Benjamin Motte

{{short description|English publisher}} {{EngvarB|date=September 2014}} {{Use dmy dates|date=September 2014}} '''Benjamin Motte''' ({{IPAc-en|m|ɒ|t}}; November 1693 – 12 March 1738<ref name="DNB">J. J. Caudle ''Dictionary of National Biography''</ref>) was a London publisher and son of Benjamin Motte, Sr. Motte published many works and is well known for his publishing of Jonathan Swift's ''Gulliver's Travels''.<ref>Ehrenpreis p. 1012</ref>

==Background== Benjamin Motte was born in the parish of St Botolph (Aldersgate), London to Benjamin Motte Sr. and Anne Clarke.<ref name="DNB"/> He was born in early November 1693 and baptised soon after on 14 November.<ref name="DNB"/> Some of his first mentions are of his early publications and when he took over Benjamin Tooke's publishing business.<ref name="Ehrenpreis p. 739">Ehrenpreis p. 739</ref>

It was not under 7 February 1715 that Motte was free from his publishing patrimony, and he took off as a bookseller in 1719.<ref name="DNB"/> Motte's place of business in Fleet Street (London) was located in Middle Temple Gate. This space was passed to Motte by his predecessor, Benjamin Tooke, and then passed to Motte's replacement, Charles Bathurst, in 1738 upon his death.<ref>Fleet Street and the Press</ref> Motte was then asked to become partners with the Tooke publishing firm after Benjamin Tooke's brother, Samuel Tooke, died in December 1724,<ref>The Daily Post, London, Number 1635, 22 December 1724</ref> and as he took the position, he became the only active member of the publishing firm.<ref name="DNB"/> On 21 December 1725, Motte married Elizabeth, the daughter of Rev. Thomas Brian, and had two children.<ref name="DNB"/>

Throughout his career, Motte had three apprentices: George Hall, Thomas Isborne, and Jonathan Russell.<ref>[http://www.devon.gov.uk/localstudies/121287/1.html Book Trade Masters – Motte]</ref> After taking over the Tooke publishing firm, he partnered with his brother, Charles, until 1731.<ref name="DNB"/> Although he had no partner from 1731–1734, Motte took up his apprentice, Charles Bathurst, as his apprentice.<ref name="DNB"/>

In 1726, Jonathan Swift sent Motte a copy of ''Gulliver's Travels'', to be printed anonymously.<ref>Ehrenpreis p. 494</ref> Motte took great care to protect the identity of the author and employed five publishing houses to speed production of the book and avoid pirating.<ref>Clive Probyn, "Swift, Jonathan (1667–1745)", ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography''. Oxford University Press 2004</ref> In 1727, Motte formed his first direct contract with Swift and Alexander Pope to publish their ''Miscellanies''.<ref name="Ehrenpreis p. 739"/> As part of the contract, Motte paid Tooke for the original copyright to the work.<ref name="Ehrenpreis p. 739"/> Motte's work with Jonathan Swift was complicated and risky; one, ''An Epistle to a Lady'', brought about Motte's arrest in 1734.<ref name="DNB"/>

Edmund Curll, as was his habit, claimed that he had the rights to some of Swift's miscellanies. Curll had obtained the works illegitimately and had published them to spite Swift, and he used the controversy with Motte to attempt to generate publicity.<ref>Ehrenpreis p. 742</ref> Although Curll was unwilling to do anything about the reproduction, Pope turned from Motte as his publisher for a fourth edition of the ''Miscellanies'' over a payment dispute and other publication-related complaints.<ref name="Ehrenpreis p. 743">Ehrenpreis p. 743</ref> Pope finally bought out his contract with Motte for twenty-five pounds.<ref>Ehrenpreis p. 744</ref>

Near the end of his life, in 1735, Motte sued the printer George Faulkner of Dublin over Faulkner's importing into Britain of Swift's ''Works''. In Motte v. Faulkner, Motte claimed that many of the works reproduced were under copyright held by Motte from the purchase of the original copyright for many of Swift's writings from Tooke and from a contract directly with Swift to publish ''Gulliver's Travels''. The London courts upheld Motte's claim and ordered that Faulkner's edition of Swift's ''Works'' to be kept from importation into England.

==Publications== Although Motte is most known for his production of Jonathan Swift's ''Gulliver's Travels'', he produced other great works. Many of these works were published on his own, but he did work with many other printers including Samuel Ballard, Charles Bathurst, Bernard Lintot, William Mears, James Round, George Strahan, and Jacob Tonson.<ref>Lynch</ref>

{{col-begin}} {{col-break}} English Works published by Motte: * Eustace Budgell's ''Works'' * Samuel Butler's ''Hudibras'' * William Chillingworth's ''Works'' * William Giffard's ''Cases in midwifry'' (1734) * Alexander Pope's "Verses on Gulliver" * Hans Sloane – ''A Voyage to the Islands of Madera, Barbados, Nieves, S. Christophers and Jamaica'' * Jonathan Swift's ''Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World'' * Jonathan Swift and Alexander Pope's ''Miscellanies in Prose and Verse'' (1727, 1728, 1732) * Joseph Thurston ''The Toilette'' (1730) * John Vanbrugh's ''Works'' * William Wycherley's ''Country Wife'' (1731)

