Michiel Hillen van Hoochstraten

Michiel Hillen van Hoochstraten or Michel Hillenius (Hoogstraten, c. 1476, – Antwerp, 22 July 1558), was a Flemish printer, publisher, bookseller and bookbinder.

[1] His printing press put out publications in a wide range of genres, including imperial ordinances, almanacs, devotional literature, anthologies of customs, textbooks, etc.

[2] He also printed humanistic writings by Erasmus, Adrianus Barlandus and Jacobus Latomus as well as the first Dutch-language version of the story of Till Eulenspiegel.

[3] Michiel Hillen van Hoochstraten is regarded as the most important publisher active in Antwerp in the first half of the sixteenth century.

[5] Michiel Hillen van Hoochstraten printed and published works in a diverse range of genres.

As a result, foreign book printers, including those from Antwerp, played an important role in supplying the English market.

[6] In addition he published in 1530 The practyse of prelates by the English reformer William Tyndale, who resided in Antwerp beginning from 1528.

This book recounts the life of Till Eulenspiegel, a trickster who plays practical jokes on his contemporaries, especially of a scatological nature and exposes his vices at every turn.

Michiel Hillen van Hoochstraten did not base his version on the Grüninger edition but on an earlier German text that is no longer extant.

He probably intended to establish an ecclesiastically approved text reflecting the prevalent view in the study of scripture in his day.

While some titles from his print catalogue were placed on the Index of forbidden books, it appears he never ran foul of the authorities.