Erik Kwakkel
@erikkwakkel.bsky.social
Professor of Book History at UBC School of Information, Vancouver. Into medieval manuscripts. He/his. Blog: https://medievalbooks.nl. Writing a book on ads by medieval scribes. “There is more to life than medieval books, but it's a good place to start.”
Extraordinary lecture that will give you an hour+ of pure joy. Highly recommended.
Carin Ruff@carinr.bsky.social · 12mo agoRare Book School has posted a lecture by Paul Needham on his most recent work on the Catholicon Press: youtu.be/o4aMEB38slw?... Paul is in good form and his presentation of the evidence is clear, whether you're on board with the theory or not. #bookhistory
Using bibliographical format to fill your boxes: 2°, 4°, 8°, two 12°s. #Bibliography #BookHistory 📚💙
Testing 1,2,3: this original cover for a schoolbook (Cicero and other classical school texts) is completely filled with pen trials. The name Hainz/Haintz appears a lot, perhaps student’s name? (Munich, BSB, Clm 18941, 15th c, digitized here: tinyurl.com/5n8furud, see pic 143)
🎉✨The Destruction of Medieval Manuscripts in England ✨ Absolutely delighted to announce that my second book has just been released (and it's open access; free to download at the link below!). academic.oup.com/book/59790?f...
The Destruction of Medieval Manuscripts in England: Institutional Collections
Abstract. It is generally accepted that the contingencies of manuscript survival have disproportionately destroyed some sorts of manuscripts and not others
academic.oup.com
Just came across this web resource: 76 digitized handwriting manuals 1600-1800 - mostly with models for handwriting exercises (bibliotheques-specialisees.paris.fr/search/N-503...). A bored child learning to write doodled in one of them (source: bibliotheques-specialisees.paris.fr/ark:/73873/p...).
Encountered during morning walk in Stanley Park. Love the scene, shoe not mine.
This spectacular Bible was created by a scribe in Mainz in 1452-53, while elsewhere in the city Gutenberg was creating the printed equivalent that would put the scribe out of business. The digitization is of equal high quality: www.loc.gov/item/52002226/. #medievalsky
Just saw this on #TodayILearned and that led me to @erikkwakkel.bsky.social ! #OldBooks www.thisiscolossal.com/2014/01/this...
This 16th Century Book Can Be Read Six Different Ways
Sure, the Amazon Kindle might have dynamic font adjustments, and it can hold thousands of books, but can it do this? Printed in the late 16th century this small book from the National Library of Swede...
thisiscolossal.com
Started to work on something new, a manuscript lost in the 1870 fire that destroyed the Public and University Library in Strasbourg. The pile in the foreground I imagine holds the remains of the codex I am writing about, how sad (Musée hist. de Strasbourg, R.20694), more exhibit: buff.ly/srNXVZy.
Give yourself a free present. Here’s a OA download for your paleography fix.
Carin Ruff@carinr.bsky.social · 2y agoRelated to @lisafdavis.bsky.social Breakfast #Paleography post today: let me recommend @erikkwakkel.bsky.social's "Biting, Kissing and the Treatment of Feet: The Transitional Script of the Long Twelfth Century" in this excellent book: www.aup.nl/en/book/9789... (short 🧵)
Alert: great opportunity if you are interested in doing a PhD around early book. Salaried (!) Marie Curie Doctoral Research position advertised by the U of Bristol within the exciting “Remediating the Early Book: Pasts and Futures” project (@rebpaf.bsky.social). uk.indeed.com/viewjob?jk=c...
There's an interesting new blogpost by Ellie Jackson at the BL: blogs.bl.uk/digitisedman... #fragmentology #mssprovenance
An unknown leaf from the Poor Clares of Cologne
The involvement of nuns in creating beautiful medieval manuscripts is often underappreciated. It is very exciting, then, to discover a new example of their work. While searching for items to include i...
blogs.bl.uk
Rehearsal for Handel’s Messiah, tomorrow in the beautiful Orpheum in Vancouver. We sound good and I feel you should all come.
Peaceful coexistence: Ox (in watermark) sharing the page with several "book worms" (beetle larvae), who left those oddly-shaped channels. Berlin, SBPK Magdeb. 89, 15th c https://buff.ly/49xfsft
All I want for Christmas is a red medieval binding with an original title label (fenestra) and brass-enforced corners... Marburg UB Ms. 37
This book on astronomy has a great deal of student notes bound in with the text. These small inserts did not usually make it, but here they are, in abundance! More on these tiny class notes ("schedula") in this blog post: https://buff.ly/2rFt0Vl. Tübingen UB Mc 64, 15th c https://buff.ly/41tCodx
I’ve gotten into this odd but useful routine of writing a page or two and then read it back on my phone. The small screen creates the distance I need to see if what I wrote made sense. More text in a single view helps with that.
Delighted to announce that my second book, The Destruction of Medieval Manuscripts in England, is coming out with Oxford University Press in April Details here: global.oup.com/academic/pro...
Fully-funded PhD scholarship opportunity on project on ‘The hidden voices of early printed books (c. 1450-1750)’ at the University of Manchester. Supervised by me and my wonderful colleague Tabitha Tuckett in collaboration with Chetham’s Library. Please share! www.findaphd.com/phds/project...
[HUMS Bicentenary PhD] The hidden voices of early printed books (c. 1450-1750): A data-driven approach to social justice in library catalogues of small and medium heritage collections at The Universit...
PhD Project - [HUMS Bicentenary PhD] The hidden voices of early printed books (c. 1450-1750): A data-driven approach to social justice in library catalogues of small and medium heritage collections at...
findaphd.com
This is an interesting volume, which includes actual medieval letters - not copied onto new pages, but physically bound into the volume. Some have clear traces of having been folded, with seal and recipient name still in place (see pics). Tübingen UB Mc 63 https://buff.ly/3ZNa6tp
Writing a book on advertisements sheets of lay scribes operating writing businesses in late medieval cities. They took momentum away from Church. BUT. Now I suddenly have a sheet tied to a monastic house. Pardon? Those folks shouldn’t be into commerce! This needs serious creativity. Coffee time.
Got ya! Just identified the origins of a bookbinding I'm working on via 1931 pub with rubbings from German bindings: the Benedictine Abbey of Tergernsee! The attested date of the in-house (!) blindstamp (1503) matches the date of the volume (Augustine: Froben, 1506). Good end of a good day.
I don't like math either, but there is no need to splash ink all over it! Tübingen UB Mc 64
Ivory panels with two evangelists writing, pen and inkwell in hand. Binding looks odd with 11th-century ivory cuttings in much later (18th/19th-century) leather board. Berlin, SBPK, theol. lat.fol. 2. https://buff.ly/49sovhH
Do you have a leaf of this manuscript in your collection that we might not know about? DM me!
This list of Sumerian words, like a very ancient dictionary, dates to ~2300 BCE from the ancient city of Ebla. Remarkably, one of the words listed is sha-zu, which means “midwife” (“one who knows the inside”). A midwife in a 4,300-year-old clay tablet cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts/24...
