My MESA
Creative Commons License
This exhibit has not been peer reviewed.  [Return to Group]  [Printer-friendly Page] 

The Genesis of a Medieval Manuscript

lquigley

Picture

Overview:

Once the scribe has procured the parchment and prepared his ink, desk, and penknife, he is ready to begin the process of transcription.  The remainder of the steps in manuscript production generally followed a clearly defined series of steps:
  1. Transcription in black ink
  2. Rubrication
  3. Illustration
  4. Correction
  5. Glossing

While the order of some of these steps are interchangeable (for example, illustration could occur before rubrication, and correction could -- and often did -- occur before the glossing process), scribes appear to have followed this sequence more often than not.  The next few sections will explore in-depth each step in the process.

Picture