Jan Januszowski’s Letters to Marcin Kromer and Tomasz Płaza on Printing "Missale Varmiense" (1587) in the Lazarus Printing House

Officina Lazari was one of the most prominent printing houses in the 16th-century Cracow. In 1587, it pressed Missale Varmiense, the only post-Tridentine missal produced in early modern Poland-Lithuania. Missale was commissioned by the bishop of Warmia, Marcin Kromer, who was persuaded to work with the Cracow printer after a recommendation from Tomasz Płaza, his long-time assistant. The history of this publishing venture-a multifaceted, dynamic process, spread over a period of about five years-can be reconstructed thanks to surviving archival documents, inter alia letters that Januszowski-the printer sent to bishop Kromer and his factotum Płaza. Composed respectively in 1585 and 1586, these letters give detailed insight into how the production of Missale Varmiense was planned and organised, constituting the kind of evidence very rare for early printed books produced in Poland-Lithuania. The earlier letter is an official Latin supplication sent by the printer to the prelate. The other letter, addressed to the bishop’s assistant, who was also the manager of the publishing process is practically oriented and personal, written at the time when the work of Januszowski and his sponsors was put to a halt by the Cracow cathedral chapter in the spring of 1586.