Palaeography

Palaeography: Notes Upon The History of Writing and The Medieval Art of Illumination

 By Bernard Quaritch, 1894

Forward: Of the books which preceded the invention of Printing, a much larger quantity is still extant than the world in general would suppose, but they are nevertheless so widely scattered and so seldom immediately accessible, that only a very long experience will enable any one to speak or to write about them in other than a blundering fashion. So many qualifications are required, that it may seem presumptuous in me to treat upon a matter bristling with difficulties and uncertainties. The brief but admirable outline of its history which Mr. Maunde Thompson has lately published is likely to mislead the inexperienced into a belief that a science defined with so much clearness and apparent ease may as easily be mastered. No one knows better than that accomplished scholar how hard it would be to supply sure and definite criteria for the guidance of palaeographical students in all the branches of their fascinating pursuit. My excuse must be that the observations which appear in the present opusculum may be useful to some who are unable for various reasons to give the necessary fullness of study to Mr. Thompson's work, and who, while loving manuscripts as well as I do, have not had so large an experience. I may venture to justify myself by a personal anecdote. The author of the "Stones of Venice" once said that he was surprised by my apparently exact knowledge of the commercial value of manuscripts; and my reply was that, as I had for twenty years been the buyer of, or the underbidder for, all the fine examples which had appeared in the public auctions, there was no great reason for his wonder.

       The following sketch will consist of a number of cursory remarks upon the calligraphy and the ornamentation of medieval manuscripts ; preceded by an historical sketch, arranged in chronological paragraphs, of the beginnings and the gradual diffusion of the art of writing throughout the world.

* Palaeography (UK) or paleography (US; ultimately from Greek: παλαιός, palaiós, "old", and γράφειν, graphein, "to write") is the study of ancient and historical handwriting (that is to say, of the forms and processes of writing, not the textual content of documents). Included in the discipline is the practice of deciphering, reading, and dating historical manuscripts, and the cultural context of writing, including the methods with which writing and books were produced, and the history of scriptoria. Read more...

1. The Beginnings of Writing
2. Writing in Egypt 5000 B.C.
3. Writing in Chaldaea, 4000 B.C.
4. Progress of the Art, B.C. 2500-1500
5. The Semitic Alphabet about 1700 B.C.
6. The Alphabet in European Greece, 800 B.C.
7. Writing in Italy from 700 to 100 B.C.
8. Roman Writing
9. Indian Writing about 300 B.C.
10. Writing in Central Asia from 300 B.C.
11. Oriental Letters after the beginning of the Christian Era
12. Spain and Gaul under the Romans
13. Influence of the Bible upon writing
14. Writing in Italy during the first five centuries of the Christian era
15. The British Isles during the Roman period
16. The Goths and Germans
17. Irish and British writing
18. Origin of Medieval Illumination
19. Merowingian, Lombardic, Visigothic 
20. The Carolingian Renewal
21. A Review at the standpoint of the Ninth Century
22. Byzantine Work
23. The Tenth Century
24. Scandinavian Writing
25. The Slavonic Alphabet
26. The Labor of Medieval Scribes from the Ninth Century onwards
27. The Illuminated MSS. of the Middle Ages
28. The chief Liturgical Books distinguished
29. The Fourteenth Century in Italy and Germany
30. English Work in the Fourteenth Century
31. French Work in the Fourteenth Century
32. The Fifteenth Century
33. Illuminated Borders in the Fifteenth Century
34. End of the Fifteenth Century

Plates: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22