The
Ranums'
Panat Times
Volume 1, redone Dec. 2014
Jacques Édouard, the composer's bookseller nephew
Born circa 1675, Jacques Édouard, then 22, was apprenticed for five years, in June 1697, to Jacques Grou the son, a printer and bookseller of the rue de la Huchette in the parish of Saint- Severin. He would be fed and housed by his master, and his mother agreed to supply his clothing. It seems that Jacques had been studying at the University, for he presented a statement from the Rector of the University to the effect that he was "congru en langue latine et qu'il sçait lire le grec," and that he was a Catholic with good mœurs (apprenticeship, and record of that apprenticeship, BN, ms fr 21838, fol. 143v, and ms fr 21856, fol. 209). This letter of recommendation suggests that Jacques Édouard dreamed of being a scholarly publisher, in the tradition of Robert Estienne and in the new model of the publications that was then being prepared "for the use of the Dauphin." This hypothesis is supported by the content of the several surviving publications that bear Édouard's name on the title page: He produced a book of comments upon the most recent edition of Moréri's dictionary; a scientific treatise on childbirth — and, of course, an engraved edition of some of his late uncle's motets. However, doubtlessly owing to the fact that his professional aspirations surpassed his financial means, Jacques Édouard's career took a downward trajectory in the world of Parisian booksellers-publishers.
Indeed, it is difficult to envisage why the Charpentier-Édouards opted for the book business. They can scarcely have been such dreamers as to be unaware that, during the period of Jacques's apprenticeship, 1697-1702, the book trade was coming under increasingly close royal scrutiny, and that the number of printers was being reduced. In fact, it was so difficult to be received as a printer that the sons of printers or libraires (who were given preference over apprentices not born into the craft) had to wait as much as ten years to be granted a mastership; and even then they often had to settle for being a mere libraire for several years as they waited for an opening as imprimeur to become available. For a young man not born into a printing dynasty, acquiring a printshop or a bookstore was a daunting venture, because the investment was simply enormous. The only way to circumvent making this expenditure was to run a shop for a widow — or to marry a master's widow or daughter. (See Béatrice Sarrazin, "La Librairie et l'Imprimerie parisiennes...., Revue française d'histoire du livre, no. 47, Apr-June 1985, pp. 196-332).
Were the Charpentier-Édouards hoping that Philippe, Duke of Orléans, would help them circumvent some of these restrictions and these financial obstacles? If so, they were disappointed, for although Jacques Édouard completed his apprenticeship in 1702, he was not received as a master until March 14, 1706, when "ledit Jacques Édouard a presté le serment ordinaire par-devant Monsieur le lieutenant général de police" and was received into the community. In the years that followed, Édouard did not become a pillar of the book community. He held no office, but he did pay his dues (BN, ms fr 21871, register of the libraires of Paris).
Even before he was officially a master, Édouard began engaging other printers to produce books for him. For example, in July 1705 he sought permission to print a book: "Il nous fait suplier de luy en accorder nos lettres," say the records compiled in the king's name, so that he can publish Les Remarques critiques sur la nouvelle edition du Dictionnaire historique de Morery, donnée en 1704." Édouard was granted a privilège for three years. This entry specifies that Édouard was going to "faire imprimer par tel libraire ou mprimeur qu'il voudra choisir," and then would himself sell the volume throughout the kingdom (BN, ms. fr. 21947, p. 48).
Then, in 1709, he once again sought a royal privilège: "Notre amé Jacques Édouard, libraire à Paris, nous a fait exposer qu'il désiroit donner au public des musique d'Église gravées, ou motets du Sr Charpentier, de son vivant maitre de musique de notre Sainte Chapelle de Paris, s'il nous plaisoit luy accorder nos lettres de privilège sur ce necessaires."A privilège was indeed granted him at Versailles on March 23 of that year, and Édouard was allowed to "les faire graver... en telle forme, marge, caractere et autant de fois que bon luy semblera, pourveu neantmoins qu'ils soient conformes au Christianisme, et de les vendre, faire vendre, partout notre Royaume, pendant le tems de six années consecutives." In addition, no one in the city of Paris would be permitted print, counterfeit or sell this music, even if it is printed abroad (BN, ms. 21947, p. 430). The result was the handsome little book entitled Motets melêz de symphonie composez par Monsieur Charpentier, which Édouard and his brother-in-law, Jacques-François Mathas, dedicated to their uncle's protector and former pupil, the Duke of Orléans.