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Works published by Motte and other publishers: * Abraham Cowley ''Works'' translation – Mears and Strahan * John Dryden's ''Don Sebastian'' – Strahan * George Farquhar's ''Comedies'' Lintot and Strahan * Thomas Otway's ''Venice Preserv'd'' – Strahan * Thomas Otway's ''Works'' – Lintot, Strahan, and Tonson * J. Saunders Saunders ''The compleat fisherman'' (1724) – Mears and S. Tooke * Jonathan Swift's ''A Complete Collection of Genteel and Ingenious Conversation'' (1738) – Bathurst * William Willymott's ''English examples to Lily's grammar-rules, for children's Latin exercises'' (1727) – Round {{col-end}}

{{col-begin}} {{col-break}} English translations published by Motte: * Demosthenes's ''Works'' * Euclid's ''Elements'' * Eutropius's ''Works'' * Isaac Newton's ''Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica'' (as ''The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy...'', 1729) * Andrea Pozzo's ''Rules and Examples of Perspective Proper for Painters and Architects'' (1707) * Terence ''Works'' * Jacques Auguste de Thou's ''Works'' * Gerhard Johann Vossius's ''Works'' {{col-break}} English translations published by Motte and other publishers: * Desiderius Erasmus's ''Colloquia'' – Strahan * Juvenal's ''Works'' – Ballard and Mears * Samuel von Pufendorf – ''The Whole Duty of Man, According to the Law of Nature'' (1735) – trans. Andrew Tooke, R. Gosling and J. Pemberton * Sallust's ''Works'' – Ballard * Seneca's ''Epistulae morales ad Lucilium'' – Lintot, Strahan, and Tonson * Thucydides's ''History of the Peloponnesian War'' – Lintot {{col-end}}

Misc. contributions: * ''Oratio Dominica'' "The Lords Prayer in Above a Hundred Languages, Versions, and Characters" (1713) – Motte was typographer for the various languages of the Lord's Prayer. He also wrote the preface and signed it "B. M. Typogr. Lond." * The Royal Society's ''The Philosophical Transactions From the Year 1700 (Where Mr Lowthorp Ends) to the Year 1720'' edited by Motte in 1721.

==Notable publications== The 1728 ''The Last Volume'' of Swift and Pope's ''Miscellanies'' including Pope's ''Peri Bathous'' provoked many pamphlets to be produced against the books.<ref name="Ehrenpreis p. 743"/>

Motte's edition of Isaac Newton's ''Principia'' (1729) was translated by Andrew Motte (1696–1734), his brother and a mathematician who served very briefly as the lecturer on geometry at Gresham College.<ref name="Smet and Verelst p. 1">Smet and Verelst p. 1</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Worms |first1=Laurence | title=Andrew Motte |last2=Baynton-Williams |first2=Ashley | work=British Map Engravers - A Supplement | date=17 October 2019 | url=https://britishmapengravers.net/entries/m-entries/andrew-motte/ | access-date=26 September 2024}}</ref> This was the first English edition and the first translated edition that included the Scholium Generale found in the second Latin edition (1726).<ref name="Smet and Verelst p. 1"/> This edition was the most commonly taught version of Newton's ''Principia'' in English and was therefore considered the "authorized version".<ref>Swerdlow p. 349</ref> However, this edition was deemed "awkward" and "inaccurate" in some locations since it was based on the second Latin edition even when it was later revised by Florian Cajori.<ref>Shapiro ''Principia'' review</ref>

Motte's edition of William Giffard's ''Cases in midwifry'' is the earliest published record of using Chamberlen forceps during childbirth.<ref>Radcliffe, Walter. ''Milestones in midwifery; And, the Secret Instrument'' Jeremy Norman Co. 1989</ref>

==Notes== {{reflist|2}}

==References== *{{cite book| last =Ehrenpreis | first =Irvin |author-link=Irvin Ehrenpreis | title =Jonathan Swift: Volume III | publisher =Harvard University Press, 1983 |ref=refEhrenpreis}} *{{cite journal |doi=10.1177/007327530103900101 |ref=refSmet|title=Newton's Scholium Generale: The Platonic and Stoic Legacy — Philo, Justus Lipsius and the Cambridge Platonists|journal=History of Science|volume=39|pages=1–30|year=2016|last1=De Smet|first1=Rudolf|last2=Verelst|first2=Karin|s2cid=141907610}} *{{cite journal |doi=10.1177/002182860103200405 |ref=refSwerdlow|title=Essay Review: The New ''Principia''|journal=Journal for the History of Astronomy|volume=32|issue=4|pages=349–356|year=2016|last1=Swerdlow|first1=N. M|s2cid=125629186}} * [http://www.english.upenn.edu/~curran/205-505/Estc.html/lynch.html List of Motte's 1720 publications] 3 May 2008 * Shapiro, Alan E. [https://web.archive.org/web/20060504081538/http://www.aip.org/pt/mar00/principia.htm Physics Today ''Principia'' Review] American Institute of Physics. 3 May 2008 * [http://www.oldandsold.com/articles33n/fleet-street-9.shtml Fleet Street And The Press] Reprinted by Old and Sold's Antiques Digest 3 May 2008

==External links== {{wikisource|works=or}}

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Motte, Benjamin}} Category:1693 births Category:1738 deaths Category:British printers Category:18th-century British people