Untitled - Monoskop

THE PREVOT OF PARIS AND OFFICERS IN THE PROVINCES
clause in a privilege granted by the prevote on 12 January 1527: 'a la charge
toutesvoyes de ne 1'exposer en vente jusques a ce qu'il ait este collationne a
celluy sur lequel avons decerne ceste presente permission'. This occurs in the
privilege, printed on the verso of the title, granted to Nicole Volcyr de
Serouville, secretary and historian of the duke of Lorraine, for the Histoire et
recueil de la victoire obtenue contre les lutheriens (Paris, 1526; PR 1527, i). There
were several other special precautions about the grant of this privilege. The
king's advocate in the court of the Prevot, the veteran Francois Goyet, was
commissioned to examine the book. It was only when he reported that he had
found nothing in it which was 'prejudiciable ne dommageable a la chose
publicque' that the certificate from the Faculty of Theology was taken into
consideration, to show that 'ce qui concernoit ladicte theologie n'estoit
pernicieux ne digne de reprehension'. Jean de La Barre, garde de la prevote de
Paris, on whose authority the privilege was issued, had only held office since
April 1526, the appointment being one of the rewards granted him by
Francis I, whose captivity he had shared. He was clearly taking no chances,
with a book describing such recent and controversial events, by an author
whose allegiance was to a foreign prince.
At this period, application for a book-privilege was a request for a favour, not
compliance with a law. In submitting the book for which he was seeking a
privilege, author or publisher knew that it would probably be inspected and
might be refused a privilege if found to be unacceptable. To most applicants
the likelihood that the book would be subjected to scrutiny must have seemed
the natural condition of getting the privilege. In many cases the approval
implied by the grant of the privilege was of no particular value to him. Would
more people, for example, buy Laforest de conscience (PR 1516, 2) because it had
been granted a privilege by the Prevot of Paris? On the other hand, the desire
to obtain written official approval in some form was probably sometimes one
of the motives for seeking a privilege. Doubts and fears may have been very
real over publishing new books or pamphlets on certain subjects, as we have
seen. To secure a privilege was then a sort of insurance against needlessly
offending the government or powerful institutions and individuals. The
'permission' element was always present in a privilege, but it did not amount
to a system of censorship. The chancery, the lawcourts and the royal officers
between them probably saw a good proportion of the works being published
for the first time, and thus had the opportunity to scrutinise them. But they
only saw books which were submitted to them voluntarily by their authors or
publishers.
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