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Christian Hebrew Printing in the Sixteenth Century: Printers, Humanism and the Impact of the Reformation *
Christian printers of Hebrew books have long been recognized as a crucial factor in the spread of Christian Hebraism in early modern Europe '. Their works have traditionally been listed together with Jewish books in bibliographies such as Moritz Steinschneider's catalogue of books on Hebrew language instruction, and the Bodleian library's collection Hebrew imprints 2 since both contain Hebrew type, but grouping them together also blurs their distinctive features. Yet the business of Hebrew printing for Christians differed in character from Jewish printing in a variety of ways 3.
* Research for this article was funded in part by Research Assistance Grant from the American Philosophical Society (1995) and from a grant-in-aid from the Friends ofthe University ofWisconsin-Madison Libraries (1998). 1 Jerome Friedman, The Most Ancient Testimony: Christian-Hebraica in the Age ofRenaissance Nostalgia (Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1983), 36-38. 2 Bibliographisches Handbuch über die theoretische und praktische Literatur für hebräische Sprachkunde (1959; reprint: Hildesheim: Olms, 1976), and Catalogus librorum Hebraeorum in Bibliotheca Bodleiana (1852-60; reprint: Hildesheim: Olms, 1964). Yeshayahu Vinograd continues this practice in his Thesaurus of the Hebrew Book, 2 vols (Jerusalem: Institute for Computerized Bibliography, 1993-1995) [Hebrew]. 3 See Alexandre Lorian, «L'imprimerie hébraïque 1470-1550: ateliers chrétiens et ateliers juifs» in: Le Livre dans L'Europe de Ia Renaissance: Actes du xxviiie internationale d'Etudes humanistes de Tours, ed. Pierre Aquilon and Henri-Jean Martin (Paris: Promodis, 1988), 219-229, and Stephen G. Burnett, From Christian Hebraism to Jewish Studies: Johannes Buxtorf(l564-l629) and Hebrew Learning in the Seventeenth Century, Studies in the History of Christian Thought, vol. 68 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1996), 39-47.
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