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Abstract
How was the gazette invented? This paper addresses the early stages of the evolution of design standardization, from the mid-sixteenth century to the first decades of the seventeenth century (i.e. before the Gazette—first published in France by Renaudot in 1631—established an international standard for the format). It also analyses how the design of the gazette was adopted in Spain via examples arriving from Italy during the last decade of the sixteenth century. In addition to confirming the vitality of the news networks that connected European populations since the early modern age, the main hypothesis put forward in this work is that a standard model for the design and structure of Spanish gazettes had already been established in the 1620s. This standardization made the product familiar to readers and served as a criterion with which to differentiate it from other formats, periodicals or otherwise.
Notes
1. More recently, Andrew Pettegree published a brilliant study entitled: The Invention of News: How the World Came to Know about Itself. The title of this book can be understood as a tribute to both scholars.
2. Nevertheless, Raymond also points to continuities between gazettes, or corantos, and newspapers: ‘Like corantos and pamphlets, however, the first newsbooks did have title-pages. Newsbooks also followed, though not at first, the use of section headings to indicate the date and place of origin of letters.’ Even so, the more relevant continuity between gazettes and newspapers does not have anything to do with typographic expression, but with the conditions of production and distribution:
The most important continuities lie not in the objects or texts themselves, but in the means employed to distribute them rapidly and widely across the country. In 1641, it was already a convention to accompany a personal letter with a printed text; carriers had become used to moving books along trade routes, and publishers had become accustomed to sending them. Provincial booksellers had already established relations with publishers in the metropolis. The provision of an infrastructure was probably the most useful precedent which corantos provided for books. (Raymond, The Invention, 9)
3. Raymond, “El rostro.”
4. The famous mazarinades ridiculing the Crown and Cardinal Mazarin during the Fronde, a series of revolts occurring in France from 1648 to 1653, were mainly pamphlets of a sporadic nature. Furthermore, during the Catalan Revolt in Spain (Guerra dels Segadors, 1640–1652), the Catalans occasionally published leaflets or news pamphlets in Catalan or Spanish. Although, in this case, there was indeed a brief boom in the periodical press, to wit, the gazettes published in Barcelona from 1640 to 1642, which were sometimes more or less direct translations of the official Gazette de France. See Ettinghausen, “La Guerra dels Segadors.”
5. Despite his advocacy of the ‘exceptionalism’ of British journalism referred to earlier, Raymond brilliantly defends the pan-European nature of early modern journalism:
It is because of this relationship with communities of readers [ … ] that newspapers have played such an important role in socio-historical conceptualizations of nationhood [ … ]. Yet there are ways in which early newspapers were transnational: their news was sourced throughout Europe, and they often received European distribution. So early newspapers are, importantly, national phenomena; yet they are also transnational. (“Newspapers,” 249)
6. Infelise, Prima dei giornali.
7. The newsletters of the Fugger and Medici families have been digitized and studied in individual research projects: The Fuggerzeitungen. An Early Modern Informative Medium and Its Indexing (http://fuggerzeitungen.univie.ac.at); The Medici Archive Project (http://www.medici.org/about/mission). Accessed August 26, 2014.
8. Díaz Noci, “Dissemination of News.”
9. Petta, “Printed Funerals,” 110.
10. Petta, “Wild Nature.”
11. Petta, “Printed Funerals,” 128.
12. Espejo, “The Prince of Transylvania.”
13. The following study on the design of newspapers in Spain during the first half of the seventeenth century involved the analysis of the 504 newsbooks printed between 1600 and 1650, which have been digitized in the Catálogo y Biblioteca de Relaciones de Sucesos (http://www.bidiso.es/RelacionesSucesosBusqueda/), up until the date of completion of this research (April 2014). Accessed August 27, 2014.
14. See, for instance, Sermón Primero qve predicó el P F Francisco Tamayo del Orden de los Mínimos, Consvltor, Calificador del consejo Supremo de la S. y General Inquisición, a las Obsequias que hizo la Nobilíssima Ciudad de Barcelona en su Yglesia Catedral … (Barcelona, Gabriel Graells, 1612). Digitized edition at http://www.bidiso.es/fotogramasRelaciones/B-39_4_6_4_10-1/digitizedPages/b-39-6-10-1.pdf. Accessed August 26, 2014.
