Aldus Pius Manutius Romanus
was born as, Teobaldo Mannuci at Sermoneta, and was born
in Bassiano, Italy in 1450. After studying in Rome and Ferrara,
he moved to Mirandola in 1482.
Alberto Pio, the prince of Carpi, gave Aldus the money to set
up a printing press for the promotion of Greek scholarship, as
well as to teach the Greek classics. It was in Carpi that he conceived
the idea of publishing these manuscripts. He went to Venice in
1489, but did not begin to print until 1494. Venice was the great
repository of Greek manuscripts at that time.In 1490, Aldus founded
the Aldine Press in Venice, assembling a staff of Greek scholars
and compositors, and making Greek the official language of his
business and household.
Aldus
Manutius introduced many innovations into the world of printing.
Aldus wanted to make the contents of classical manuscripts available
to the masses. The format of the earliest books printed in Venice
was usually the Folio or the Quarto. Instances of the Octavo before
Aldus are very rare. Aldus' desire to produce books cheaply led
to the invention of the italic. The most important result of the
italic type and the octavo page was the immediate lowering of
the cost of printing, making it affordable to the public and it
became a great service for travelling scholars.
The
former goldsmith, Francesco Griffi da Bologna, was the
first punchcutter for the Aldine Press and would advance typeface
design beyond simple imitation of hand-drawn characters. Griffo's
most brilliant work was the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili (1499) by
Francisco Colonna. His most famous achievement may have been the
invention of italic type during the years 1500-1501. He cut the
famous italic types, which were supposedly modeled on the handwriting
of Petrarch.
The
fame of the Aldine italic spread throughout Europe rapidly, and
so did the forgeries. In the same year that Aldus issued his Virgil,
a pirated edition appeared in Lyons. Aldus increasingly complained
to the Signoria in Venice about the many forgeries. In Venice
his type was known as Aldino or Venetian; but in Germany and the
Netherlands, it was called cursiv, and in France it was called
Italian or Italic. In addition to the Greek classics, he also
published a whole series of Latin manuscripts. Aldus published
the first known book catalogue in 1498. Listed in his catalogues
are many Italian translations of Latin classics and Italian editions
of Petrarch and Bocaccio.
Aldus
Manutius died February 6, 1515. No rival, nor imitator, ever achieved
the excellence of Aldus Manutius, the Scholar Printer. He was
the last true innovator in the field of type design. As Updike
writes: "With the Aldine Italic, originality of ideas in type
forms ceases."
Research
Sources:
Brigham
Young University Biography on Aldus Manutius
Aldus
Manutius: Scholar printer
Graphion:
Aldus Manutius(1450-1515)
Encyclopedia
Britannica: Biography on Aldus Manutius,The Elder