page_title: Christophe Plantin
section_title: Printing work
hierarchical_section_title: Christophe Plantin / Printing work
caption_attribution_description: A 1569 Bible in Latin, published by Christopher Plantin
context_page_description: Christophe Plantin was an influential French Renaissance humanist and book printer and publisher living and working in Antwerp.
context_section_description: Plantin was a prolific printer and prosperous entrepreneur, publishing more than 40 editions of emblem books. His most important work is considered to be the Biblia Regia (King's Bible), also known as the Plantin Polyglot. Facing increasing pressure and turmoil in the Netherlands, Plantin needed to find a patron that would not fall victim to claims of heresy or being a Protestant sympathizer. In spite of clerical opposition, Plantin was encouraged by King Philip II of Spain, who sent him the learned Benito Arias Montano to lead the editorship. The Polyglot Bible has parallel texts in Latin, Greek, Syriac, Aramaic, and Hebrew. This venture for Plantin was very expensive, requiring him to mortgage his own business to pay for the production of this bible, in the hope that there would be a worthwhile payoff in the end.  It took thirteen presses and fifty-three men to complete the task. With Montano's zealous help, the work was finished in four years (1568 - 1572). There were eight volumes in folio format, meaning only two pages could be printed at one time. This work earned Plantin little profit, but resulted in Philip's granting him the privilege of printing all Roman Catholic liturgical books (missals, breviaries, etc.) for the states ruled by Philip, the title "Architypographus Regii," which he dutifully added to the title pages of Plantin Press books, and the unwanted duty of prototypo-graphus regius, obligating him to inspect and verify the skill and dogmatic adherence of other printers. 
  Besides the Plantin Polyglot, Plantin published many other works of note, such as the "Dictionarium Tetraglotton" of 1562, which was a dictionary in Greek, Latin, French and Flemish, editions of St. Augustine and St. Jerome, the botanical works of Dodonaeus, Clusius and Lobelius, and the description of the Netherlands by Guicciardini. His editions of the Bible in Hebrew, Latin and Dutch, his Corpus juris, Latin and Greek classics, and many other works are renowned for their beautiful execution and accuracy. A skillful businessman, by 1575 his printing firm reckoned more than 20 presses and 73 workmen, plus various specialists who did job-work out of their homes. The vast collection of handwritten ledgers and letters of the Officina Plantiniana, as it was known, can be examined online following digitization by the Museum Plantin-Moretus and hosting by World Digital Library.
  Though outwardly a faithful member of the Catholic Church, he appears to have used his resources to support several sects of heretics, sometimes known as the Family of Love or Familists. It is now proven that many of their books, published without naming the printer, came from Plantin Press.
caption: A 1569 Christopher Plantin Bible, owned by Dr. Shiwei Jiang of Virginia
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