SALISBURY, THOMAS (1567?-1620), publisher London
Date of birth: 1567?
Date of death: 1620
Parent: Pierce Salisbury
Gender: Male
Occupation: publisher
Area of activity: Printing and Publishing
Author: William Llewelyn Davies
He is described in his indentures of apprenticeship to Oliver Wilkes, stationer, dated 9 October 1581, as the son of Pierce Salberye of the parish of Clokanock (Clocaenog), Denbighshire He was admitted freeman of the Stationers' Company, 16 October 1588; he may also be the Salisbury 'a bookbinder dwelling in Powles churchyard,' who is mentioned in Hist. MSS. Comm., Cecil MSS., vi, 288-9.
Salisbury published at least four Welsh books in London between 1593 and 1604, viz.: (a) Henry Salesbury, Grammatica Britannica, 1593; (b) William Middleton, Psalmae y Brenhinol Brophvvyd Dafydh gwedi i cynghanedhu mewn mesurau cymreig, 1603; (c) Edward Kyffin, Rhann o Psalmae Dafydd Brophwyd, 1603; and (d) a Welsh translation, 1604, of king James I, Basilikon Doron. Entered by him in the Stationers' Registers in 1597 was a Welsh version of A godly meditation of the soule concerninge a love towards Christ our Lord, but there is no evidence that this was ever published. In a letter written to Sir John Wynn of Gwydir c. 1610 (Ballinger and Jones, The Bible in Wales and Calendar of the Wynn of Gwydir Papers) Salisbury refers to several books in Welsh lost through the untimely death of Edward Kyffin, the translator of the (incomplete) Rhann o Psalmae …, during the plague sickness of 1603, and adds that the printing of the Basilikon was not completed. William Middleton's Psalmae is dedicated to Sir Thomas Myddelton, kinsman of the translator and patron of the publisher. As has been shown by E. D. Jones (N.L.W. Jnl., i, 52-3), Sir Thomas Myddelton, on 5 January 1593/4, advanced £10 to ' Thomas Salisbury stacioner, and Harry Salesbury clarck ….' (possibly the Henry Salesbury of the Grammar of 1593) towards the printing of a book called ' the sickmans salve, in the Welshe tong,' and on 12 October 1602, ¢30 towards the printing of William Middleton's Psalmae, 1603. (See Sir Thomas Myddelton's account book among the Chirk Castle MSS. in N.L.W.).
It has been suggested (in D.N.B.) that JOHN SALISBURY (fl. 1695), London printer, was a grandson of Thomas Salisbury. He was the first printer and editor of the Flying Post, the first number of which was issued on 11 May 1695. A few details concerning him are given in the D.N.B. He died probably before 1705.
Author
- Sir William Llewelyn Davies, (1887 - 1952)
Sources
- To the sources named above (and in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography account) add
- R. B. McKerrow, (ed.) A dictionary of printers and booksellers in England, Scotland and Ireland, and of foreign printers of English books 1557-1640 (London 1910)
- R. B. McKerrow, (ed.) Journal of the Welsh Bibliographical Society, ii, 169-70, 180-2
Published date: 1959
Article Copyright: http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC-RUU/1.0/
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