House of Elzevir

Elzevir is the name of a celebrated family of Dutch booksellers, publishers, and printers of the 17th and early 18th centuries. The duodecimo series of "Elzevirs" became very famous and very desirable among bibliophiles, who sought to obtain the tallest and freshest copies of these tiny books.

Although it appears the family was involved with the book trade as early as the 16th century, it is only known for its work in some detail beginning with Lodewijk Elzevir (also called Louis). The family ceased printing in 1712, but a contemporary publisher, Elsevier, takes its name from this early modern business.

In an age of non-standardized spelling, the name of the family was most often spelled Elsevier, or Elzevier, and their French editions mostly retain this name; but the name was gradually corrupted in English into Elzevir as a generic term for their books. The family originally came from Leuven, where Louis was born circa 1546, and was of Moorish origin, having taken as its surname a transliteration of al-Sifr or al-Zifr ("the cypher"), originally a trade-name byname applied to scribes and accountants in a culture without surnames. Although he worked in the book trade throughout his life, Louis seems to have worked mostly as a bookbinder in his early decades. He relocated with his family several times, including a stint at Antwerp, and in 1565 his name can be found on the payroll of the great printer-publisher Plantin. In 1580, he made a final move to Leiden, where he seems to have worked first as a bookbinder, and later as a bookseller and publisher.

An edition of Eutropius, which appeared in 1592, was long regarded as the earliest Elzevir publication, but the first is now known to be Drusii Ebraicarum quaestionum ac responsionum libri duo, which was produced in 1583. In all Louis published about 150 works. He died on 4 February 1617. Of his seven sons, five, Matthieu/Matthijs, Louis, Gilles, Joost and Bonaventura, adopted their father's profession. Among them Bonaventura Elzevir (1583–1652) is the most celebrated. He began business as a publisher in 1608, and in 1626 took into partnership Abraham Elzevir, a son of Matthijs, born at Leiden in 1592. In 1617 Isaac Elzevir (1596–1651), Matthijs' second son, was the first in the family to acquire printing equipment, which then passed into the hands of the partnership of Bonaventura and Abraham in 1626 when he decided to exit the business. Abraham died on 14 August 1652, and Bonaventura about a month afterwards.

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