Not Chaucer?
Rethinking the First British Author in Print
A fresh investigation into who really came first in British printing history
Introduction: A Rare Discovery Sparks a Question
Recently we acquired a truly exceptional (and very rare!) book - the first edition of John Duns Scotus' Quaestiones printed on the 5th of November 1472 in Venice by Wendelin of Speyer, an important early printer. This was the first printing press in Venice. It goes without saying that this is a very early printed book, but it's an extremely early printed book by a British author, as John Duns Scotus, as his last name implies, was born in Scotland. For the purposes of this investigation, I'm defining "British" as having been born in England, Scotland, or Wales (or those country's previous names when referencing ancient writers), and so this excludes Irish authors as I'm taking "Britain" in a geographical sense rather than the modern political context which may include Northern Ireland. "Great Britain" refers to only England, Scotland, and Wales in a geographical sense.
Since the first edition of John Duns Scotus clearly predates the first book printed in England by a good few years, I thought it would be a very interesting question to investigate: what is the earliest printed book attributable to a British writer?
Why the Internet Can't Answer This
My first instinct was simply to search the internet, but I quickly found out that nobody really had much of a clue. It's easy to find out what the first book printed in the English language was, or the first book printed in Britain, but that's not the question presented here. Most early authors had their works printed in Latin, the language of medieval scholasticism, and the presses of continental Europe were far more advanced than anything Britain could offer throughout the entire incunable period (i.e. 1455-1501), and so almost all of the British writers I could find were first printed somewhere in continental Europe, in Latin, decades, or even centuries, before they appeared in the English language at a British printing press.
That meant rethinking my approach. I began by reaching out to curators at major British institutions with significant early printed collections. This was indeed fruitful and brought up a good number of contenders, but also brought up a great amount of controversy!
Controversy: Who's British... Attribution?
As it turns out, there are a lot of ancient and medieval writers, and with a great number of them, their birth place is either completely unknown, speculated, or loosely attributable. So this meant I had to narrow down my search criteria even more. Now I wanted to include only those who can be securely historically confirmed to have been born in Britain. This certainly got rid of one problem, but there's also great academic controversy about the attribution of certain works to certain authors to contend with as well.
A great example of the controversy of attribution is with a medieval philosopher called Walter Burley who was born in England, probably in Yorkshire, and who later spent a great deal of time in Paris and other academic centres throughout continental Europe, as with most medieval philosophers and theologians. There was a book first printed somewhere circa 1470 called "De vita et moribus philosophorum" and it's a biography of around 120 ancient philosophers and poets. This book was long attributed to Walter Burley, an Englishman, but is now universally recognised as not written by him and is instead just considered to be anonymous. It was printed a large number of times before 1501 by various printing presses around Europe, and in a few of those editions it was attributed to Walter Burley. It being printed circa 1470 is significant, as if this were attributable to a British writer, this would take the number one spot. Unfortunately, it isn't, and so the search continues.
Another important early writer who is possibly British is Johannes de Sacrobosco, an important astronomer. His highly significant Sphaera Mundi was the first printed astronomical work and was printed in 1472. Almost nothing is historically confirmable about him. Indeed, speculation regarding the year of his death stretches over 20 years! The only real evidence that he was born in Britain was from someone writing a few decades after his death who said that he was, but there's really no evidence to support or contradict this claim. The only geographical place which can be roughly verifiably associated with him is the University of Paris, which unfortunately doesn't narrow down anything as far as we're concerned. Consequently, he also doesn't make our list, but is worth an honourable mention.
