, the great bulk of his work bears no date, but several
circumstances in his career, coupled with internal evidence gathered
from the books themselves, enable us to get very near their date of
issue. Like his contemporaries he abandoned the secretary type in favour
of black letter, but neither so readily nor so entirely as they did. His
first black letter, in use before 1536, was also a very well cut and
beautiful letter; with it he printed the _Epistle_ of Erasmus, in
octavo, and the _Book of Good Works_, of which the only copy known is in
the library of St. John's College, Oxford. But unquestionably the two
most important books known of this printer are William Marshall's
_Defence of Peace_, folio, 1535, printed in secretary, and the
_Questionary of Cyrurgyens_, which he printed for Henry Dabbe and R.
Bankes. In 1536 the house in which he was working changed hands, passing
into the possession of the Duke of Suffolk, consequently all books
which have in the colophon 'in the Duke of Suffolkes Rentes,' or 'Beside
the Duke of Suffolkes Place,' were printed after that year. As Wyer
continued to print until 1555, this circumstance does not help us much;
it may, however, be taken as some further guide that all his later work
was done in black letter.

Robert Wyer appears to have done a great deal of work for his
contemporaries, notably Richard Bankes, Richard Kele, and John Gough.

Most of his books have woodcuts, the most profusely illustrated was his
translation of Christine de Pisan's _Hundred Histories of Troy_. This
book had been printed in Paris by Pigouchet, and the illustrations in
Wyer's edition are rude copies of those in the French edition. They are,
without doubt, wretched specimens of the woodcutter's art; but in this
respect they are no worse than the woodcuts found in other English books
at this date, and the number and variety of them speak well for the
printer's patience. Robert Wyer's device represented the Evangelist on
the Island of Patmos, with an eagle on his right hand holding an
inkhorn. With this he used a separate block with his name and mark. He
had also a smaller block of the Evangelist from which the eagle was
omitted. This is generally found on the title-page or in the front part
of his books.

[Footnote 2: It is rather remarkable that of the eight books dated 1534
six are in octavo. Readers of the works of Erasmus, Colet, and Lily seem
to have shown a preference for this form, which is used m