Exploring the world of books at Oxford
Researchers at Oxford and Manchester are working on a research project combining computer vision and human perception to improve ‘optical collation’ – the spotting of differences in printed books. This collate-a-thon provides an opportunity to learn about typographical variance in books and why it matters to book historians, and to make a contribution to our …
by Marina Giraudeau (Intern in Medieval German under the supervision of Henrike Lähnemann) This week, a change of scenery: the History of the Book seminar is meeting at St Edmund Hall! After making our way into the college’s Front Quad, we are warmly welcomed by librarian James Howarth, who will be our enthusiastic guide through …
Written by Delilah Pearson, MSt. in Modern Languages 2025 Week one of Michaelmas saw this year’s History of the Book cohort gather for the first time – M.St. Modern Languages students with a range of specialisms, brought together by their curiosity about, among other things, palaeography, conservation techniques, and discussions surrounding books as cultural objects. As we trickled …
Are you curious about what manuscripts can tell us beyond their texts? Join Digital Scholarship @ Oxford and the Bodleian Libraries for a hands-on workshop using data from manuscript catalogues to explore trends and patterns in medieval manuscript production. You’ll learn: You’ll have the opportunity to work directly with manuscripts from the Bodleian’s collections, learning …
Eighth week of Michaelmas brought the moment we had all been waiting for… having spent the term learning from the experts, it was time for the History of the Book students to put all their newly-founded knowledge into practice. With over a million special collections items to choose from, finding a project was no easy …
The South-East UK Early Modern German Network is delighted to announce its 2025 programme which focusses on early modern printing practices and material culture. All welcome! Monday 20 January, 13:30-15:00, Zoom OnlineJacqui Pearce (Museum of London Archaeology) Bartmann Goes Global! How German stoneware travelled round the known world in the 16th/17th century Monday 3 February, …
Week five’s class at St Edmund Hall offered a fascinating glimpse into the world of library management and the art of caring for collections. Guided by James Howarth, the Hall Librarian, and Emma Carter, the Assistant Librarian, we delved into the practical and philosophical aspects of preserving books—not just for their content, but also for …
by Viviane Arnold, MSt. Modern Languages As the term slowly is coming to the end we had another highlight in our History of the Book course. The class was taught by Andrew Honey, a Book Conservator from the Bodleian Libraries who gave us exciting insights in the method of bookbinding and showed us how the …
By Matthew McConkey As anyone who has grappled with Single Sign-on can attest, humanities researchers and IT are often uneasy bedfellows. It was this perceived <div>ide that the 2024 history of the book students confronted last Wednesday: just what hides behind the intimidating pseudonyms ‘XML’ and ‘TEI?’ Luckily, we had an expert guide in Emma …
Following our foray into textual encoding last week, Dr Giles Bergel joined us from the Visual Geometry Group (https://www.robots.ox.ac.uk/~vgg/) to talk about book-historical uses of computer vision. Originally trained as a book historian, Dr Bergel gave us an overview of the theory behind it, how it has been used in humanities projects, and what computer …