The Method That Worked: Manual Bibliography
There are many online bibliographic databases which are extremely useful in my life as a rare book dealer, and some are dedicated solely to early printed books, such as the ISTC ("Incunable Short Title Catalogue") which is run by the British Library, or the VD16, but this just focusses on 16th century books and we're looking a century earlier. However, the best for this search are actual physical books, as the online databases unfortunately don't let me search "was this person born in Britain?" as part of their advanced search criteria. There's a very good German language printed book called "Der Gesamtkatalog der Wiegendrucke" (a.k.a GW) which catalogues the Berlin State Library, and another by Frederick R. Goff which was printed in 1964 and catalogues all incunabula (books we're interested in!) in libraries in all of North America. Naturally, there are a lot of entries in both books, tens of thousands of them, in fact. As a book dealer with a specialism in early printed books, I have copies of both. In order to be as comprehensive as I could, I decided to just do it manually and go through every entry in these books and cross-check them with ISTC (and/or USTC) and then research each author to find out where they were born. If I came across an author born in Britain, I then researched them even more, as it's possible, given how rare many of these books are, that there are no copies in North American libraries or that GW have cited of an earlier edition by one of the authors. It proved to be very interesting, and I learnt a lot about many ancient and medieval authors I had never heard of up until this investigation. Many were so obscure that nothing came up with a google search of their name, which made the research even more fun trying to figure out where they were born.
What resulted is, as far as I can tell, the first time this list has ever been created - a chronological bibliographical list of the earliest printed books by British authors. Where there were authors who were not definitively British (like Johannes de Sacrobosco as we discussed a moment ago), I have given a list at the bottom, also in chronological order, but this is fairly short as I could definitively rule out most of those who were initially in this category after further research.
The Earliest British Authors in Print: The List
According to our aforementioned criteria, Batholomaeus Anglicus is the first time a British author appears in print, and it is his De proprietatibus rerum, a medieval encyclopaedia. Unfortunately for the collector, we can trace no copies in private ownership and no copies having ever appeared for sale. If one did come up for sale, it would presumably be a seven-figure book. This was a very interesting bibliographical investigation to carry out, particularly with our copy of the John Duns Scotus first edition which comes in at number two on this list, being the earliest obtainable printed book attributable to a British author. Fortunately, this is the case even if the contested authors were British, i.e. Johannes de Sacrobosco, and John of Wales (depending on when inside 1472 his work was printed for priority), as the first edition of Sacrobosco is entirely unobtainable. Indeed, the Sacrobosco in particular has only 3 known surviving copies worldwide, and, being the first printed book on astronomy, and quite possibly the first printed scientific work, it would also most likely command a seven-figure price. The John of Wales first edition is more accessible, with two copies having appeared at auction since 1906, the most recent appearance being in 2023 where it sold for £20,800 (inclusive of the buyer's premium). Still, its date is given as circa 1472, whereas the Duns Scotus editio princeps is confirmable to the 5th of November, whereas the John of Wales could possibly be earlier or later; it's uncertain.
| Rank | Author | Date of first printing |
| 1 | Bartholomaeus Anglicus | c.1471-1472 |
| 2 | John Duns Scotus | 1472 |
| 3 | John of Wales [1] | c.1472 |
| 4 | Richardus de Bury | 1473 |
| 5 | John Bromyard | 1473 |
| 6 | William Caxton* | 1473 |
| 7 | Adelard of Bath | c.1475 |
| 8 | Venerable Bede | c.1475-1478 |
| 9 | William of Ockham | 1476 |
| 10 | John Peckham | c.1476 |
| 11 | Richard of Middleton | c.1476-1478 |
| 12 | John Lydgate | 1477 |
| 13 | Anthony Woodville | 1477 |
| 14 | Michael Scotus** | 1477 |
| 15 | Robertus Anglicus | c.1477 |
| 16 | Geoffrey Chaucer | c.1477 |
| 17 | John Galensis*** | 1478 |
| 18 | Alexander Carpenter | 1480 |
| 19 | John Mandeville | 1480 |
| 20 | Alexander of Hales | 1481 |
| 21 | Ranulf Higden | 1482 |
| 22 | John Trevisa | 1482 |
| 23 | John Lathbery [2] | 1482 |
| 24 | John of Salisbury | c.1482 |
| 25 | Thomas Littleton | c.1482 |
| 26 | John Anwykyll | 1483 |
| 27 | Richard Rolle | 1483 |
| 28 | John Gower | 1483 |
| 29 | John Mirk | 1483 |
| 30 | William Lyndwood | 1483 |
| 31 | John Baconthorp | 1484 |
| 32 | Thomas Malory | 1485 |
| 33 | Robert of Shrewsbury | 1485 |
| 34 | Thomas of Chobham | c.1485 |
| 35 | Dame Juliana Berners | 1486 |
| 36 | John Watton | c.1486 |
| 37 | Thomas Waleys | 1488 |
| 38 | John of Eschenden | 1489 |
| 39 | Nicholas Statham | 1490 |
| 40 | John of Gaddesden | 1492 |
| 41 | Robert Grosseteste | 1494 |
| 42 | Richard of Saint-Victor | 1494 |
| 43 | Walter Hilton | 1494 |
| 44 | Thomas Bradwardine | 1495 |
| 45 | John Alcock | 1496 |
| 46 | Robert Holcot | 1497 |
| 47 | John Skelton | 1499 |
| 48 | Robin Hood | 1500 |
* William Caxton
Caxton’s 1473 printing was a translation of Raoul Lefèvre’s Recuyell of the Histories of Troy, not an original work. Still, Caxton was the translator and thus is here considered to be the author of the text as printed.
