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A REPUTATION FOR EXCELLENCE
A History of the Edinburgh Printing Industry
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well as those items which the Chepman—Myllar partnership were
authorised to print in their original charter they also printed
many of Dunbar’s and Henryson’s poems including The Flyting
of Dunbar and Kennedy, The Twa Marrit Wemen and the Wedo and The
Gest of Robyn Hode. The jewel of their press and the primary motivation
behind its creation was the Aberdeen Breviary of 1509—10. The
Aberdeen Breviary was written by William Elphinstone, bishop of
that town, and was a two-volume work intended to provide an authentically
Scottish form of service which would replace the then current English
one.
In the confusion and trauma which followed the catastrophe of Flodden,
the newly founded print-ing trade suffered with the rest of the
country. Royal patronage was brought to an end and, after the death
of Andro Myllar c.1511, no printer of note appeared in Edinburgh
until the advent of Thomas Davidson in the late 1520’s. Davidson
was the first printer in Scotland to use Roman type in Strena, a
poem written c.1528 to celebrate the accession of King James V.
and he was also commissioned to print the Acts of Parliament in
1541.
The years leading up to and including the Reformation saw a dramatic
increase in the number of printers and printing material fuelled
by the gathering storm of debate, argument and denunciation. The
degree of confusion arising from these years of secular and religious
intrigue and division can be gauged by the fact that it was felt
necessary in 1552 to enact a law ‘anent prentaris’ which
attempted to regulate the printing of all material by making it
necessary to gain the approval of ‘sum wyse and discreit persounis
depute thairto be the ordinaris quhatsumever’ to guarantee
the orthodoxy of the particular work Failure to do so could lead
to the seizure of goods and banishment. Although these were dangerous
times, a printer could, with sufficient nerve and circumspection,
turn the situation to advantage. John Scot was one such. In 1552
he printed the Catechism of Archbishop Hamilton, and in 1553 the
Acts of Parliament. Immediately after the Reformation he printed
the Reformers’ Confession of Faith but, perhaps inevitably,
became unstuck when, in 1562, he was arrested by the magistrates
of Edinburgh for printing the work of a Catholic priest. He did
not print again until 1568.
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Volume 1, published 1990
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