Christopher Plantin

Christophe Plantin
Posthumous painting by Rubens
Born	c. 1520 France
Died	1 July 1589(1589-07-01) Antwerp
Resting place	Antwerp
Years active	1548–1589
Known for	Plantin Press
Net worth	135,718 florins

Christophe Plantin (Dutch: Christoffel Plantijn; c. 1520 – 1 July 1589) was an influential Renaissance humanist and book printer and publisher.

Plantin was born in France, probably in Saint-Avertin, near the city of Tours, Touraine. As a youth he apprenticed as a bookbinder in Caen and also married there. In 1545, he and his wife, Joanna Riviere, set-up shop in Paris, but after three years they chose to relocate to the booming commercial center of Antwerp, where Plantin became a free citizen and a member of the Guild of St Luke, the guild responsible for painters, sculptors, engravers and printers. The quality of his work as a bookbinder brought him into contact with nobility and wealth. While delivering a prestigious commission he was mistakenly attacked, receiving an arm wound that prevented him from labouring as a bookbinder and led him to concentrate on typography and printing. By 1555, he has his own printshop and is an accomplished printer. The first book he is known to have printed was La Institutione di una fanciulla nata nobilmente, by Giovanni Michele Bruto, with a French translation. This was soon followed by many other works in French and Latin, which in point of execution rivalled the best printing of his time. The art of engraving then flourished in the Netherlands, and Dutch engravers illustrated many of his editions.

In 1562, while Plantin was absent in Paris, his workmen printed a heretical pamphlet, which resulted in his presses and goods being seized and sold. It seems, however, that he eventually recovered much of the value that was taken from him. With the help of four Antwerp merchants he was able to re-establish and expand his printing business significantly. Among these friends were two grand-nephews of Daniel Bomberg, who furnished him with the fine Hebrew typefaces of that renowned Venetian printer. This co-venture only lasted until 1567 however it enabled Plantin to acquire a house in the Hoogstraat which he named "De Gulden Passer" (The Golden Compass). This gesture mirrors the commercial success of publishing emblem books, which present collections of images paired with short, often cryptic, text explanations. It is also at this time that Plantin adopted a printer's mark which would appear in various forms on the title pages of all Plantin Press books. The motto Labore et Constantia ("By Labor and Constancy") surrounds the symbol of a compass held by a hand extending from a bank of clouds and inscribing a circle. The center point of the compass indicates constancy, the moving point which renders the circle is the labor. Plantin holds this instrument in portraits of him, such as the one commissioned from the Flemish painter Peter Paul Rubens.