Manuscript: Did you mean...?

Sometime in 1153 or 1154, the German nun Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179) wrote a letter to the elderly Pope Anastasius IV (1073-1154). Her words were scathing. She called the pope tired and criticized his rule, describing him as too accepting...

The Report of Wenamun (also known as The Tale of Wenamun or The Report of Wenamon) is an Egyptian literary work dated to c. 1090-1075 BCE toward the end of the New Kingdom (c.1570 - c. 1069 BCE). The piece was originally interpreted as an...

Philo of Byzantium's On the Seven Wonders (225 BCE) is the first known list of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World (though it may have been based on earlier works now lost). Philo's list differs from the standard Seven Wonders in replacing...

Monasteries and other religious institutions such as priories and nunneries were a quintessential part of the medieval landscape and an important component of a community's social fabric. Providing spiritual guidance, employment, education...

The key purpose of Melissa Reynolds's first book, Reading Practice: The Pursuit of Natural Knowledge from Manuscript to Print, is to explore how readers interacted with texts and manuscripts related to natural knowledge and how the readers...

Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, a medieval illuminated manuscript illustration depicting the work on an agricultural estate during the month of March. In the background, Mesuline is flying in dragon form over Lusignan Castle, c. 1412-1440...

Detail from the Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, a medieval illuminated manuscript illustration depicting the work on an agricultural estate during the month of March. Condé Museum, Château de Chantilly, Oise.

Depiction of a monk at work copying a text by hand in a writing room known as a scriptorium. From the 5th to the 13th century CE monasteries were the sole producers of books. The scriptorium was a large room with wooden chairs and writing...

God surrounded by seraphim, illustration from the illuminated manuscript Petites Heures of Jean de France, Duc de Berry, 14th-century. Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris.

Book of Revelation, folio 6v and 7r of illuminated manuscript Fr 403 by Maître de Sarum and Hennequin de Bruges, 1240-1250. National Library of France, Paris.