Abstract

Written manuscripts underwent massive changes in terms of style and content due to the economic changes in the period between the 1348 plague and 1650, often listed as the end of the renaissance. What has already been studied is the effect these economic changes had on the production of manuscripts. In study of the 1348 plague, it was concluded that the mass death of literate clergy and the labor reconstruction that followed began a causal change leading eventually to a literate population and, in turn, a great increase in production. This trend continued until the introduction of the printing press in 1476, where the low cost of printing was proven to outweigh the social value of the manuscript. While the facts of the matter have been discerned in a clear, statistical manner, research has yet to be done in order to better understand the events from a humanistic lens. Yes, we understand the changes in the manuscript industry, but how did the people directly affected by these changes react? The author uses categorical analysis of digitized manuscripts, ranging from 1350 and 1650 in an effort to determine this. Manuscripts, pulled from the Cambridge and Oxford libraries, are analyzed for the script or scripts used within and are given a rating based on their decorative content. The resulting findings suggest three main ways in which a scribe would adjust to the changing environment: reduction, imitation, and degradation. The simplest of the three, reduction consists simply of the decrease of decorative content, this was primarily pursued in the creation of scientific manuscripts. When it came to literary manuscripts, scribes would seek to imitate the style of the printed book. This served two purposes: reducing variation and therefore work, and creating a manuscript more similar to the style a consumer was accustomed to. The third, degradation, was reserved primarily for religious manuscripts. Degradation consisted not of a decrease in quantity of decorative content, but a decrease in quality.

Keywords: late Middle Ages, England, printing press, economic adaptation

Background to the Manuscript and Printing Industries in England

The printing press was introduced to England by William Caxton in approximately 1476, allowing the printed book to for the first time be seen as a viable alternative to the traditional, non-printed manuscript. Soon the printing industry would begin to grow quickly, with two more printing shops being opened by 1500 and thirty-two more being opened by 1523. As the number of print shops increased greatly, so did the volume of printed books produced (see Fig. 1)

.

Figure 1: Production of Printed Books in England Per Half Century (Photo by Author)

An inverse relationship appears between the production of printed books and manuscripts when the two are compared, with the production of printed books greatly increasing and manuscript production inversely decreasing.

Figure 2: Estimated Manuscript Production in Central Europe, 1300–1309 to 1490–1499

Manuscript production numbers increased by approximately 900% between the year 1300 and their peak production in the period of years between 1460 and 1469. The long-term impacts of the Black Death can be seen during and following the “golden years of English Laborers,” where the lack of laborers and artisans allowed for those remaining to demand higher pay. The scribal population, which consisted mainly of the clergy living in the highly-populated urban centers, were some of the most impacted. The few remaining laborers were able to demand wage increases of roughly 60 percent, causing a generation-long halt in the industry due to the unaffordability of texts. However, increased wages also allowed for increased access to education, raising literacy levels in the general populace and in turn expanding not only demand but production as well. It is only after the impact made by the introduction of the printing press that production of manuscripts lowers, only for the spread of text to be picked up by the superiorly efficient method of print.

While the direct impact made by the introduction of the printing press upon the people within the manuscript industry can be seen through statistics, the experiences of the workers within the industry as they adapted their work to these changes have not been made clear. While the stylization of a manuscript was dependent heavily on the wishes of the person buying it, the decoration of printed texts, being mass-produced, was determined by the vendor who commissioned the text. Despite printed texts taking after manuscripts in terms of style, a certain style began to take hold of printed books. This style, while certainly not humble, was also not necessarily luxurious, it reflected a careful mix of the desires of the average consumer and what was best for the producer. 

The style of printed texts to an extent mimicked that of manuscripts, hoping to provide the reader with a familiar experience. Early type most often resembled the dark, sharp Textura Quadrata used in religious manuscripts of the time. Aside from initialing and rubrication, unnecessary decoration was avoided. However,  necessary decoration was added to supplement the content within. Even then, embellishment in decoration was kept to a minimum, focusing on the dispensation of knowledge rather than the luxury that was once associated with text. A more complete analysis of the changes in style employed by scribes in an effort to match the efficiency of the printing press could provide a greater understanding of both the evolution of late manuscripts and the evolution of printed books up to the style present today. This paper provides an attempt at the above through  humanistic analysis of the changes in manuscript production and decoration in the period between the Black Death and the effective end of the industry. By viewing the history not as fact but as action, efforts are made to better understand not only how manuscripts evolved but why they did so in such a way.

