book history resources

John Starkey's bookseller's advertisement in the back of John Dancer's translation of Tasso's Aminta (London, 1660; Folger Shakespeare Library, T172)

A brief list of open-access resources for studying early modern book history, with a preference for British history. Updated November 4, 2019.

catalogs & digital collections | vocabulary & glossaries | Latin | book trade | bindings | paper | printers manuals | videos

catalogs and digital collections

book vocabulary and glossaries

help with Latin

book trade

bindings

paper

printers manuals

  • Sometimes you want to hear from the horse’s mouth and that can mean reading early printer’s manuals. Over on EarlyPrintedBooks.com, I keep a list of facsimiles of such manuals, including Moxon and the Encyclopédie .

videos

  • Sometimes the best way to understand something is by watching how it’s done. Over on EarlyPrintedBooks.com I keep a list of videos related to book-making for these purposes, including information on intalgio printing, making type, and paper making.