It is believed that William Caxton was born in Tenterden in the Weald of Kent in 1422, his exact education is unclear but it is known that he had knowledge of French, Latin, Dutch and English.  He moved to London in 1438 where he began an apprenticeship with Robert Large a rich mercer (dealer in cloth) who later became Sheriff and Lord Mayor of London in 1439.  After Large’s death in 1441 he moved to Bruges in Belgium and built up a successful textile business.

He visited England and was admitted to the Mercers Company in 1453 and was appointed Acting Governer of Merchant Adventurers in the Low Countries in 1463. 

He was hired as an advisor by Charles to his wife Margaret, Duchess of Burgundy (the sister of King Edward Fourth of England) in 1470 and was encouraged by the Princess to take up his work again on the translation of Raoul le Fevre’s The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye.  He went to Cologne, Germany in 1471 where he learnt the art of printing and returned to Bruges in 1472 where he and Colard Mansion (a Flemish Calligrapher) set up a press together.  He printed the first book in English The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye in greater quantities at the press of Colard Mansion and also The Game and Play of the Chesse (the first printed book in English to contain woodcuts) in 1474.

He returned to England and set up his own printing press in Westminster under the sign of the Red Pale in 1476.  On 18 November 1477 he printed the first English book to be printed in England Dictes of Sayengis of the Philosophres (written by Earl Rivers, the King’s brother-in-law).  This was the beginning of a stream of 96 books in total.  Some of the most famous books to be printed by him are:

Canterbury Tales (by Chaucer)

Morale Proverbs (by Christine de Pizan)

L’Morte D’Arthur (by Mallory)

The Fayttes of Armes and of Chyvalrye (by Christine de Pizan)

In 1490 he began using a more open typeface originally devised by the Parisian printer Antoine Verard based on the French letter batarde.

He died in London, England in 1491 and is buried at St Margaret’s Church, Westminster, London.

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