksson. Reproduced with permission from Uppsala Universitetsbibliotek. The Skara breviary was not an isolated printing experiment or a Scandinavian anomaly, but rather part of an entire, virtually forgotten, genre of early printed books. Bishop Gerlaksson was not acting alone: between 1478 and 1501, over a hundred editions of Latin liturgical texts were printed on the orders of at least sixty-seven individual bishops for a total of fifty-two different dioceses, as official, reformed, diocesan products. The commissioners of liturgical incunabula included some of Latin Christendom's highest-ranking prelates, among them six cardinals — Jean Rolin (d. 1483) of France, Pedro Mendoza (d. 1495) and Ximenes de Cisneros (d. 1517) of Castile, Melchior von Meckau (d. 1509) of the Empire, John Morton (d. 1500) of England, and Fryderyk Jagiellon (d. 1503) of Poland. Present across late fifteenth-century Latin Christendom, from Linköping to Capua, from Toledo to Kraków, this episcopal printing initiative has passed almost completely below the radar of ecclesiastical and Reformation historians. To date, these episcopally commissioned incunabula have been the subject of only a handful of avowedly local studies, with the result that this class of early printed books has not yet been recognized, far less explored, as the European-wide ecclesiastical phenomenon that it is.4 This is a pity, because although liturgy is sometimes seen as an intimidating and esoteric field, Bishop Gerlaksson's breviary is an exciting book, for at least two reasons. First, the 1498 Skara breviary and its fellows provide evidence that the high clerical elites of the Catholic Church actively and positively engaged with printing in the fifteenth century. In the Reformation period, Martin Luther and John Foxe triumphantly declared the printing press to be the willing handmaiden of Protestantism, a divine scourge against the Catholic Church, claims reinforced by A. G. Dickens in the 1970s.5 Even if Reformation historians now approach such statements with some scepticism, there remains a persistent sense that the religious potential of Gutenberg's press was not fully realized in the fifteenth century.6 In particular, the pre-Reformation Latin church hierarchy is widely regarded as having displayed a hostile and ultimately sterile attitude towards the press. The early printing censorship measures decreed by Archbishop Berthold of Mainz in January 1486, by Pope Innocent VIII in 1487, by Alexander VI in 1501 and by the Fifth Lateran Council in 1515 are often held up as typifying the high clergy's distrust of the new technology.7 Writers such as Eamon Duffy have tried to nuance this picture by implicitly contrasting clerical suspicion with the positive, enthusiastic engagement of a pious laity who avidly, and precociously, consumed early printed books of hours, saints' lives and simple devotional texts.8 Cristina Dondi, Guy-Marie Oury and James Clark have, meanwhile, emphasized the importance of religious orders in providing patronage and premises for early printing presses, but it has not yet been seriously argued that the secular/diocesan Catholic hierarchy engaged with printing in any wholehearted or systematic way before the Counter-Reformation.9 Bishop Gerlaksson's breviary therefore offers an immediate and intriguing corrective to that picture. The Breviarium Scarense is also exciting because in its language, tone, structure and intentions the bishop's book bears a striking resemblance to a very famous sixteenth-century text, the ‘Tridentine’ Breviarium Romanum printed in Rome in 1568 on the orders of Pope Pius V, and to its sister-volume, the Missale Romanum of 1570. These Tridentine publications are celebrated in scholarship as landmark volumes in the history of Christian worship, which at a stroke abolished the plethora of local liturgies which had flourished in the monasteries and dioceses of medieval Europe, imposed the curial rite of Rome on the entire Catholic world, and constituted one of the hallmark reform projects of the Counter-Reformation papacy, part of a trinity of bold policies alongside the Index of and the of the of Catholic reform have to find the or the Tridentine The for has on books published in early sixteenth-century and on the breviary of Gerlaksson's Swedish and the hundred fifteenth-century editions to the of Pius Tridentine liturgies in a new The Skara breviary therefore a of from the immediate to the in the late fifteenth century, Bishop Gerlaksson and other with the printing and and in the new these incunabula the between reform and the Catholic Church in the between and the Council of these episcopally commissioned liturgies have for of the of printing in late medieval In which early printing for a declared that the press the late medieval a which of least in the religious The liturgical books printed for late fifteenth-century bishops that these were in way or to the episcopally commissioned incunabula the that printing the of in in the and the of the ecclesiastical a in the of The is on two of out in the the on diocesan liturgical books commissioned by bishops and printed before January 1501 in incunabula all are the total of a of in rare book in the and the was in these and books to the of printing and and into a late fifteenth-century in which von to the bishop of in — with an which the Reformation as — that printing was to the Catholic is by all to the of which in the of and the Catholic Church, by this and In the Gutenberg's with the press in bishops printed a of of it such as of the texts to the by a were books containing the local the and for In virtually all fifteenth-century Catholic clergy to the the liturgical of the but in the of the diocese and religious orders had individual or of the clergy were to the daily services which up the divine office of and The books printed by bishops from 1478 were texts for this the and bishop also a in the of the an and from which priests and a or a handbook to clerics the liturgical with the new of the printing the of fifteenth-century bishops was therefore not to devotional texts and the for but rather to clergy with of the books which with from the and On the of the printing was by bishops to the and the of the Latin In January von of the of the to a printed liturgical book for his The