Jakov of Kamena Reka

Jakov of Kamena Reka
A page from the Book of Hours printed by Jakov
Born	16th century
Nationality	Venetian
Other names	Kamenče[1] or Osogovac[2]
Occupation	printer
Known for	one of the first printers of Cyrillic books

Jakov of Kamena Reka^[3] (Macedonian: Јаков од Камена Река, Serbian: Јаков из Камене реке; fl. 1564–72) or Jakov Krajkov (Јаков Крајков, Bulgarian: Яков Крайков^[4]) was a Venetian printer. The information about his life is scarce. It is known he was from a former village called Kamena Reka or Stone River,^[3] according to him near the town of Kolasia, in Osogovo, Macedonia.^[5] It is assumed that the village could be Makedonska Kamenica in present-day Republic of Macedonia,^[6] or Kamenichka Skakavitsa, in present-day Bulgaria, both placed in an area in Osogovo called Kamenitsa, near the town of Kyustendil.^[7][8] Also, in some works his birthplace is connected with Kamena Reka, near Kolasin in Herzegovina in today Montenegro.^[9][10][11] Nevertheless, that view is criticized as 19th century Šafárik's misinterpretation of the medieval name of Kyustendil (Kolasia)^[12] with that of the town of Kolasin, that was adopted afterwards by other researchers.^[13][14][15] His family members had a long tradition of being Christian priests.^[16] In his youth Kraikov was a copyist of Church Slavonic books in the Osogovo Monastery "St. Joakim Osogovski". Then he went to Sofia, where in a local Church school, Kraikov deepened his literary knowledge.^[17] However some researchers maintain that Jakov of Sofia and Jakov of Kamena Reka are different historical persons.

Afterwards, he set off through Kyustendil and Skopje to Venice. It is assumed that Kraikov worked on his way in Gračanica monastery where a printing press was opened.^[18] He was among the first printers of Cyrillic books.^[19][20] Kraikov reached Venice around 1564 or 1565 where he worked in the Vuković printing house, established by Božidar Vuković and inherited by his son Vićenco Vuković.^[21] In 1566 (in period of only three and a half months) he printed the Book of hours (Casoslov) of 710 pages on the printing press of Vićenco Vuković.^[22][23] It was printed in Serbian recension of the Church Slavonic language.^[24] To print this book Jakov used old, already worn out, sorts. He had at disposal Vuković's matrix and was prepared to cast new letters but he obviously failed to do it.^[1] This book is described in some sources as the first Bulgarian/Macedonian printed book.^[25][26]

In 1570 Jakov worked in the printing press of Jerolim Zagurović where he printed a Prayer book.^[23] In 1571 Jakov again worked in Vuković printing house, where Stefan Marinović also worked before him.^[27] In 1597 this printing house was taken over by Italian printers (Bartolomeo Ginammi, Marco Ginammi, Giovanni Antonio Rampazetto, Francesco Rampazetto, Georgio Rampazetto, Camillo Zanetti) and its printing press was operational for additional 70 years.^[27]

References

Further reading

• Evgenij L'vovic Nemirovskij : Die venezianische Druckerei des Jakov aus Kamena Reka - Gutenberg-Jahrbuch, 1996, 71
• Марияна Цибранска-Костова, Сборникът „Различни потреби“ на Яков Крайков между Венеция и Балканите през ХVІ век, 2013, Издателство „Валентин Траянов“ ISBN 978-954-9928-63-1.