Writers Seeking Readers

Texts are written to be read, and to ensure that a work will find as many readers as possible, action must be taken. In the age of the manuscript book, as now, authors recognized the necessity of publishing their work. Even so, the question as to how this was done in the Middle Ages, and to what effect, has only recently evolved into a sustained scholarly debate. Spanning more than eleven centuries, from Late Antiquity to the Renaissance, this volume offers the most comprehensive contribution to that discussion to date.

Drawing on a wide array of sources, including letters, hagiography, historiography, commentaries, scholastic treatises, and humanist writings, the contributions investigate the diverse contexts in which medieval publication practices took shape. Topics addressed include the relationship between authorship and royal or ecclesiastical patronage, the social and professional dimensions of disseminating texts, the emergence of vernacular literary identities, and the evolving interplay between manuscript and print cultures. Together, these studies illuminate the complex mechanisms through which medieval authors sought readers and shaped their own reception.

Samu Niskanen, Introduction

Jesse Keskiaho, The Publication and Early Reception of De statu animae by Claudianus Mamertus

Marco Cristini, Cassiodorus’ Variae and the Gothic War: a Case Study on the Role of Authorial Publication in Sixth-century Diplomacy

Andrea Verardi, The Libellus sacrosyllabus of Paulinus II of Aquileia: Publishing and Ecclesiastical Assemblies

Christian G. Schweizer, Published, Not Perished: Dicuil’s Gifts for Louis the Pious

Sarah Maria Schnödewind, "Opening Doors" to Different Elite Networks and a Wider Audience? The Case of Rangerius of Lucca

Andrew N. J. Dunning, Organic Publishing as a Systemic Practice: a Case Study in the Cult of St Frideswide in Eleventh- to Sixteenth-century Oxford

Sofia Lodén and Leah Tether, Translating Copyright: Herr Ivan and the Impediment of Chrétien de Troyes

Maria Cristina Rossi, Writing and Publishing in the Workshop of Thomas Aquinas: from the First Autograph Drafts to Dissemination

Sofia Brusa, "In propatulum edidit": the Publication of Albertino Mussato’s Ecerinis (1315)

Jakub Kujawiński, Nicholas Trevet OP (c.1258–after 1334) as Publishing Friar: Part II. Quaestiones

Teresa Nocita, An Author’s "Testament": Boccaccio, the Decameron and the Hamilton 90 Codex

Lori J. Walters, Christine de Pizan’s Queen’s Manuscript as the High Point of Her Career as Publisher

Cecilia Sideri, Releasing and Promoting One’s Own Works: Poggio Bracciolini and His Latin Diodorus

Taneli Puputti, Promoting Historical Texts during the Italian Renaissance: the Case of Flavio Biondo’s (1392–1463) Decades

Antti Ijäs, The Publication of Philippo Vadi’s De arte gladiatoria dimicandi

Omar Khalaf, Appropriating Authority: William Caxton, Wynkyn de Worde, and the Publication of Earl Rivers’ Dicts and Sayings of the Philosophers

Outi Merisalo, The Publishing Strategies of Antonio Brucioli (1487–1566)

Manuscripts Cited

General Index