Breviarium and were printed in by an This was by immediate to the by von of and to the by von of Breviarium was commissioned in this in the the diocesan liturgical from The of and were in by the of and in In the phenomenon also to the dioceses of and in and In the the in the Church, at and also to and among In that episcopally commissioned liturgies also in the of in and in the and in In the meanwhile, an in the Linköping breviary of was by of in Uppsala in and Skara in The episcopally commissioned liturgical book flourished the of the of the editions in the or and Swedish and this the from diocese to diocese, as one as the episcopal printing also in and were and with On the far of this were England, with John single of and, of one of the of in the Catholic world, and in to a of fifteenth-century the for episcopal only by the two breviaries printed for dioceses in the of and The printing of liturgies have had a in who served as or a to a or who were as all in the In Europe, for the liturgies commissioned by or the liturgies with of Fryderyk and of the of implicitly such as of who the late fifteenth on by the the of diocesan the printing of its was also or it was the for bishops to local or to a to up in this the among bishops of or dioceses, such as or a of for episcopal and bishops texts for often across among the who this was who episcopal in his and from the Nuremberg printed liturgies for Swedish and bishops from major included of of and the and The by which episcopal and and with printing and The between the bishop and of and that the the entire of the and of a the and and in the of the but it is such a rare that if it is have only of from incunabula from to liturgical incunabula are on the subject of who the of but the breviary and that the bishop had the The of such therefore episcopally commissioned liturgical book and as containing one or of a of These included of the bishop of the editions his of as a or a in the that the was an episcopal The of an episcopally commissioned liturgy a to setting out the bishop's for a which the of a pastoral letter from the to his clerical Bishop of Skara or of an having These — a and of evidence for this printing phenomenon — to be the of the bishop or a up on his by his but is and a towards the that to liturgical incunabula into a of relatively 1478 not that the in them on of diocesan were commissioned printed liturgy an which flourished in the and its and a of the Church, by who were served by a of now a of the late fifteenth-century Latin to these texts to the and of early printing and a liturgical that a liturgical In the book in are bishops a to that that the of printed books was and an in ecclesiastical Melchior von for in the to his of the he had before that reform of his diocese was by the printing of an These to — has as the the late medieval Church, it is not bishops it as and the the of between the Church on and the with priests and books as a of the if this be prayer for the of the world, and or liturgical and — engaged in the and of on the Church, and the of and of a at a his liturgical and his to by liturgical books were in of and of one of the of these are the of the of and the of the texts for that of diocesan were in an of — von of and of that local books were with to the and that the of local books were was that of 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of the local liturgy had been The by bishops in other to as a handful of any as to liturgical but these the of two very different of the and of liturgical reform In the find who with the of into the diocesan of late medieval Latin liturgy was its of the with which it new and In such a of the new to the diocesan and also The of 1486, for of its the Uppsala and breviary and the of of the In dioceses, by von to local to the of the diocese, the bishop of the In Capua, Bishop that have this and it to its that is the and liturgy of These a that was in a to of the local in a a of liturgical These in in the sixteenth-century over or not be to the reform of Catholic a which to at the Council of the of the reform the of the is only The from a of is had the texts them to be two at all on the printing The breviary that printing the with the breviary that the be completely and of it were by in these was seen to have were the liturgical books that the bishops The be that the books were liturgical books in and were with that these have been medieval or In — and — to almost with the of the in the scholarship on early and for argued in the that of texts had to a total of books in in other to in to the press which meanwhile, that to an of with an of a a of only by Gutenberg's which in is some evidence that bishops were the as a — in and the of that inaccurate the that it is not only which are as liturgical but incunabula The evidence for this in the of the book The episcopally commissioned editions in the in only a part of the in printed liturgical books in the fifteenth alongside a the or diocesan printed 1501, at least diocesan editions were printed by acting on an clergy on a In a of the dioceses in the such printed editions of the had been for clergy to before the of any episcopally In for editions of the local liturgy had been printed by the of Bishop de in the diocesan had been to it by over of such printed books. 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between bishop and book, as the of a liturgical now of a of the bishop's by the of and the Archbishop of and of of of of The episcopally printed book therefore bishops new to on local the printed liturgy was a and of episcopal the late fifteenth-century The very of a single liturgical book for a diocese, now a relatively and by the printing was an of the bishop's over the and his the bishop's over the liturgical and had been and priests and had liturgical books on initiative by on an as from fifteenth-century and The bishop at the of such by to out of texts and or by to to the for This of in in Uppsala and of episcopally commissioned incunabula was In these dioceses, the bishop not only from local the to and but — the of for for the Missale or for the liturgical books were into immediate — the that the of books was a have in Swedish by that some from over two hundred books which as of in which of priests had and who to a in for also that had bishop