When did publishers stop asserting a monopoly on printings of books in the common domain?

Question

Usually, when a book is published, it reflects the original creative work of scholars, authors and editors who deserve the benefit of that work. So naturally it’s understood that other parties are not supposed to simply re-print and sell that work as if it were their own, competing unfairly with the parties who did the work and earned the right to the benefit of that work.

But when the Talmud was first produced on a movable-type printing press, it was accompanied by the assertion that nobody else was to print the Talmud for a certain period. This was not the usual assertion of creators’ right to the benefit of their work. The people asserting the right were not the authors of the Talmud, and they were not trying to prevent others from using their work at all. It was a more general ban on completely independent work that would compete to the detriment of the one asserting the right. It was as if I decided to sell ice cream and announced that nobody else was to sell ice cream, because that competition would make it hard for me to make money.

I feel that I cannot stress this distinction enough.

Today, when ArtScroll printed the Ramban’s commentary on the Torah, for example, they did some sort of research to decide upon a “best” Hebrew text of that commentary. They paid a team of translators to produce an English translation. Naturally they expect that nobody else will simply reprint the ArtScroll book and sell it in competition with ArtScroll. But they did not announce that nobody else is allowed to print any other edition of the Ramban’s commentary on the Torah. It seems clear enough that such a ban (on other, independent publications of the commentary) would be advantageous to ArtScroll and help them reap a greater profit on their work. But they just don’t assert such a right.

My question is, how and when did this type of assertion go out of fashion? Were the original printings of the Talmud the only examples? Do we know of other publishers who sought such authorization from rabbis and were told that they did not have such a right to keep others from competing with them?

Answer 1

In the days when Rabbinic authority in Europe was far more centralized, it was common that they would decree under power of cherem that publications of important works would be protected for a certain amount of time, so that the sefer would be spread as far as possible, and its author would recoup his expenses. Their authority to do so was based on the general authority of Rabbis to make decrees for the benefit of their community.

For example, when the Tosafos Yom Tov was first published, the Rabbis of Prague (including the Shelah Hakadosh) decreed with a cherem that no one could print any other edition of Mishna with any commentary for four years.

When the printers of the Sulzbach Shas violated such a cherem, the Noda BiYehuda declared anyone who purchased a volume of that edition during the next fifteen years would be in cherem. Source

Nowadays, there is no central governing body with that kind of authority, so the question of whether such rules would be appropriate nowadays is only academic.