Creation of the Survey

To complete this research, an analysis of changing stylistic methods, namely decoration and choice of script, was carried out through a comparison of decoration and scripts used within digitized manuscripts in the Bodleian Library and the Cambridge Digital Library, produced both prior to and after 1476–the year in which Caxton is believed to have set up shop within England. Manuscripts were selected from between the years of 1348 and 1650 to allow for analysis of changes caused by the effects of the Black Death and, subsequently, the introduction of the printing press. Manuscripts were divided into three categories (high, medium, low) based on the level of decoration which they contained. The decoration level of a manuscript was determined not purely by the amount of decoration present within said manuscript, but also by the cost required to produce said decoration; whether the cost was required due to the amount or type of decoration present was not taken into account. Specific guidelines for manuscript categorization were determined based on previous literary, statistical, and financial research; taking into account both labor and material costs. Manuscripts that consisted simply of either initials or simple borders were considered to have a low level of decoration; whereas manuscripts with a combination of both basic and complex decorations or simple engravings were considered to have a medium level of decoration. Finally, manuscripts where detailed paintwork or engravings were prevalent were considered to have a high level of decoration.

The script used in each manuscript was analyzed manually. For a manuscript that consisted primarily of one script but contained uses of another, classification was given to the script which made up the majority of the manuscript. 

Most manuscripts were marked as either Textura, Anglicana, or Secretary, as these were the main book hand scripts used at the time. In the scenario that a manuscript consisted of a script other than the three listed above, it was simply marked of “other”. Works whose hand(s) displayed qualities of more than one script were marked twice, each time with a different script. 

Of the three main scripts: Textura, due to its precise nature and its larger lettering (requiring a greater surplus of materials), was determined to be the least efficient (and therefore the most costly); Anglicana naturally took its place as the middle-ground script, displaying a mix of fluidity and embellishment; and Secretary, being derived from Anglicana as a way to write more quickly in business and court, became the clear cheapest.  However, when analyzing why a certain script may have been used, the purpose or function of the manuscript beyond the efficiency of production alone was taken into consideration. 

Based on these considerations, two hypotheses were formulated: (1) After the introduction of the printing press, the average level of decoration in scientific and literary manuscripts would decrease heavily. (2) After the introduction of the printing press, the script used in both scientific and literary manuscripts would tend towards secretary. 

It should be noted that religious manuscripts were excluded from these hypotheses. This is due to a few key assumptions regarding the production and ownership of religious manuscripts: (1) Religious manuscripts produced prior to the introduction of the printing press were owned primarily by either religious organizations or the wealthy. (2) As religious manuscripts were owned primarily by either the church or the wealthy, they were likely to have been decorated heavily and with expense. Based on these assumptions, alternative hypotheses were formulated: (1) The sample of religious manuscripts produced prior to the introduction of the printing press consists mainly of manuscripts with either a high or medium level of decoration. (2) The sample of religious manuscripts produced prior to the introduction of the printing press consists mainly of manuscripts written in either an Anglicana or Textura script. While these alternative hypotheses are applied solely to manuscripts of a religious focus, the same process is used to analyze religious texts as are used to analyze secular texts. As stated prior, this process is simply to note the script used and to assign a level of embellishment based on both qualitative and quantitative analysis of the decorational content.  

Scientific Manuscripts

The introduction of the printing press greatly impacted the scientific community, allowing for the more efficient and less expensive dispersion of information and ideas. To keep up with both the increased demand for, and increased production of scientific treatises, the scriptorium were forced to both increase the speed of production and decrease the cost of production in order to stay in business while competing against the far more efficient print shops. This can be seen in the decreasing prevalence of decoration in scientific manuscripts after 1476.

