In Szeben (Sibiu, RO), in this central town of the Transylvanian Saxons printing had a long tradition. In the course of the 17th century printers hired the press from the town magistrate. As the tenants were changing very often, it seems that the office was not too profitable. The printings from the Szeben press are very scarce today with very few copies extant.

The view of Szeben in a contemporary engraving

Johann Fabritius who began to work in the previous century, died in 1601 and was followed as a tenant by Simon Grüngras, who was in charge of the press between 1601-1608. He regularly issued calendars in German and Hungarian language. Grüngras was followed by Paul Seel and Paul Wolff (1610-1612) and then Jakob Thilo In the time of the latter the press was apparently more productive and there was a greater variety of genres and contents in the books. His name can be found in the imprint of books between 1616 and 1619.

At the same time the first Transylvanian publisher-bookseller, Benjamin Fiebick appeared. As he had no press at his disposal, the books (Lutheran songbooks with notes) financed by him were printed at Thilo's (RMNy 1123). He also issued at his own cost some books, like a news-pamphlet about the Transylvanian events of 1613 (RMNy 1170) and also continued to publish calendars.

Tail-piece from the Szeben town press

The printing shop of Szeben was inventorized in 1621. In the inventory there are 190 copper matrices, 64 wood block ornaments and 339 wood-cut initials listed. Maybe, the inventory was taken at the death of the printer Thilo. After some years' pause a new printer apperaed in Szeben, Marcus Pistorius who stayed in the town from 1629 for several decades. Judging from his name he was probably coming from Linz - he used his name as Marcus Pistorius of Linz. His first product in Szeben was the trilingual word list by Balázs Szikszai Fabricius from 1629 (RMNy 1151).
In accordance with the language of the inhabitants of this Transylvanian Saxon town, he mostly issued books in German.

Emblematic illustration on the title page of Nomenclatura printed by Pistorius (RMNy 1151)	Three languages with three different types printed in the trilingual Nomenclatura: Latin, German and Hungarian

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LITERATURE:
Régi magyarországi nyomtatványok 2, 1601–1635. Szerk.: Borsa Gedeon és Hervay Ferenc. Budapest 1983.
(for short : RMNy)