The printer's widow: gender, family and editorial choices in early modern Antwerp, Louvain and Douai (long 16th - 17th centuries)

The early modern printing and publishing business was a man’s world. The new technology of the printing press was associated with men’s work, due to considerable start-up costs and associations with skilled work, literacy, and learned men. Why then, did early modern title pages regularly name women-led businesses as their place of production? This dissertation investigates how women participated in the production and sale of rare books and prints and what structures shaped their possibilities to work as typographers. By using insights from the growing historiography on women’s work, I contribute to an ongoing re-examination of male-centred narratives in book history, where women are often only cast as helpmates of master typographers or as absent owners.

The dissertation compares evidence from three towns in the early modern Low Countries: metropolitan Antwerp and the university towns Leuven and Douai. As women were in all probability excluded from wage work in printing houses, women typographers always gained access to the trade through familial ties. Printing houses were family firms which relied on the labour of family members of both sexes. I analyse how gender, family, and institutions shaped women’s economic possibilities in the printing house and how women utilised these options.

The first three chapters analyse the familial context of women’s work from three vantage points: the education and work of (unmarried) daughters, the role of the book trade in printing families’ economic activities and marital choices, and women’s ownership of print-related assets. While women probably did not pull the press, they participated in a wide range of activities in printing houses, ranging from running errands and aiding proof-readers as daughters to managing the workforce and making editorial decisions as widows. The education of printing families’ daughters was geared towards immediate usefulness in the family business and acquiring skills transferable to other types of businesses, such as bookkeeping. These transferable skills were useful in an economy in which most individuals and families combined multiple sources of income. While the cultural status of the book has often led scholars to focus primarily on book production, the evidence from printing families demonstrates that women combined many different economic activities in their day-to-day work routines, which suggests that they could support the publication of higher risk editions by providing for their families in other ways. Similarly, their choice of marital partner was equally more diverse than often acknowledged by book historians, including exogamous marriage partners. The third chapter compares the property rights of widows and daughters. While egalitarian inheritance practices meant that daughters received equal shares in their parents’ estate, printing families were inclined to gear their print specific assets towards sons. In contrast, typographers’ widows often had large claims on the estate, resulting in a stronger bargaining position to negotiate financial structures and work relations with their family members.

Chapters four and five move outside the family firm to investigate the status of widows and their relationships with the institutional landscape of print in the Low Countries. As the historiography on women’s work has demonstrated, the widows’ right to continue their husbands’ workshops reflected a shared framework for women’s participation in artisan production in many craft trades, but the case of the book trades shows that this system expanded beyond guilds to include universities and governments as well. This meant that widow typographers represented their businesses to the outside world and were held responsible for its publications. Evidence from court cases and petitions shows that they knew how to navigate their institutions when needed. Finally, I argue that the framework of the family business meant that the production of women-led businesses often was less influenced by the gender of the owner-manager than by existi

The early modern printing and publishing business was a man’s world. The new technology of the printing press was associated with men’s work, due to considerable start-up costs and associations with skilled work, literacy, and learned men. Why then, did early modern title pages regularly name women-led businesses as their place of production? This dissertation investigates how women participated in the production and sale of rare books and prints and what structures shaped their possibilities to work as typographers. By using insights from the growing historiography on women’s work, I contribute to an ongoing re-examination of male-centred narratives in book history, where women are often only cast as helpmates of master typographers or as absent owners.

The dissertation compares evidence from three towns in the early modern Low Countries: metropolitan Antwerp and the university towns Leuven and Douai. As women were in all probability excluded from wage work in printing houses, women typographers always gained access to the trade through familial ties. Printing houses were family firms which relied on the labour of family members of both sexes. I analyse how gender, family, and institutions shaped women’s economic possibilities in the printing house and how women utilised these options.

The first three chapters analyse the familial context of women’s work from three vantage points: the education and work of (unmarried) daughters, the role of the book trade in printing families’ economic activities and marital choices, and women’s ownership of print-related assets. While women probably did not pull the press, they participated in a wide range of activities in printing houses, ranging from running errands and aiding proof-readers as daughters to managing the workforce and making editorial decisions as widows. The education of printing families’ daughters was geared towards immediate usefulness in the family business and acquiring skills transferable to other types of businesses, such as bookkeeping. These transferable skills were useful in an economy in which most individuals and families combined multiple sources of income. While the cultural status of the book has often led scholars to focus primarily on book production, the evidence from printing families demonstrates that women combined many different economic activities in their day-to-day work routines, which suggests that they could support the publication of higher risk editions by providing for their families in other ways. Similarly, their choice of marital partner was equally more diverse than often acknowledged by book historians, including exogamous marriage partners. The third chapter compares the property rights of widows and daughters. While egalitarian inheritance practices meant that daughters received equal shares in their parents’ estate, printing families were inclined to gear their print specific assets towards sons. In contrast, typographers’ widows often had large claims on the estate, resulting in a stronger bargaining position to negotiate financial structures and work relations with their family members.

Chapters four and five move outside the family firm to investigate the status of widows and their relationships with the institutional landscape of print in the Low Countries. As the historiography on women’s work has demonstrated, the widows’ right to continue their husbands’ workshops reflected a shared framework for women’s participation in artisan production in many craft trades, but the case of the book trades shows that this system expanded beyond guilds to include universities and governments as well. This meant that widow typographers represented their businesses to the outside world and were held responsible for its publications. Evidence from court cases and petitions shows that they knew how to navigate their institutions when needed. Finally, I argue that the framework of the family business meant that the production of women-led businesses often was less influenced by the gender of the owner-manager than by existing publication strategies.

Approaching book history with insights from social and women’s history adds to the historical understanding of book production by taking women seriously as historical actors. This dissertation re-examines the way book historians have commonly viewed subjects such as marriage patterns and collaboration between men and women, and invites scholars to include the actors who were not male master printers into their research. I argue that in an economic system in which printing houses operated as family firms and in which gender ideologies shaped women’s work in the male-dominated business, women’s multifaceted labour was nevertheless integral to the production of rare books and prints.

ng publication strategies.

Approaching book history with insights from social and women’s history adds to the historical understanding of book production by taking women seriously as historical actors. This dissertation re-examines the way book historians have commonly viewed subjects such as marriage patterns and collaboration between men and women, and invites scholars to include the actors who were not male master printers into their research. I argue that in an economic system in which printing houses operated as family firms and in which gender ideologies shaped women’s work in the male-dominated business, women’s multifaceted labour was nevertheless integral to the production of rare books and prints.