Figure 3: Digitized Scientific Manuscripts in the Bodleian prior to 1476 by Level of Decoration (Photo by Author)

Figure 4: Scientific Manuscripts after 1476 by Level of Decoration (Photo by Author)

Comparing manuscripts produced prior to 1476 and manuscripts produced after 1476, there is a stark increase in the number of manuscripts with no decoration. This can be explained due to the fact that, compared to other genres of written text, the decoration found within scientific literature consisted mainly of diagrams or illustrations. These additions could easily be removed from later copies without much adverse effect to the content within the manuscript itself. In contrast, decoration within religious manuscripts was regarded highly and was often retained for the sake of respect. At the same time, the possible hindrance of understanding brought about by the removal of decoration in scientific manuscripts may have been seen as an acceptable sacrifice for the benefit it brought in terms of both production cost and labor.

A similar pattern can be observed in the use of scripts when comparing scientific manuscripts prior to the printing press and after its introduction in 1476.

Figure 5: Scientific Manuscripts prior to 1476 by Script Used (Photo by Author)

Figure 6: Scientific Manuscripts after 1476 by Script Used (Photo by Author)

When comparing the scripts used in scientific manuscripts before and after 1476,  a clear shift towards use of the secretary script can be seen after the introduction and spread of the printing press. This implies a focus on efficiency and cost of production rather than style and luxury. When put in conjunction with the increased absence of decoration in scientific manuscripts, this paints a picture, not of an industry that is quietly drowning, but rather of an industry that is aware of their demise and fighting to adapt.

Literary Manuscripts

Humans have always told stories, whether orally or in writing. The advent of the printing press only served to further enrich this storytelling tradition, allowing stories that were once passed down primarily through oral storytelling to reach a far wider audience. While the decoration in literary manuscripts was often sparse before the printing press, it was uncommon for it to be non-existent.

Figure 7: Digitized Literary Manuscripts in the Bodleian prior to 1476 by Level of Decoration (Photo by Author)

Humanity’s inherent desire for storytelling was perhaps spurred forth by the increase in quality of life in the years following the Black. While quality of life faced a steep decline in the years immediately following the plague, the lasting economic and social changes allowed for an increase in personal wealth and freedom. Humanity has always had a desire to tell stories, and perhaps the changes faced in the 14th century not only allowed for storytelling to take a larger part in the lives of the English populace but, from their eyes, for it to be actively encouraged. 

This desire for storytelling was only spurred forth by the printing press, whose introduction led to an even greater quality of life increase as a result of the new ability to spread knowledge, religion, and of course, stories.  According to macroeconomic data collected by the Bank of England and processed by Our World in Data, the GDP per capita in England experienced a steady increase for the first 50 years after the introduction of the printing press (see Fig. 8).

Figure 8: GDP Per Capita in England from 1476 to 1526, Adjusted for Inflation (Photo by Author)

However, it would be foolish to think that the printing press alone is what allowed for these stories to take form. The human imagination has always been hyperactive, and as such a far more satisfying argument on this matter is formed not by looking at the cold facts but at the heart. Such an argument is given by Oxford social historian Adam Fox in his book Oral and Literate Culture in England 1500–1700. Fox paints a picture of England where the printing press not only enabled the telling of new stories but also the greater dispersion of old stories. Julia Crick puts it best when she writes:

The part played by print in reviving and propagating the products of scribal culture neatly parallels the manner in which it served to nourish and reinvigorate unwritten tradition. As Adam Fox and others have demonstrated, at least in the short term ‘typography (and indeed chirography) popularised long cherished beliefs that had hitherto been confined to the sphere of speech…

For our context, the printing press not only allowed new stories to be told but furthered the knowledge of traditional English folktales. As tellings or retelling of stories already well known to the English people, they espoused their beliefs and morals. They told stories of great nostalgia and taught lessons of great importance. Storytelling was not only a way to entertain, but a way to instruct. Crick continues by saying:

[…] It preserved legends, rhymes, and pieces of proverbial wisdom on paper and in the guise of the broadsheet rescued many songs from near extinction. Old stories and romances of Robin Hood, King Arthur, Bevis of Southampton, and Guy of Warwick — some of which had flowed out of literate culture themselves —were likewise revitalised.

As the style of the printing press became the standard and England fell into financial crises, it would have become financially infeasible to maintain the level of decoration that would have previously been seen in manuscripts. 

Through analysis and comparison of literary manuscripts prior to and after the introduction of the printing press, the initial hypothesis is proven to be  correct in-part. As expected, there is a far greater number of manuscripts containing little to no decorational content. However, a contrasting increase in manuscripts with high levels of decoration can also be seen.