15. See, for instance, Relación verdadera de las capitvlaciones se hizieron entre el Príncipe nuestro Señor y la Infanta de Francia, y de la Infanta de España con el Rey de Francia (Barcelona, Gabriel Graells, 1612). Digitized edition at http://www.bidiso.es/fotogramasRelaciones/B-59_4_3_4_42-40/digitizedPages/b-59-3-42-40.pdf. Accessed August 26, 2014.
16. Relación de la felicíssima entrada en Larache, por el señor Marqués de San Germán, con todo lo en el caso sucedido, a veynte de Nouiembre de mil y seiscientos y diez años (Seville, Alonso Rodríguez Gamarra, 1610). Digitized edition at http://fondosdigitales.us.es/fondos/libros/1128/1/relacion-de-la-felicissima-entrada-en-larache-por-el-senor-marques-de-san-german-con-todo-lo-en-el-caso-sucedido/. Accessed August 26, 2014.
17. The basic design already seems to have become consolidated in these Seville gazettes of the 1620s, featuring an emphasized title in capitals, a subtitle or subtitles alternating round and italic fonts, and the central presence of a shield, sometimes archiepiscopal as occurs in some of the newsbooks of the printer Juan Serrano de Vargas, and at other times that of the Habsburgs, commonplace in the newsbooks of Juan de Cabrera. This can be seen respectively in these two examples: Relacion del dia, acompañamiento, forma y ceremonias como se leuantó el Pendón Real en esta ciudad de Sevilla, por el Rey nuestro Señor don Felipe Quarto deste nombre, que Dios guarde muchos años (Seville, Juan Serrano de Vargas, 1621). Digitized edition at http://www.bidiso.es/fotogramasRelaciones/33-5-4%20---%20014/digitizedPages/33-5-4---014.pdf; Rota qve el Emperador de Alemania tvvo con el general del enemigo llamado Albestad, en Dinamarca. Y presa que los Navios de Dunquerqye hizieron a los Olandeses. Año de 1626 (Seville, Juan de Cabrera, 1626). Digitized edition at http://fondosdigitales.us.es/fondos/libros/1086/1/rota-que-el-emperador-de-alemania-tuuo-con-el-general-del-enemigo-llamado-albestad-en-dinamarca-y-presa-que-los-navios-de-dunquerque-hicieron-a-los-olandeses-ano-de-1626/ . Accessed August 26, 2014.
18. In the 1630s, the front-page design of the printer Juan de Cabrera was borrowed and perfected by other Seville printers, such as Andrés Grande, who adopted a set design so as to make their serialised newsbooks perfectly familiar to their public. This is substantiated by the following examples: Verdadera relación de la vitoria qve tvvieron el señor Rey de Vngría, y el Sereníssimo Infante Cardenal, contra el exército del Rey de Suecia, sucedida en el mes de Setiembre deste año de mil y seiscientos y treinta y quatro (Seville, Andrés Grande, 1634). Digitized edition at http://www.bidiso.es/fotogramasRelaciones/33-4-27%20---%20028/digitizedPages/33-4-27---028.pdf; Verdadera relación de lo svcedido en Flandes, y felice Vitoria, qve el Sereníssimo Infante Cardenal don Fernando de Austria, ha tenido con Franceses y Olandeses: y de cómo tomò el Fuerte que llaman Esquenequescant, junto a Nimega, que es la llave de Olanda, este año de 1635 (Seville, Andrés Grande, 1635). Digitized edition at http://www.bidiso.es/fotogramasRelaciones/33-4-27%20---%20029/digitizedPages/33-4-27---029.pdf. Accessed August 26, 2014.
19. From the second half of the 1630s until the 1660s, the Seville printer Juan Gómez de Blas, the acknowledged editor of La Gazeta Nueva, only partially copied from the Madrid gazette of the Habsburgs, published several hundred semi-periodical newsbooks in which, although not consistently, he almost always used this standardized design. See, for instance, Copiosa relación de la ivnta y marcha, qve el exército de su Magestad Catholica hizo para el socorro de la Ciudad de Lérida, que gouierna Don Gregorio Brito, Valeroso y Leal Portugués (Seville, Juan Gómez de Blas, 1646). Digitized edition at http://www.bidiso.es/fotogramasRelaciones/61-5-8%20(%20signatura%20antigua_1_%2063-2-30)---014/digitizedPages/cft410010.pdf; Relación de la vitoria qve la armada de Inglaterra que está sobre Cascaes, ha tenido con los Nauios de la Flota de Portugal que venía del Brasil (Seville, Juan Gómez de Blas, 1650). Digitized edition at http://www.bidiso.es/fotogramasRelaciones/61-5-8%20(%20signatura%20antigua_1_%2063-2-30)---033/digitizedPages/cft410029.pdf. Accessed August 26, 2014.
