Here Is a Good Boke to Lerne”

Practical Books, the Coming of the Press, and the Search for Knowledge, ca. 1400–1560

Datos Bibliográficos

ID10068763
AutoresMelissa Reynolds (0000-0002-0489-8722, autor de correspondencia)
Año2019
Volumen58
Número2
Páginas259-288
Fecha de publicación2019-04-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaJournal of British Studies (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0021-9371 • E-ISSN: 1545-6986
EditorialCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/jbr.2018.182
OpenAlexW2944227877
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas1
Referencias citadas36

This article compares the circulation and reception of useful knowledge—from medical and craft recipes to prognostications and agricultural treatises—in late medieval English manuscripts and early printed practical books. It first surveys the contents and composition of eighty-eight fifteenth-century vernacular practical manuscripts identified in significant collections in the United States and United Kingdom. Close analysis of four of these late medieval practical miscellanies reveals that their compilers saw these manuscripts as repositories for the collection of an established body of useful knowledge. The article then traces the transmission of these medieval practical texts in early printed books. As the pressures of a commercial book market gradually transformed how these practical texts were presented, readers became conditioned to discover “new” knowledge in the pages of printed books. The introduction to England of the “book of secrets” in 1558 encouraged readers to hunt for “secrets” in unpublished medieval manuscripts, ensuring that these century-old sources would remain important sites for useful knowledge well into the early modern era

Archaeology · Art · Craft · Fifteenth · Literature · Vernacular · Classics · Historical and Literary Studies · Historical Studies and Socio-cultural Analysis · History · Reformation and Early Modern Christianity