Figure 9: Literary Manuscripts after 1476 by Level of Decoration (Photo by Author)

With historical context, both contrasting shifts can be explained in terms of the emergence of the printing press. As mentioned earlier, the decoration of a manuscript was highly dependent on the preferences of the person who purchased said manuscript. However, as the printed documents emerged as a majority in the market and the printed style became a standard, the preferences of the buyer can be expected to have changed. As such, it would be expected for the average manuscript style to change to fit these preferences.

A similar change can be seen in the scripts used after the introduction of the printing press, with manuscripts continuing to favor the less efficient Anglicana script.

Figure 10: Literary Manuscripts Prior to 1476 by Script Used (Photo by Author)

Figure 11: Literary Manuscripts After 1476 by Script Used (Photo by Author)

As can be seen, while the percentage of manuscripts utilizing the Anglicana script did decrease after the introduction of the printing press, it did not do so to nearly as much as the hypothesis projected. This again can be explained by the manuscript industry trying to replicate what was considered standard. Of Caxton’s original typefaces which he brought to England, his Type 3 (which is a rounded, Lettre de Forme gothic font that seems to be based on the Littera Textualis script), by virtue of its continued use and replication, has gone on to inform the later used typography of the English language. This typeface, essentially a gothic bookhand, is very similar in both form and appearance to the bastarda Anglicana. While a majority of manuscripts produced in the fifteenth century were plagued with a mixed usage of script, the features of these manuscripts belonged primarily to the Anglicana script as it was the primarily used book hand of the fourteenth century. As such, the analysis of literary manuscripts sheds light on a further strategy of survival for the manuscript industry: imitation.

Religious Manuscripts

Of the religious manuscripts digitized by the Bodleian, too few were produced after the introduction of the printing press to gather reliable data. As such, additional religious manuscripts were gathered from the collections made available by the Cambridge Digital Library. While the total number of religious manuscripts produced decreased drastically after the introduction of the printing press, it can be assumed that the prevalence and importance of religion in the lives of the medieval did not decrease with the introduction of the printing press. In contrast, it was the believed moral need to propagate religion which led to the creation and spread of the printing press to begin with. Inversely, it was this desire to spread religion that was the primary contributor to the decreasing production of religious manuscripts.

While the religious manuscripts digitized by the Bodleian after Caxton  are too scarce to analyze directly, the same cannot be said for religious manuscripts which were produced prior to his arrival in England.

Figure 12: Digitized Religious Manuscripts in the Bodleian Prior to 1476 by Level of Decoration (Photo by Author)

Contrary to the original hypothesis, manuscripts produced prior to the introduction of the printing press were found to vary widely in level of decoration, with almost half having a level of decoration which was classified as “low”. This can be explained through sample bias, with  This can be explained through sample bias, with many of the manuscripts in the serving being produced in the later years prior to the introduction of the printing press, where manuscripts were decreasingly seen as luxuries and were increasingly owned by the common person. As such, and with the manuscript industry being primarily commission based, the level of decoration in religious manuscripts decreased drastically to allow for cheaper and speedier production.

Figure 13: Religious Manuscripts Prior to 1476 by Script (Photo by Author)

The same can be seen with the use of script in religious manuscripts prior to 1476, but to a more minimal extent. While nearly 40% of the manuscripts analyzed were written in an Anglicana script, a substantial number of manuscripts still utilized the Textura script which was traditional to the field. This goes to show the endurance of luxury in regard to religious manuscripts against the force of economic and mercantile change. While the deterioration of script and decoration continues nevertheless more strongly after the introduction of the printing press, religious manuscripts still maintain a substantial amount of their former luxury when compared to other forms of written text.

Figure 14: Religious Manuscripts After 1476 by Level of Decoration (Photo by Author)

Figure 15: Religious Manuscripts After 1476 by Script

The survey conducted for this research analyzed hundreds of digitized manuscripts from both the Bodleian Library and the Cambridge Digital Library, showing  that more than a quarter of religious manuscripts produced after the introduction of the printing press still maintained a level of decoration that was classified as  “high.” However, many of these “highly decorated” manuscripts were still shown to employ methods to decrease production costs.

