Book Production in Paris

Abstract

This chapter surveys the history of book production in Paris, the most important source for manuscript books in northern Europe from the mid-twelfth century until the end of the fifteenth. The authors discuss book production in the eighth and ninth centuries centered in the Benedictine monasteries of Saint-Denis and Saint-Germain, in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries at the Augustinian abbeys of Saint-Victor and Sainte-Geneviève, the commercial production for the University in the same period, as well as the production of glossed Bibles, and single-volume Paris Bibles. Also covered are the booksellers (libraires) and the pecia system, as well as the increase in the copying of vernacular books in the fourteenth century.