Simon de Colines

Simon de Colines (c. 1480 – 1546), a Parisian printer, was one of the first printers of the French Renaissance. He was active in Paris as a printer and worked exclusively for the University of Paris from 1520 to 1546. In addition to his work as a printer, Colines worked as an editor, publisher, and punchcutter. Over the course of his lifetime, he published over 700 separate editions (almost 4% of books published in 16th-century Paris). Colines used elegant roman and italic types and a Greek type, with accents, that were superior to their predecessors. These are now called French old-style, a style that remained popular for over 200 years and revived in the early 20th century. He used rabbits, satyrs, and philosophers as his pressmark.

Colines was born between 1480 and 1490, possibly south of Paris, where his siblings later owned farms. He probably studied at the University of Paris and probably worked for the elder Henri Estienne, and replaced Estienne as press director after his death in 1520. Colines married Estienne's widow, Guyonne Viart, and inherited charge of the press and her six children. He continued working in Estienne's shop until Robert Estienne (Estienne's son) entered the business in 1526, by which time Colines had set up his own shop nearby at Soleil d'or and helped Robert become established as a printer without ties to the university. One scholar, Jeanne Veyrin-Forrer, believes Colines may have furnished French old-style typefaces to his step-son, Robert Estienne. For the next thirteen years Colines would cut most of his common print types: Romans, Italics, and his two best Greeks. In 1528 he began to use italic type. Colines was recognized for using rabbits near a tree as part of his pressmark, but after moving to Soleil d'or he started using satyrs and philosophers as his pressmarks. In 1539, Colines left Soleil d'or and moved his presses outside Paris's wall, at the sign of the four evangelists, where he stayed until his death in spring in 1546. Colines let his stepson-in-law, Chaudière take over his location at Soleil d'or and would send him projects either because Colines was ill or overloaded. Upon Coline's death it was Chaudière and not Robert who took over Colines' backlist.

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