20. See, for instance, Breve sumario de las facvultades qve trae el Illvstríssimo señor Don Francisco Barberino sobrino de su Santidad Vrbano VIII. y su Legado a Latere, assí en materias de graçia, como de justicia, por todo el Reyno de España (Barcelona, Sebastián y Jaime Matevad, 1626). Digitized edition at http://www.bidiso.es/fotogramasRelaciones/B-59_4_3_4_42-60/digitizedPages/b-59-3-42-60.pdf; and Fidelíssima relación de la Vitoria que tuuieron sinco Galeras de la Religión de San Iuan de dos vaxeles Turquescos, embiada a vn Cauallero desta Ciudad, de dicha Religión (Barcelona, Estebán Liberós, 1628). Digitized edition at http://www.bidiso.es/fotogramasRelaciones/B-44_4_3_4_5-10/digitizedPages/b-44-3-5-10.pdf. Accessed August 26, 2014.
21. This standardized design was first adopted by Imprenta del Reino and María de Quiñones’ printing office, both at Madrid. See, for instance, Svcessos y Vitorias de las Católicas Armas Españolas, è Imperiales, en Francia, y otras Prouincias, desde 22. De Iunio deste año, hasta 20. de Agosto del mismo de 1636 (Madrid, Imprenta del Reino, 1636). Digitized edition at http://www.bidiso.es/fotogramasRelaciones/50-V-34_4_27/digitizedPages/50-v-34-27.pdf; Escrívense los progresos, y entrada de sv alteza del señor Infante Cardenal en Francia por Picardía, en nueue de Iulio deste año, etc. (Madrid, María de Quiñones, 1636). Digitized edition at http://www.bidiso.es/fotogramasRelaciones/50-V-34_4_26/digitizedPages/50-v-34-26.pdf. Accessed August 26, 2014.
22. For the pioneering gazettes of Felipe Mey, in the context of Spanish journalism, see Espejo, “El primer periódico,” and “El mercado.”
23. Hillgärtner, “Meeting the Reader's Expectations.” For an historical study of the comparative design of German and Dutch newspapers, see Hillgärtner, “Die Gestalt,” “Die Entstehung,” and “Meeting the Reader's Expectations.”
24. See Wilke, “From Handmade to Technology-Driven Journalism.”
25.
It is difficult to talk about fixed and static readers’ expectations; we must rather understand the early layout conventions as an adjustment to reading practices that already existed. Printers and publishers using established layout schemes met expectations through referring to layout models known to the readers. The analysis has shown that German newspapers applied the standards for book typography while printers in the Dutch Republic with their papers often visually referred to the layout of a broadsheet or a pamphlet. (Hillgärtner, “Meeting the Reader's Expectations”)
26.
Late January and February [1641] also saw the abandoning of full title-pages. Title-pages were inherited from pamphlets, which served as the model for the first newsbooks, probably because they were familiar to both printers and readers. To maximize the efficient use of space, newsbook publishers first introduced news onto the verso of the title page, which was not a standard printing practice, and then reduced the title to cover about half of the front page. This considerably increased the amount of text, though it did not make for prestigious presentation. This early period, then, was characterized by two contradictory tendencies: the instability and flux caused by shifting partnerships of publishers, editors and printers by the lack of traditional practices for producing newsbooks; and the uneven, sometimes rapid, improvisation and systematization of new practices which introduced regularity. (Raymond, The Invention, 23)
27. For a defence of the pan-European approach to the historiography of journalism, see Ettinghausen “How the Press Began” and Raymond, “El rostro” and “Newspapers.” Also Espejo, “European Communication,” and the forthcoming volume by Raymond and Moxham, News Networks in Early Modern Europe, with the conclusions of the project of the same name: http://newscom.english.qmul.ac.uk/.
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Carmen Espejo
Carmen Espejo, Facultad de Comunicación, Universidad de Sevilla, Avda. Américo Vespucio s/n, 41092 Seville, Spain.