Category: Book History
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Week 17: Provenance and the Individual Book in the Digital Age
Another chapter down. This one was on reception and readership and – combined with some very exciting plans for a new project which I’ve been cooking up with a friend down south – it’s been making me think about provenance and book ownership even more than usual. “[People] care about what makes a book unique“ A…
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A Stray Letter and a Unique Book
At a recent workshop in Edinburgh I was comparing notes with two colleagues about which bibliographies of Scottish printing we owned (such are the exciting lives of academics). In the course of the conversation both related their pleasure at having obtained copies of that magnum opus of Scottish book history, the Bibliographia Aberdonensis, a systematic account…
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The Poet in the Print Shop
A couple of years ago I was reading the account book of Robert Freebairn’s print shop in Edinburgh (because what could be more thrilling?) and came across some unusual entries. In amongst the regular business of the shop – “for a new barr-shaft to the press”, “for ten fathom of cords for hanging books”, “for…
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The Joys of Data Entry
A few months ago I mentioned that one of the chapters of my new book would be about the public reception of the early Enlightenment texts I’m writing on. Now, the spreadsheet of subscribers to Scottish books (c.1700-1740) continues to grow apace and, indeed, that’s what I’m trying to finish so I can move forward to…
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An Excursus into Bookbinding: MacLehose of Glasgow
A couple of days ago, I had bindings on my mind. I’d been discussing Scottish bindings with a friend and that evening found myself looking at my own library for any which stood out from the ordinary run. Pulling a couple of volumes off the shelves, the third Miscellany of the Spalding Club (Aberdeen, 1846) and…
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The Future of Early Modern Scottish Studies
What a great conference! I probably shouldn’t say that quite so unreservedly, given that I was one of the organisers, but last weekend’s conference on “The Future of Early Modern Scottish Studies” really did exceed all expectations. Over two days we had twenty-two speakers from across Europe and America, two roundtable discussions, five debate-filled coffee…
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Peeling Back the Layers of an Eighteenth-Century Book
Amongst my weaknesses may be counted a taste for collecting the books I study. This led me, a few days ago, to be in the happy condition of owning a copy of Alexander Nisbet’s System of Heraldry, 2 vols. (Edinburgh, 1722-42), one of the heftier sets of antiquarian folios to be published by the eighteenth-century Scottish book…
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Perthshire Libraries: Leighton and Innerpeffray
Perthshire is unique in Scotland – perhaps unique in Britain – for containing two seventeenth-century public libraries, both still housed in purpose-built early modern buildings: the Leighton Library in Dunblane and the Innerpeffray Library in Innerpeffray. The Leighton Library was established in 1684 under the terms of the will of Robert Leighton, Archbishop of Glasgow…
Kelsey Jackson Williams 