Geoffrey Chaucer

Malcolm Beckwith Parkes

Elizabeth Salter

A Facsimile of Corpus Christi College Cambridge MS 61

Troilus and Criseyde

The study of writing and reading in the middle ages is not only of direct importance to the understanding of its culture but also fascinating in its own right. Scribes, Scripts and Readers brings together fifteen essays by M.B. Parkes, the author of English Cursive Book Hands, 1250-1500. Centred on England and her direct neighbours, they deal with scribes and schools of writing, scribal techniques, and wider questions of communication in written language, literacy and the availability of books. This is a book of interest not only to palaeographers but also to historians, linguists, literary scholars and librarians.

Studies in the Communication, Presentation, and Dissemination of Medieval Texts

Scribes, Scripts, and Readers

Following on from his acclaimed study of punctuation, Pause and Effect, this new book by Malcolm Parkes makes an equally fundamental contribution to the history of handwriting. Its purpose is to focus on the writing of scribes from late antiquity to the beginning of the sixteenth century, and to identify those features which are a scribe's personal contribution to the techniques and art of handwriting. The text is illustrated with 69 plates, and accompanied by a glossary of technical terms, which in itself makes a significant contribution to the subject.

Malcolm Beckwith Parkes

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