Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers

The Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers is one of the Livery Companies of the City of London. The Stationers' Company was founded in 1403; it received a Royal Charter in 1557. It held a monopoly over the publishing industry and was officially responsible for setting and enforcing copyright regulations until the passage of the Statute of Anne in 1709. Today, the Company mostly carries out ceremonial functions. Furthermore, it contributes to educational charities. All its members work in the book or allied trades. In the order of precedence of the ...

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• Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers - History
• Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers - External link

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In 1403 the Corporation of London approved the formation of a Guild of stationers. At this time stationers were either booksellers or limners. Booksellers sold manuscript books that they or their employees had copied. They also sold the writing materials that they used. Limners illustrated and decorated manuscripts. Printing gradually displaced manuscript production and by the time that the Guild received a royal charter of incorporation in 1557 it was in effect a Printers' Guild. In 1559 it became the 47th livery ...

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Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers, Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers - History, Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers - External link

Read more here: » Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers: Encyclopedia II - Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers - History

John Lilburne was born in servant's quarters at the old palace at Greenwich, a child of middle level but still prosperous members of the royal court. The exact date of his birth is not known and there is some dispute as to whether he was born in the year 1613 or 1614. His family had originated in Sunderland, in North-East England where his uncle Richard Lilburne became one of the first members of Parliament to represent the county of Durham. In the 1630s he was apprenticed to John Hewson who introduced him to the Puritan physician John Bastwick, an active pamphleteer against Episcopacy wh ...

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John Lilburne, John Lilburne - Early life, John Lilburne - Unlicensed publishing, John Lilburne - Freeborn John, John Lilburne - English Civil War, John Lilburne - Agitation, John Lilburne - Putney debates, John Lilburne - Written Constitution, John Lilburne - Quaker, John Lilburne - Footnotes

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In 1515, after years of dispute, the Court of Aldermen of the City of London settled an order of precedence for the 48 Livery Companies in existence at that time, based on the Companies' economic or political power. The first 12 Livery Companies are known as the "Great Twelve". The Merchant Taylors and Skinners dispute their precedence, and so annually alternate between sixth and seventh place, the change occurring each Easter. This is one of the theories for the origin of the phrase "at sixes and sevens", as the master of the Merchan ...

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Livery Company, Livery Company - Governance, Livery Company - Precedence, Livery Company - List of Livery Companies in order of precedence, Livery Company - City Companies Without Grant of Livery, Livery Company - Recognised as City Companies Without Grant of Livery, Livery Company - Other guilds aiming to obtain a Grant of Livery

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There were two more editions of this famous document. The second was An Agreement of the People of England, and the places therewith incorporated, for a secure and present peace, upon grounds of common right, freedom and safety2, was presented to Parliament on September 11, 1648 after amassing signatories including about a third of all Londoners. Following the defeat of the Royalists and the abolition of the monarchy and House of Lords, England became a republic in 1649 with the regicide of Charles I. It was while he ...

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John Lilburne, John Lilburne - Early life, John Lilburne - Unlicensed publishing, John Lilburne - Freeborn John, John Lilburne - English Civil War, John Lilburne - Agitation, John Lilburne - Putney debates, John Lilburne - Written Constitution, John Lilburne - Quaker, John Lilburne - Footnotes

Read more here: » John Lilburne: Encyclopedia II - John Lilburne - Written Constitution

Lilburne was imprisoned from July to October 1645 for denouncing Members of Parliament who lived in comfort while the common soldiers fought and died for the Parliamentary cause. It was while he was incarcerated that he wrote his tract, England's Birthright Justified. In July 1646, he was imprisoned in the Tower of London for denouncing his former commander the Earl of Manchester as a traitor and Royalist sympathiser. It was the campaign to free him from prison which spawned the political party called the Levellers. Lilburne called them "Levellers so-called" because he vi ...

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John Lilburne, John Lilburne - Early life, John Lilburne - Unlicensed publishing, John Lilburne - Freeborn John, John Lilburne - English Civil War, John Lilburne - Agitation, John Lilburne - Putney debates, John Lilburne - Written Constitution, John Lilburne - Quaker, John Lilburne - Footnotes

Read more here: » John Lilburne: Encyclopedia II - John Lilburne - Putney debates

In the First English Civil War he enlisted as a captain in the Parliamentary army commanded by the Earl of Essex and fought at the Battle of Edgehill. He commanded Parliament's garrison at Brentford against Prince Rupert during the Royalist advance on London in November 1642 and although he managed to save the artillery, he was taken as a prisoner to Oxford. As the first prominent Roundhead captured in the war, the Royalists intended to try Lilburne for high treason. But when Parliament threatened to execute Royalist prisoners in repri ...

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John Lilburne, John Lilburne - Early life, John Lilburne - Unlicensed publishing, John Lilburne - Freeborn John, John Lilburne - English Civil War, John Lilburne - Agitation, John Lilburne - Putney debates, John Lilburne - Written Constitution, John Lilburne - Quaker, John Lilburne - Footnotes

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John Lilburne was arrested upon information by an informer acting for The Stationers' Company and brought before the Court of Star Chamber. Instead of being charged with an offense he was asked how he pleaded. John Lilburne demanded to be presented in English with the charges brought against him (much of the written legal work of the time was in Latin). The Court refused Lilburne's request. The court then threw him in prison and again brought him back to court and demanded a plea. Again John Lilburne de ...

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John Lilburne, John Lilburne - Early life, John Lilburne - Unlicensed publishing, John Lilburne - Freeborn John, John Lilburne - English Civil War, John Lilburne - Agitation, John Lilburne - Putney debates, John Lilburne - Written Constitution, John Lilburne - Quaker, John Lilburne - Footnotes

Read more here: » John Lilburne: Encyclopedia II - John Lilburne - Freeborn John

Livery Companies are governed by a Master (known in some Companies as the Prime Warden), a number of Wardens (who may be known as the Upper, Middle, Lower, or Renter Wardens), and a Court of Assistants, which elects the Master and Wardens. The chief executive officer of the Company is known as the Clerk. Members generally fall into two categories: freemen and liverymen. One may become a freeman, or acquire the "Freedom of the Company", upon fulfilling the Company's criteria; traditionally, one may be admitted by "patrimony" if either ...

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Livery Company, Livery Company - Governance, Livery Company - Precedence, Livery Company - List of Livery Companies in order of precedence, Livery Company - City Companies Without Grant of Livery, Livery Company - Recognised as City Companies Without Grant of Livery, Livery Company - Other guilds aiming to obtain a Grant of Livery

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John Lilburne then began in earnest his campaign of agitation for freeborn rights, the rights that all Englishmen are born with, which are different from privileges bestowed by a monarch or a government. His enemies branded him as a Leveller but Lilburne responded that he was a "Leveller so-called." To him it was a pejorative label which he did not like. He called his supporters "Agitators." It was feared that "Levellers" wanted to level property rights, but Lilburne wanted to level human basi ...

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John Lilburne, John Lilburne - Early life, John Lilburne - Unlicensed publishing, John Lilburne - Freeborn John, John Lilburne - English Civil War, John Lilburne - Agitation, John Lilburne - Putney debates, John Lilburne - Written Constitution, John Lilburne - Quaker, John Lilburne - Footnotes

Read more here: » John Lilburne: Encyclopedia II - John Lilburne - Agitation