La Ville de Tours

Guillaume Guéroult (Rouen, 1507 - Lyons, October 7, 1569) was a French publisher, translator and poet. An editor with a troubled and dissolute life, as well as a restless character, Guéroult is considered one of the greatest French printers of the Renaissance. Born in Rouen in 1507, in his youth he acquired a good knowledge of classical languages ​​and, after finishing his studies, he began the art of printing with his uncle, Guillaume-Simon Du Bosc, a bookseller-printer from Rouen. Guéroult adheres to the Reformation together with his uncle around 1540 and in this period writes paragraphs of the Psalms and religious poems already sung and already circulating in manuscripts, before being published in his collection Chansons spirituelles of 1548. Guéroult leaves Rouen to live as a proofreader in Paris and Lyon, cities where printing flourished, as had his uncle, who had been driven out because of the constant harassment and persecution of printers and the reformed. Staying in Lyon he has the opportunity to be appreciated in literary circles, among poets, publishers and engravers. Very active and esteemed, starting from this moment he prepares, on behalf of various libraries, translations or works that will see the light only later.