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- # Section IV: The Copyright of the Poem
## Overview
This section, labeled "IV," is part of a larger chapter and discusses the copyright history of the poem *Lucrece*. It details the various owners of the copyright from its initial publication in 1594 through the 17th century.
## Context
This section is extracted from the file `pdf-01KG6Q7Q25RHMFT3SJXPV18VFF.txt`, which is part of the collection `PDF Workflow Main Test 2026-01-30T00:26:53`. It follows Section III and precedes the section titled "LUCRECE." The text focuses on the publication history and copyright transfers of Shakespeare's poem *Lucrece*, drawing parallels and contrasts with the publication history of *Venus and Adonis*.
## Contents
The section begins by introducing the copyright of *Lucrece*, noting that it changed hands less frequently than that of *Venus and Adonis*, with only five owners over a century. It identifies John Harrison as the first owner, holding the copyright from May 9, 1594, to March 16, 1614. Harrison, a Master of the Stationers’ Company, commissioned Richard Field to print the first edition. The text then traces subsequent copyright holders: Roger Jackson, Francis Williams, and three individuals named John Harrison (or Harrison), detailing the dates of their ownership and the editions published during their tenure. It also mentions the printers involved, such as Peter Short, Nicholas Okes, Thomas Snodham, John Beale, Richard Bishop, and William Gilbertson. The section concludes by noting that the latest 17th-century edition of *Lucrece* appeared in 1655.
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- Section IV: The Copyright of the Poem
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- IV
The copyright of the poem.
In the history of the publication of *Lucrece*, two of the personages, the printer Richard Field, and the publisher John Harrison, who were concerned in producing the first edition of *Venus and Adonis*, reappear, but not in quite their former capacities. The copyright changed hands far less often than that of *Venus and Adonis*. There were only five owners in the course of a century.
John Harrison the first owner, May 9, 1594—March 16, 1614.
The copyright of *Lucrece* was owned at the outset by John Harrison of the White Greyhound in St. Paul's Churchyard, a publisher or stationer who was thrice Master of the Stationers’ Company—in 1583, 1588, and 1596. He had distributed copies of the first edition of *Venus and Adonis* in the spring of 1593, and acquired the copyright of that poem fourteen months later. The entry in the Stationers’ Company’s Register attesting his ownership of *Lucrece* runs under date of May, 1594, thus ‘:—
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LUCRECE 27
Entred [to Master Harrison, senior] for his copie under
thand of master Cawood Warden, a booke intituled the
Ravyshement of Lucrece viᵈ C.
Harrison employed Richard Field, Shakespeare’s fellow towns-
man, to print the work, and Field’s device of an anchor,
hanging in an oval frame with the motto *Anchora Spei*, is
prominently displayed on the title-page of the original edition.
Harrison retained the copyright of the poem for nearly
twenty years, until March 1, 1612, and published at least four
editions—in 1594, 1598, 1600, 1607. But only the first was
printed by Field. Peter Short printed that of 1598; Harrison’s
son, also named John, printed that of 1600, and Nicholas Okes
that of 1607. All the printers were men of position in the
trade. Okes was on intimate terms with Field, who had acted
as his surety when he was admitted a freeman of the Stationers’
Company on December 5, 1603, while Thomas Heywood,
the author, in his *Apology for Actors* which Okes printed for
him in 1612, addressed him as his ‘approved good friend’,
and commended his care and industry—compliments which
were rare in the intercourse of printer and author.
On March 1, 1612, Harrison parted with the copyright of
*Lucrece* and of three other of his publications of a different
class to a stationer of comparatively minor reputation, Roger
Jackson, whose shop over against the Great Conduit in Fleet
Street bore the sign of the White Hart.¹ The transaction
is thus entered in the Stationers’ Company’s Registers (iii.
542):—
¹ Roger Jackson, son of Martin Jackson, of Burnholme, Yorkshire, had
been apprenticed to Ralph Newbery, a well-known stationer, on July 5, 1591
(Arber, ii. 175). He had been admitted a freeman of the Stationers’ Company
on August 10, 1599, and acquired his first copyright (Greene’s *Guest Hunting*
*Cenoy Catchers*) on September 3, 1602 (Arber, iii. 216). His first apprentice,
Richard, son of Thomas Gosson, joined him April 23, 1604.
D 2
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