English Cursive Book Hands, 1250-1500
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A01=M.B. Parkes
Alexander De Villa Dei
Anglicana Formata
Anglicana handwriting
Anno Domini
Approach Stroke
Author_M.B. Parkes
bodleian
Bodleian Library
Book Hand
broken
Broken Strokes
Category=WFU
century
eq_bestseller
eq_crafts-hobbies
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
fifteenth
Iuxta Illud
Lambeth Palace Library
library
manuscript studies
medieval English handwriting analysis
medieval palaeography
mid
Mid Fifteenth Century
minim
Minim Strokes
plate
previous
Previous Plate
scribal practices
script evolution
Secretary script development
strokes
Product details
- ISBN 9780859675352
- Weight: 700g
- Dimensions: 210 x 280mm
- Publication Date: 22 Nov 1979
- Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Hardback
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First published in 1969, English Cursive Book Hands rapidly established itself as a key resource for the study and teaching of palaeography. It covers the changes in handwriting that arose from the mid-twelfth century, tracking the growth and development of the cursive script that came to dominate book production in medieval England. This reprint is a re-issue of the 1979 second edition published by Scolar Press. This study sets out the nature of the developments which took place in English book hands, from the mid-twelfth century, largely determined by two factors: the increasing demand for books, and the increase in the size of the works to be copied. The secularization of learning and the rise of the universities created a voracious demand for texts and commentaries. At the same time improving standards of literacy led to a demand from a wide range of patrons for books of a more general nature. In such circumstances speed and ease of writing became increasingly important. Scribes began to use different kinds of handwriting for different classes of books, and as a result a new 'hierarchy' of scripts arose, each with its own sequence of development. Towards the end of the thirteenth century the cursive script which had recently been evolved for the preparation of documents was introduced into books. A hierarchy also arose in the cursive script itself, as scribes began to devise more than one way of writing depending on the degree of formality they required. Eventually the varieties of cursive usurped the functions of other scripts in the copying of nearly all kinds of books and documents. English Cursive Book Hands illustrates the developments which took place in the cursive handwriting used in England for writing books.
M.B. Parkes (1930 - 2103) was Professor Emeritus of Palaeography in the University of Oxford, and Fellow emeritus of Keble College. He was a Senior Fellow of the British Academy, a Corresponding Fellow of the Medieval Academy of America, and had been Visiting Professor at the University of Konstanz (1974 and 1980), James T. Hill Visiting Professor at the University of Minnesota (1991), and Visiting Professor of Latin at Harvard University (1997). He is the author of Their Hands Before Our Eyes: A Closer Look at Scribes and his other publications include Pause and Effect: An Introduction to the History of Punctuation in the West; both books are also available from Ashgate.
