Statues - Hither & Thither

Site Search:

Dieppe
Seine-Maritime
Haute-Normandie

Rue de Sygogne 9-11
(Villa vénitienne)

Laurens Jansz. Coster - Peter Schöffer

Dutch and German inventors of the printing press.

Mathurin Moreau
c. 1892

Dieppe / Laurens Jansz. Coster - Peter Schöffer

Description

Two cast iron statues flanking the façade:

Laurens Jansz. Coster - Laurens Jansz Koster (Haarlem, ca. 1370 - ca. 1440), an inventor of a printing press from Haarlem. Since the late 1890s, Haarlem has been willing to concede that perhaps Mainz printed earlier, in the person of Johann Gutenberg (Wikipedia).
Peter Schöffer - Petrus Schoeffer (Gernsheim c. 1425 - Mainz 1503), German printer, studied in Paris and worked as a manuscript copyist in 1451 before apprenticing with Johannes Gutenberg and joining Johann Fust, a goldsmith, lawyer, and money lender (Wikipedia).

Annotation

The statues are listed in the 1892 catalogue of the Val d'Osne foundry of Paris, plate number 596. The four statues 324-325-322-323 show four inventors of the printing: "Schoeffer", "Fust", "Coster", and "Guttemberg". Two of these (numbers 324 and 322) are here in Dieppe.

Artist

Mathurin Moreau (Dijon 1822 - Paris 1912), French sculptor, worked for the Société anonyme des hauts-fourneaux et fonderies du Val d'Osne, anciennes masions J.P.V. André, Barbezat et Cie, Fourment Houille et Cie, J.J. Ducel et fils : Seringe frères et Noailles (short: Val d'Osne). (Wikipedia).

Location (N 49°55'28" - E 1°4'17") (Satellite view: Google Maps)

Item Code: frhn017; Photograph: 27 August 2011
Of each statue we made photos from various angles and also detail photos of the various texts.
If you want to use photos, please contact us via the contact form (in Dutch, English or German).
© Website and photos: René & Peter van der Krogt