SIXTEENTH CENTURV.
- )8d
the said company £\ 6t. Sd. to be paid annually to the vicar of St. Alkmunds, reading prayers on Monday mornings, before the drapers set out for Oswestry market."
1584, June. Died, Huldric Fugoer,* an eminent patron of literary men, and a great pro- moter of the art of printing. He was born at Augsburg, in Germany, in the year 1526, and sprung from a family conspicuous both for its antiquity and wealth. For a time, he dischargfed > the office of chamberlain to pope Paul III. but aXterwards became a protestant ; wa.s himself learned, and expended extraordinary suras in the purchase of manuscripts of ancient authors, and causing them to be printed. In 1558, Henry Stephens the second, assumed the appellation of Typograpkiu illuttru nri Hutdnci Fuggeri, Domini in Kirchperg, If Wej/tsenfiom.f It is highly probable that Henry Stephens was in- debted for this distinction, on the recommenda- tion of Henry Scrimger,^ a Scotch professor, of considerable erudition, with whom ne was con- nected by friendship and literary intercourse. Huldric Fugger assigned to Henry Stephens an annual gratuity, which some accounts have esti- mated at the sum of fifty gold crowns ; but how long our printer had the good fortune to enjoy this pension, it does not distinctly appear. It is recorded that the family of Huldric, offended at
- The name appcan greatly diversified : Moreri terms
them Ftmchera; Rabelais, les Fourquet ffAujettourg; his aanotator, la famiUe da Foucret^ ou Fuggert. They were Terydlstln^ished merchants of Aagsbui^, says M.Bayle. t The earliest work which exhibits Henry Stephens onder the designation ofittiuliiM viri Huldrichi Fuooaai TTPooaAPHtrs, appeared in 1558, entitled Imperatorum Justiniani, Juttini^ Leonis, Nottelta Cotutituliones ; Jut' tiniani Edicta, Greece; fol. This worlc was prcpaied for the press by Henry Scrimfer ; who in his capacity tk editor, inscribed it to his patron Ulric or Huldric Fujrger.
t Henry Scrim^r was descended from one of the first fomiUes of ScotUmd. He was born at Dundee, in 1506, and was educated in the grammar school of his native town, and afterwards at St Andrew's. He travelled throuf^h Taxions parts of Europe, and formed acquaintances with the learned of every country. He settled at Geneva, where he taag:ht philosophy ; but was soon afterwards invited by tJlrich Fugg:er to reside with him at Aug:sbur^, and con- tinued for many years employed chiefly in collecting: books and manuscripts under the patronajre of his benefactor. The only work which Scrimger appears to have pub- lished, Ijeiides the Higtorti of FrancUcuK Spira^ a notori- ous apostate, of whose extraordinary case he wrote a narrative, was an edition of the Novella Cotuiitutionei of Justinian, in Greek ; a work which was highly prized by the drat lawyers of the Ume.
The testimonies to Scrimj^'s worth and merits, by bis cotemporaties, are numerous. Thuanus, Casaubon, and Stephens, with many others, mention his name with the highest encomiums. Dempster says he was a man inde- fatigable in his reading, of a most exquisite Judgment, and without the smallest particle of vain glor>'. And the great Cujanos was accustomed to say, that he never parted from the company of Henry Scrimtfer, without having learned something that he never knew before. Scrimgcr returned to Geneva, where he died, at the end of 15/3 or the begin- ning of 1573.
His library, which was one of the most valuable in Europe, he left by testament to his nephew, Peter Young, who was Buchanan's assistant in the education of James VI., and it was brought over to Scotland by the testator's brother, Alexander Scrimger, in the year 1573. Besides many valuable books, this library contained manuscripts of great value ; but Young was not a very enthusiastic scholar ; and as he was more intent upon advancing his personal interests in the world, and aggrandizing his family, than forwarding the progress of knowledge, they probably came to hut small account.
the excess to which he carried his passion for collecting manuscripts and books, and bis patro- nage of letters, at length institutetl a legal pro- cess, and caused him to be declared incapable of the administration of his own property. Some accounts have stated that this sentence produced a melancholy, which accelerated his death ; but according to M. Bavle, his epitaph says that he was unshaken by this rude blow, and that he also recovered possession of his property, and inherited the succession of his brother. He had retired to Heidelberg, and there died at the age of fiftv-eight years, bequeathing to the palati- nate his fine library, and perpetuating bis own memory by various liteiary and charitable foun- dations. He purchased the library of Achilles Gassarus, whom Melchior Adam describes as a venu lietluo librorum. Vit. Medicor. page 234.
Huldric Fugger was not the first of his family who collected a magnificent library ; for the author last cited relates, that Hieronymus Wol- fius having gone to Augsburg, was there kindly received by Antonius Fugger, and that to his care was entrusted the celebrated " Bibliotheca" of Joannes Fugger, an elder brother of Huldric, who was also a distinguished votary of literature.
The learned Fregius, in the preface to his Qiuestiones Justiniana, describes this library as abounding not only in elegantly printed works, but in manuscripts ; Greek more especially ; which were gratuUously permitted to the inspec- tion of visitors : " but" he adds, " though every thing is admirable, yet nothing is more the sub- ject of admiration than Wolfius himself, the host and very soul as it were of this repository, who like a kind of living library, has treasured up in his own memory the various erudition dis- persed through the shelves of this noble edifice." He then describes the extraordinary magnifi- cence of their city residence, its outward deco- rations, interior furniture and splendour, its de- lightful gardens, its pictures and works of art ; its mensa tessellata ex porphyretico mantore, decorated with a profusion of gems of the most precious kind ; its Imperatorum primorum into- ginet tredeeim, brought from Italy, and there purchased at a vast expense ; exquisite statues, marbles, and other monuments of genuine anti- quity, denoting opulence aud a taste for magni- licence, scarce exceeded by the Medicean family of Florence. Such was the account of the Fug- gers of Augsburg, given by Fregius in 1578. Charles V. when in 1548,he changed the govern- ment at Augsburg, highly distinguished this family, advancing tliem to the dignity of barons, and their descendants retained the same rank, and in subsequent times became connected by marriage » ith some of the most illustrious houses of Germany. No less than ten individuals of this muuifioent family are noticed by Freherus, in his T/ieatrum FtVor, claror. Bayle mentions a German work, published in 1620, containing 1 10 portraits of the various members of it, male and female, with a short notice respecting each. The first therein mentioned is Jacques Fugger, " called the elder," who died in 1469.
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