These efforts were observed to have come mainly from sacrifices to both the level of detail and the quality of ink used to produce illustrations within the manuscript. While the manuscripts, to an extent, maintained their level of luxury; they sacrificed their level of quality to obtain it. This pattern of imitating the styles of old can be seen, furthermore, in manuscripts classified as having either a medium or low level of decoration. In these manuscripts, the decoration is made up primarily through stylized initials and headings. While in the past such forms of decoration would have been illustrated with vibrant inks, after the introduction of the printing press they began to be illustrated with the same ink as the rest of the manuscript. Thus, analysis of religious manuscripts illuminates a third method by which the stylization of manuscripts is adapted to keep up with the changing economy and market: loss of quality.

Conclusion

Results of the survey and further analysis of economic and cultural conditions of the times reveal three methods by which manuscript production adapted to the various economic and social changes in England between 1300 and 1650: (1) A decrease in the use of decoration and a shift towards a more efficient script, (2) An effort to imitate the style of printed text, (3) A change in the usage of decoration, shifting from decoration as a form of luxury or embellishment and towards decoration purely as a way to convey information. Although the research presented in this study is limited both by sample size and in part by sample bias, it serves to illuminate the scribal industries in England not as a dying market, but as an outdated technology fighting to survive in a changing world. However, additional research in this sphere is warranted as the human elements to change must still be solidified further. 

Further research could further study the ways in which specific events and actions lead to the observed patterns through a lens not merely of statistical proof, but of explanation through cultural change. Analyses of manuscript decoration could attend to the short periods of years both prior to and after an event of focus, with the further ripple effects of said event being examined only as a secondary focus. Such research would allow for an intimate understanding of the more personal, deliberate shifts in stylization made by individual scribes and within individual manuscripts rather than the relatively wide focus of the research above. While an understanding has been formed of how the scribal industries adapted in a general sense, great progress can still be made when it comes to allowing the scribe as an individual to be seen.

Bibliography

Bank of England. A Millennium of Macroeconomic Data, 2017. Processed and distributed by Our World in Data. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gdp-per-capita-in-the-uk-since-1270.

Blades, William. The Biography and Typography of William Caxton, England’s First Printer. New York: Scribner and Welford, 1882. https://lccn.loc.gov/09024383.

Bühler, Curt F. The Fifteenth-Century Book: The Scribes, The Printers, The Decorators. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1960.

Buringh, Eltjo, and Jan Luiten Van Zanden. “Charting the ‘Rise of the West: Manuscripts and Printed Books in Europe, A Long-Term Perspective from the Sixth through Eighteenth Centuries.” The Journal of Economic History 69, no. 2 (2009): 409–45. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022050709000837.  

Cambers, Andrew. Godly Reading: Print, Manuscript and Puritanism in England, 1580–1720. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011.

Fox, Adam. Oral and Literate Culture in England 1500–1700. United States: Oxford University Press, 2000.

Neddermeyer, Uwe. “Möglichkeiten und Grenzen einer quantitativen Bestimmung der Buchproduktion im Spätmittelalter." Gazette du livre médiéval 28 (1996): pp. 23–32.

Overty, Joanne Filippone. “The Cost of Doing Scribal Business: Prices of Manuscript Books in England, 1300–1483.” Book History 11 (2008): pp. 1–32. https://www.jstor.org/stable/30227411.

Parkes, M.B.. English Cursive Book Hands 1250–1500. London: University of California Press, 1980. 

Siebert, Fred S. (Fred Seaton). Freedom of the Press in England, 1476-1776: the Rise and Decline of Government Controls. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1952. https://doi.org/10.1086/ahr/58.2.349.

Smith, Jeremy. "On Scriptae: Correlating Spelling and Script in Late Middle English" Revista Canaria de Estudios Ingleses 80 (April 2020): 13-27. https://doi.org/10.25145/j.recaesin.2020.80.02.

Thompson, Wendy. “The Printed Image in the West: Woodcut.” The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Department of Drawings and Prints, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, October 2003. https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/wdct/hd_wdct.htm.

Updike, Daniel Berkeley. “Types of the Fifteenth Century in England.” In Printing Types: Their History, Forms, and Use, 113–125. Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1966.

Walshman, Alexandra and Julia Crick, eds. The Uses of Script and Print, 1300–1700. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.