The dedication leaves no doubt about Édouard and Mathas's motives: They begin by emphasizing old patronage links between the prince and the dead composer, citing: "l'honneur qu'il [Charpentier] a eu de lui [Orléans, then Duke of Chartres] développer les principes de la composition de la musique." Next they explicitly seek the Duke's "protection" — ostensibly on their late uncle's behalf. Orléans is asked to "protéger les Ouvrages qui ont fait quelquefois le sujet de ses [Chartres's] amusements." Although they conclude by asserting that Orléans would reward them sufficiently by "protecting" these "works," the fact that they allude to the "soins que nous nous sommes donnés pour rendre publics" means that these works must be viewed as a thinly-disguised request for a financial reward. Their choice of a closing carries this petition still farther, for by "offering" this book to the prince, they hope to "merit the honor" of being his "servants" in the future. (For the full text of the dedication, see Catherine Cessac, Marc-Antoine Charpentier, pp. 22-23, and p. 22 of the translation.)
The title page gives as an address "rue Neuve N. Dame," doubtlessly
Édouard's bookshop called the "Trois Rois" located on or near the Parvis
de Notre Dame, the square before the cathedral. It is likely that
Édouard did not print the book himself but hired it done, and that he
and Mathas did so in hopes that the prince would not only reward them
handsomely for this first book of a projected series — this "premier
Recueil" — but would see fit to become the patron of future volumes of
Charpentier's music. If such was their hope, it was dashed. (See my
Musing of 2013 about Edouard,
Mathas and Motets melêz de symphonie
"Les
Trois Rois" doubtlessly was located at the bottom of this selection from
a map of the Parvis Notre Dame. The rue Neuve Notre-Dame, which is one
of the addresses provided by Édouard, appears at the bottom of this map.
Above it is the Parvis proper. The small building on the rue Neuve Notre
Dame that is marked with a cross is the Enfants Trouvés. Just above this
chapel is a shop numbered "14" that is just next to the entrance of the
Hôtel Dieu, Emplacement de l'Hôtel Dieu and situated on a prolongation
of the rue Neuve Notre Dame — two quite specific details provided in one
source or another. On the map this shop is situated just below the A of
DAME. (Directly opposite Notre Dame, three much smaller shops , situated
in the Parvis itself, surround a "fontaine," but there is no reason to
think that one of these was Édouard's shop.)
There is another, more intimate dimension to the circumstances surrounding this publication. Édouard and Mathas must have made their request for a royal privilège during the final months of December 1708 or the first weeks of January 1709. Those were the very weeks when their aunt Étiennette was in failing health (see her "complaint" to the Châtelet about Mathas's violent and threatening conduct toward her: see Etiennette's complaint to the police) and was holding tightly onto her purse-strings in order to ensure that the portion of her estate that would go to the Mathases would more or less equal Marie-Anne Édouard's outstanding bills! On March 22, 1709, Étiennette died. And, by pure coincidence, the very next day — while Édouard and the Mathases were standing beside their individual procureurs in Étiennette's lodgings, and claiming their rights as officials from the Châtelet placed seals on the doors and cabinets — the royal privilège was being granted!
Thus it was that — irrespective of whether Marc-Antoine Charpentier's manuscripts had remained in Étiennette's possession until her death (they are not mentioned in her inventory or in the scellé), or whether she had already passed them on to Jacques Édouard (it seems unlikely that she would have entrusted unfortunate Marie-Anne Édouard and irascible Jacques-François Mathas with such a precious relic!) — Jacques (but apparently not the niece and her husband) now was the official heir to these manuscripts. That is to say, Étiennette made it very clear in her will that her executor must not allow the niece and nephews to fight over things that Étiennette had previously given to one or the other : "ce que j'ay peu leur donner à l'une ou à l'otre pendant ma vie, dont je leur recommande et leur defant de jamais ne se faire aucune demande à l'une et l'otre, leur en faisant de rechef don an tant que besoin serés, sans aucune obligations d'an rande cont," she had stipulated when she drew up her last will in 1707. Indeed, does this assertion not suggest that, by April 1707, Étiennette had passed the music to Jacques Édouard and that, by this clause in her will, she was protecting him from the predatory behavior of his brother-in-law?
And does Étiennette's legacy of 200 livres to the Jesuit noviciate of Paris put into a special context the flattering article about the Motets that appeared in the Jesuit-sponsored Journal de Trévoux in August 1709? (available in Cessac, p. 23; p. 22 of translation) Is this a "thank-you" of sorts to the sister of their late chapel master? Or were the reverend fathers simply seizing an opportunity to congratulate themselves for having employed such a fine composer of Latin works?
By 1712 Jacques Édouard must have realized that the Duke of Orléans was not going to become his protector. He therefore did the eighteenth-century equivalent of "place an ad" in a provincial publication, the Journal de Verdun. Having mentioned the published Motets, the notice then informs its readers that, in Édouard's shop on the parvis Notre Dame, "on y trouvera tous les ouvrages de cet auteur en partitions originales, ... le tout en manuscrit de la main de M. Charpentier." Édouard, the article continues, proposes making these manuscripts that he had inherited available to a chapel master.
