Fai clic su di un'immagine per andare a Google Ricerca Libri.
|
Sto caricando le informazioni... Latin manuscripts : An elementary introduction to the use of critical editions for high school and college classes (1897)di Harold Whetstone Johnston
Nessuno Sto caricando le informazioni...
 Iscriviti per consentire a LibraryThing di scoprire se ti piacerà questo libro. Attualmente non vi sono conversazioni su questo libro.  waltzmn | Aug 26, 2012 |  nessuna recensione | aggiungi una recensione
Appartiene alle Collane Editoriali
Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: THE TRANSMISSION OF THE BOOKS. 'PHE PERIOD COVERED.?The creative genius of the Ro- 42 mans ends, so far as literature is concerned, with the reign of Trajan (97-117 A. D.). From this time until the invention of printing the preparing and publication of books did not vary from the methods described above, except so far as the parchment codex differed in form from the papyrus roll. During this period of about thirteen centuries we have now to consider the fates of the published works, or in other words of the manuscripts that contained them: the means that were taken to preserve them, how they were lost, and then after nearly a thousand years partially recovered. This period may be naturally divided into three very unequal portions: i. The Period of the Decline, extending roughly to the Germanic invasions of about the fifth century; 2. The Dark Ages, extending to about the thirteenth century; 3. The Revival of Learning. It must be remembered that we are concerned with the social, political and literary history of these times so far only as it relates to the Transmission of the Manuscripts. The Period Of The Decline.?It is a fact well known to all 43 students of literature that at the time when genius is least productive and originality most torpid the masterpieces of an earlier day will be most carefully studied and appreciated. This is eminently true of Roman literature: its darkest period saw the establishment of public libraries, the growth of schools and universities on humanistic lines, the rise of the grammarians, and the classics made the last defense of paganism against Christianity. All these agencies made for the preservation of literature, so far as it was preserved at all, and must be examined therefore in some detail. 44 Public Libraries.?The growth of pri... Non sono state trovate descrizioni di biblioteche |
Discussioni correntiNessunoCopertine popolari 
 Google Books — Sto caricando le informazioni...VotoMedia: (3)
Sei tu?Diventa un autore di LibraryThing. |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
1
The study of paleography and textual criticism is vast, and applies to every language which has a written tradition predating the invention of printing. Confining the subject to early Latin manuscripts helps somewhat -- but not much. You still have to understand all the aspects of ancient copying (preparing parchment or papyrus, pens and ink, scriptoria, lighting). You still have to learn the various problems scribes had (from homoeoteleuton to dittography to the need for a corrector). You still have to learn that the shape of the alphabet, and the conventions of spelling, change over time. You have to know about palimpsests, and pseudonymous authors. As I said, the subject is vast.
This book isn't big enough to cover it all. No book ever published has been. But if you want a quick view, this covers most of it. The chapter names are indicative: "The Making of Manuscripts," "The Publication and Distribution of Books," "The Transmission of the Books," "The Keeping of the Manuscripts," "Styles of Writing," "The Errors of the Scribes," "Methods and Terminology of Criticism," "Textual Criticism," "Individual Criticism." All of these sections are too short. But at least they're all there. Plus there are many fine facsimilies of important Latin manuscripts.
Of course, the book is more than a century old. The field has advanced greatly -- to mention just two obvious improvements, we now have computer collations, plus infrared and ultraviolet photography to allow us to read previously-unreadable manuscripts. None of this is covered, and they have changed the field. So this shouldn't be the last book you read. But there are worse choices for a first book. And the subject can be genuinely fascinating. (