therefore find that a printed or and emerging as a of an not a for an of his his and the and of the Church, but with the new of the printed book, bishops had the potential to the episcopal and — in other to in a of and the late medieval and Counter-Reformation in the century, the of religious reform be a way of The books printed by episcopal order from 1478 to have been by priests and as or This has on books printed before 1501 — this is the at which the of the incunabula and there is of for books printed in the century. episcopally commissioned liturgies to have had in the and with the genre on the on the of the a of books printed in in the century, the of the with the episcopally commissioned liturgies printed between and for dioceses in the (see such editions between 1501 and in the and two in the with the breviary of a of almost a new printed editions of its commissioned or between and a from 1515 to and this was in all the dioceses by of be to for episcopal as a a by at the of printing it is that such a it be that this by the because fifteenth-century bishops had printed to clergy for of as late as that the of the Missale in the and were still printed by Fryderyk Jagiellon and Bishop in the and early In liturgical printing the Reformation a and to the Latin liturgy from the in and the for the of the episcopally commissioned is that at by Catholic over liturgical reform across Latin in the of the because of very over the liturgy be to an or up to with the an to the to liturgical were the and of this phenomenon by the Reformation and its the printed liturgical book was in a different part of — the In and the Council of the of liturgical was with the of a Latin and breviary the rite of the but by the of the in these had to any that the of liturgical books to the and a by Pius and over by and the of a The Breviarium Romanum — by order of the Council of on the orders of Pope Pius — was printed in Rome by in two by the Missale To any of the fifteenth-century the and of Pope Pius volumes is and The frontispiece of the for depicts Pius kneeling in before the by his a which the of Ximenes de Fryderyk Jagiellon and Bishop von the a and which served as to the 1568 breviary and are very of the episcopal in fifteenth-century In the of the two almost Pius that he was of the of his office and by the and of of the from one had therefore engaged to a new liturgical text, which was to the printing press. from this printed was a of a hundred this Pius single in the Catholic had to the divine office his reformed, printed local were for the new breviary — and six for in and the In to the new breviary and a to the was to of it is very to the clerics the Tridentine printed liturgies — the and and Pius — were the episcopal incunabula as a for the Tridentine and the fifteenth-century as a for the of 1568 and or in and with some the the and and a of the books and the across dioceses the between these two of reformed, printed liturgical books commissioned by Catholic the between these projects to a of on the Tridentine by the of Pius has by to the Breviarium Romanum and the Missale Romanum as from the and as of or the incunabula editions that the Tridentine liturgies in a the reform of printed books for clergy was a and the Catholic hierarchy by the century, if it was one which had into Pius famous books were the of a high with its not in the Rome of the but in the of the in the in not this books of 1568 and be seen as the of fifteenth-century episcopal printing bishops such as de of or of had of liturgical in had been for the be in a different if a of concord in a single diocese was to the between dioceses be an of divine In the that all dioceses in the a single and has from the early for a of liturgical Cristina Dondi, meanwhile, has argued that liturgies printed by the a for a towards a single Catholic liturgical reform in its and up the Catholic reform it also up the hierarchy — from to to to by the in the the of printing official, books had for the ecclesiastical of some of the by liturgical but as the incunabula had had the potential to and the and office of the the Tridentine liturgies the of the — the now commissioned and for liturgical books for Catholic in and elites out to this Counter-Reformation printing as had in late fifteenth-century or — in the the were diocesan bishops who to and the local liturgy by a the very which late medieval had to The history of reformed, printed Catholic liturgies between 1478 and 1568 also to a for the of reform in the century. The fifteenth-century breviaries and were or by Pius and as an avowedly This to or on reform also be in other texts by the Counter-Reformation in this — in Index of which the by the the of the of and and the of and or in the Tridentine by of Bishop and the these early printed liturgies and the which had commissioned them the of a not only the of sixteenth-century bishops in liturgical but in all local of the rite which not an of at least two Pius also a for the of breviaries and printed by and and ultimately of these early printed books in a sense — a up the of the Catholic with printing and reform in the before the and 1568 is for this that Pius Breviarium Romanum is up in on the Brinolf Gerlaksson's 1498 Breviarium Scarense in fragments in and a and of a major late medieval reform In incunabula such as Bishop Gerlaksson's 1498 Skara breviary that — two Gutenberg's in and before the of Martin Luther — bishops printing as a of ecclesiastical engaged printing not because the was a of book to the but in order to in an and printing which the of Catholic liturgy the of was the new which held an in its for it bishops to an of over the and of books in diocese, and as an of as as in the and this was by the Counter-Reformation papacy, in the ‘Tridentine’ Breviarium Romanum and the Missale Romanum von commissioned the printed liturgy for his of in he that the and of the press by the Latin Church was the of liturgical books to priests in of and the almost a on the far of the Luther and the Reformation Pius incunabula in the as part of the of at incunabula in the as part of the of at
Source: Past & Present
DOI: 10.1093/pastj/gtr012
Author: N. Nowakowska
Institution: University of Oxford
Language: English
Subfield: History
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2331892773