THE OLDEST BOOK ON FISHING 229 



It concludes : — 



" And this work was caused to be printed by 

 Matthias van der Goes." 



In an introduction to the translation, Mr 

 Denison, quoting Holtrop {Momimens Typo- 

 graphiques des Pays Bas au XVe Siecle), recalls 

 the fact that Matthias van der Goes printed at 

 Antwerp from 1482 to 1491, in which year he 

 died. His widow married his successor, Godfridus 

 Bach, a bookbinder, on November 19, 1492, and 

 the natural conclusion, therefore, seems to be that 

 the little book was left in type by Van der Goes, 

 and published soon after his death by Bach. 

 Writing in 1872 Mr Denison expressed the 

 opinion that it is the first known work on angling, 

 since which date I am not aware that anything 

 earlier has been discovered. It should be noted 

 that his unique copy is a first edition, but another 

 edition, without place or date, according to West- 

 wood and Satchell (pp. 36, 2)7)^ is, or was, in the 

 library of the Due d'Arenberg in Brussels, while a 

 third and much later edition is dated 1584. The 

 very limited number of copies (twenty-five) of the 

 English translation no doubt accounts for its being 

 so little known to English anglers. 



