Date/Time
Date(s) - 20 Apr 2015
5:15 PM - 5:15 PM
Location
Class of 1978 Pavilion, Special Collections Center
Category(ies) No Categories
Monday, 20 April
Penn Workshop in the History of Material Texts.
5:15pm in the Class of 1978 Pavilion in the Kislak Center
on the 6th Floor of Van Pelt-Dietrich Library.
Ray Clemens (Yale),
“Reading the Physical History of the Book When You Can’t Read the Book: The Beinecke Cipher Manuscript.”
Ray writes,
“The Beinecke Voynich Manuscript has puzzled historians since it was first
brought to light by the bookseller Wilfrid Voynich (1865-1930) in the early
years of the twentieth century. Since that time, great effort has been
expended attempting to crack the cipher and reveal the purpose of the
manuscript. Relatively little effort, until recently, has been put into
reading the clues offered by the manuscript’s material production. Failure
to understand this history has led some historians to discount what little
documentary evidence we do have for the book, such as the letter that
indicates that Emperor Rudolf II (1552–1612) paid 600 gold ducats (an
enormous sum) for the manuscript. We will start with an overview of the
many failed approaches to the manuscript: the known unknowns and then
progress to the things that we can say about the manuscript, either from
its physical construction or from documents that clearly describe it (some
of which accompany the manuscript). While this may not bring us any closer
to understanding the script and cipher the book is written in, it can lead
us to a much richer knowledge about the actual book itself and the
interesting road it has traveled from its original manufacture to its
present home in the Beinecke Library.”
*Ray Clemens is the curator for early books at Yale University’s Beinecke
Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Before coming to Yale he was associate
professor of history at Illinois State University. He is the co-author,
with Timothy Graham, of Introduction to Manuscript Studies (Cornell,
2007). He was the acting director of the Newberry Library’s Center for
Renaissance Studies (1997-99) and the recipient of an Andrew Mellon
Postdoctoral Fellowship (2004).*
All are welcome! Please forward this email widely to any who might be
interested. Those who do not hold University of Pennsylvania ID cards
should bring another form of photo identification in order to enter the
library building.