Édouard continued to "publish" books. In 1714 appeared Pierre Amand's Nouvelles observations sur la pratique des accouchemens, avec la maniere de se servir d'une nouvelle machine (BN., Rés. p.t. 99) This book was approved by the Faculty of Medicine and appeared on the market shortly after his marriage to a bookseller's widow. It saw a second edition in 1715. From the final pages of this second edition, we get an idea of the contents of Édouard's shop in 1715. He sold — but had not necessarily "printed" — the following books: Le Dictionnaire œconomique de M. Chomel, published a Lyon and, in Paris, by Ganeau, 2 vols in-folio; the Supplément to this dictionary, 1 vol. in-folio; "plusieurs livres de medecine et de chirurgie des meilleurs auteurs"; "le premier livre des Motets en musique de feu Monsieur Charpentier ...," 1 vol in-4, broché, 3 livres; Les Fragments en musique de M. de Lully, in-4, broché, 5 livres; Le Nouveau Theatre italien, comédies de M. Dominique (that is to say, the famous Harlequin, Domenico Biancolelli), 1 vol. in-12, 1 livre 15 sols; Reflexion sur le livre des femmes, brochure in-12, 8 sols; and "il vend aussi toutes sortes de livres de dévotion et d'usages en gros et en détail."
About this time, Édouard began casting around for a way to make money from his uncle's manuscripts. He began by seeking a privilège from the boy king Louis XV. "Notre bien amé Jacques Édouard nous ayant fait remontrer qu'il avoit herité des ouvrages du feu sieur Charpentier, son oncle, l'un des maistres de musique du feu roy de glorieuse mémoire....," he was proposing a new kind of spectacle: "[Édouard] désiroit faire part au pubic d'un nouveau spectacle qu'il a inventé, tout different des autres, consistant en plusieurs divertissemens commiques en francois dans le goust italien meles de concertz de voies, de simphonies, de danses, de machines et de decorations qui n'ont jamais parus, lesquels concerts sont tirés de cantates francoises et italiennes des plus celebres autheurs anciens et modernes," says the privilège granted to Édouard in 1716. It is perhaps significant that it was the Regent — that is to say, the Duke of Orléans, Charpentier's protector ! — who advised the boy king to grant Édouard a very broad privilège that would be in force for thirty years, "pour faire exécuter toutes sortes de pieces comiques francoises dans le goust italien, en forme de comedies en trois actes"; to employ any actors he wished, and as many as he wished; and to call the troop the "troupe parisienne." One-fourth all the profits on each new spectacle would, however, have to be turned over the Opera of Paris.
The privilège had not even been recorded when Édouard signed an agreement with Louis Gautier de Saint-Edme, conseiller du Roy, and his wife by which he ceded his privilège in return for 26,000 livres. In addition, Saint-Edme agreed to pay Édouard 10,000 livres a year for the duration of the privilège — plus four free seats per performance, and a 1,000-livre bonus one month after the first performance by the troop (Recherches, VII, pp. 231-232). The project seems to have been still-born. Indeed, if Jacques Édouard ever received and kept those huge sums, he spent them foolishly and rapidly: he appears to have become increasingly impecunious as the years went on, selling his uncle's manuscripts to the royal library in 1727 for the very modest sum of 300 livres (see Cessac, p. 24 and my article in the Bulletin Charpentier, July 1993).
A few other facts about Jacques Édouard have been uncovered here and there. In October 1713 new possibilities became possible for him when he took a familiar route in the printing world: he married the widow of printer Pierre Lesclapart, "libraire," and as such he now aspired to becoming an imprimeur (BN, ms. fr. 21856, fol. 260). I haven't tried to learn much about the Lesclaparts, beyond the fact that Antoine-Pierre Lesclapart of the rue des Cannettes had married Marie-Anne Le Page (MC, LXXXII, 57, May 4, 1698). Born into a printing family, Lesclapart had been received as a libraire in July 1700 (BN, ms. fr. 21856, fol. 172), but he may have died before a printership became available. After Marie-Anne Le Page's death, Édouard married Marie-Jeanne Gueffier, the sister of Claude-Pierre Gueffier, a libraire (information provided by M.F. Quignard of the reserve department of the Bibliothèque nationale.) By the 1750s, when he was his late seventies, Jacques Édouard had nothing but a "pauvre misérable qui ne vend que des Bouquains" (ms. fr. 22107, for 1752). He died circa 1761 (ms. fr. 22106, fols 36 and 41). The second Mme Édouard lived on until circa 1767, when she too disappeared from the registers (ms. fr, 22106, fol. 79).