** Michael Scotus
This is the second work by a Scottish author to be printed during the incunable period after our Duns Scotus editio princeps which was the first printed book by a Scottish author. The work of Michael Scotus is titled Liber physiognomiae (1477), a philosophical/astrological treatise, as with many of the books in the list above.
*** John Galensis
Not to be confused with John of Wales. See DNB vol. 59, entry for “John Wallensis.”
→ [1] John of Wales
Although some catalogues (including Goff) list his Summa collationum, sive Communiloquium as printed in 1470, better scholarship places this as circa 1472. See Sotheby’s 5 Dec 2017, lot 121, which more accurately dates the edition to c.1472.
→ [2] John Lathbery
See Christie’s 4 Dec 2018, lot 167, for a beautiful example of this Oxford printed first edition of his work.
Contested and Honourable Mentions:
Others who are not definitively British but are often associated with Britain, or are not firmly attributable to a given author, include Johannes de Sacrobosco (c.1472), Johannes Britannicus (1481), the possible British author of the Myrrour of the Worlde (1481), King Henry VI, actually anonymous law reports, (1482), St Anselm (1491), the anonymous author of "Ghostly Matters" printed by William Caxton (c.1491), Henry Parker (possibly 1493, if he wrote the Dives and Pauper), Gregorius Britannicus (1495), and Merlin, who is probably mythical/legendary and not a real historical figure (1498).
Conclusion: A Bibliographical Investigation Worth Doing
The common assumption that Chaucer or Caxton stands as the first British author in print is, while understandable, no longer sustainable in light of the evidence. Thanks to early continental presses and the Latin dominated world of scholastic printing, British born authors were appearing in print several years before England had a printing press of its own, and well before any work was printed in English.
What this investigation reveals is not just a name or a date, but a broader reality: that the intellectual contributions of British thinkers were circulating on the Continent from the very earliest days of movable type. Bartholomaeus Anglicus, John Duns Scotus, and John of Wales were among the very first British voices to enter this new medium, their works shaping discourse across Europe long before the English printing trade was born. But not just them, also names which have stood the test of time like William of Ockham, the Venerable Bede, Sir John Mandeville, and of course Geoffrey Chaucer, but also many names which are now largely unknown but who were once significant enough to be printed all across Europe.
This list, the first of its kind as far as I’m aware, is offered not as a definitive canon, but as a foundation, a new starting point for those interested in the history of printing, British intellectual heritage, and the complex web of textual transmission. It reminds us that the history of British authorship in print began not in Westminster, but in Cologne, Venice, and Paris... and it began far earlier than most realise.
In the end, it may not be Chaucer, and it certainly wasn’t Caxton. But it was British, and it was printed.
Other notes:
The Congratulatio ad Nicolaum Trunum, printed in 1471, is attributed to Guglielmus Paiellus, who is not the same person as the 12th-century English poet William the Pilgrim. The author of this congratulatory oration was Italian, as confirmed by bibliographic evidence. Several individuals in the medieval period bear similar names, including Wilhelm the Pilgrim of Bogen, Bavaria, but none match a British profile.