2026 International Medieval Congress at Leeds: Program

July 1, 2026 in Announcements, Conference, Conference Announcement, International Medieval Congress, Manuscript Studies

“Manuscripts at Play and as Play:
Temporalities and (Re)Configurations
as Reading Methods”

Session Sponsored
by the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence
at the 2026 International Medieval Congress
(In person or Hybrid)
6–9 July 2026

Organisers:
Michael Allman Conrad
and Mildred Budny

Session 609
Tuesday, 7 July 2026
11:15 am –12:45 pm British Summer Time (= GMT+1)

Hybrid:
Laidlaw Library, Teaching Room 2
and online for Congress Registrants

The Name of the Game

For 2026 the RGME proposes to explore the nature of play in manuscripts across time and place. We think of manuscripts at play, as play, and in play.

With the success of our activities at the International Medieval Congress (IMC) at Leeds in 2024 and 2025, we prepare for another year responding to the “Special Thematic Strand” selected for the 2026 IMC:

Temporalities

Our choice of session addresses

“Manuscripts at Play and as Play:
Temporalities and (Re)Configurations
as Reading Methods”

After announcing and successfully completing our 2026 Call for Papers, we selected the programme for our session, announced here and in the

2026 IMC Programme (page 160).

For information about the IMC:

International Medieval Congress at Leeds
2026 IMC Programme
Call for Papers for the 2026 IMC, with the Special Thematic Strand of “Temporalities”.
IMC 2026 Padlet, with poster-like announcements of Calls for Papers

The Plan:
Locating Manuscripts in Their (Mobile) Temporalities

For the 2026 IMC and its Special Theme, we explore manuscripts in terms of the essence of their ‘temporalities’ (also see Temporalities) — that is, in a nutshell, “the state of existing within or having some relationship with time”, which pertains intrinsically to any physical object, just like its “spatial position”. That essence or condition, combining location with points in time, forms both centerpiece and focus-point going forward in our continuing studies of Manuscript Evidence.

Building upon the success of our activities at the annual IMC in 2024 and 2025, we extend the subject of one of our Sessions at the 2025 Congress, namely:

“Knowledge Games and Games of Knowledge”, organised by Michael Allman Conrad (see RGME @ 2025 IMC: Program)

2025 Leeds: “Knowledge Games and Games of Knowledge” Poster 1. Set in RGME Bembino.

For the 2026 ICMS, we seek to examine games and playful approaches of multiple kinds with regard to manuscripts. The opportunities across time range from the creation of a book to its use in the world. We observe, for example, habits of entering scribbles and sketches as spontaneous or imaginative playtime on the one hand to creating and transmitting texts about games or gaming strategies.

Aims

By their nature, whether text or image, the planarity of manuscript surfaces offers invitations for readers to engage with them playfully. This play entails a process of temporalisation, of setting manuscript elements into motion, resulting in configurations and re-configurations that are keys for deciphering hidden — or less apparent — meanings. While carmina figurata or picture poems may range among the most obvious examples, they are by no means limited to them. Such elements can include scribbles and sketches, diagrams (including game diagrams specifically), material extensions (such as volvelles and other pop-up features), acrostics, and other puzzles. We consider the performativity and dynamics at work, or play, on the pages.

We examine a wide range of materials and genres and from a variety of perspectives, to consider case-studies, work-in-progress, or research results celebrating the roles of play in which manuscripts engage, and which they might inspire in us as readers, scholars, and beholders.

Want to play? Are you game?

Our Session

“Manuscripts At Play and As Play:
(Re)Configurations as Reading Methods”

IMC Session 609 – Hybrid
(2026 IMC Programme, page 160)

Laidlaw Library, Teaching Room 2
For Location see:

Campus Map, Number 63:

Sponsor:

Research Group on Manuscript Evidence

Organisers:

Mildred Budny
Research Group on Manuscript Evidence, New Jersey
and
Michael Allman Conrad

Moderator:

N. Kıvılcım Yavuz
Institute for Medieval Studies / School of History, University of Leeds

Presentators

1. Michael A. Conrad
Literatur-, Kunst- und Medienwissenschaften, Universität Konstanz

“Can There Be Fun in Coding and Decoding?:
What Game Theory Has to Say about Medieval Carmina Figurata“

Abstract (see also the IMC 2026 Portal: MAC’s Paper)

By discussing examples from Rhabanus Maurus’ De laudibus sanctae crucis and others, the paper aspires to position the playfulness of medieval carmina figurata within the framework of the history and theory of games and play. How do the game-like features of carmina figurata impact the special relationship they establish between readers and reading? The apparent isomorphy of ludic and cognitive movements is key here, since this directly ties into the similarly linear movements of acrostics, mesostics, and telestics. Given this game-like quality, the paper argues for the relevance of fun, discussed both in terms of contemporary concepts, such as laetitia temporalis and gaudium spirituale as well as in the light of modern game theory.

2. Mildred Budny
Research Group on Manuscript Evidence, New Jersey

“Pages and Words at Play across Time:
Text as Puzzles and Images as Playful Creations”

Abstract (see also the IMC 2026 Portal: MB’s Paper)

Manuscript surfaces offer scope and expanse for play by image and words, whether separately or combined. Leaving the corpus of structured games as such to other studies, here I focus on several classes of play at work on the pages of medieval manuscripts. They range from marks integral to the original production to additions entered on available surfaces. Acquired scribbles, doodles, pen-trials, and sketches—related to existing marks on the page or not—represent a wide range of skill sets, from untutored or childish to consummately masterful. Earnest forms of word play embedded in the texts can be seen in carmina figurata and textual puzzles posed by acrostics, mesostics, and telestics. We will explore elements of play and forces at play in selected case studies.

Respondents

1. Antony R. Henk
Englisches Seminar, Ruhr-Universität Bochum

Antony reports:

In my response, I will reflect on the depictions of the Holy Land, both textual and pictorial, present in a ninth-century recension of Adomnán’s De locis sanctis in Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Latin 13048. Building on the established model of pilgrimage narratives as enabling a peregrinatio in stabilitate, a meditative reenactment of the pilgrimage for the cloistered reader, I ask whether a manuscript’s ability to aid in contemplative piety through narrative experience can also be framed as a form of solo play: as roleplay.

2. David Porreca
Department of Classical Studies, University of Waterloo, Ontario

Deus ex machina.

************

Posters to Display and Keep

2026 IMC Poster 1 (Text)

2026 IMC Poster 2 (Image)

Yours to download:

2026 Leeds Posters 1 & 2

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Images

To whet the appetite, we survey some evocative images-on-pages, pages-as-images, and words-as-image in the remarkable genre of picture poems.

Examples of dynamic constructions involving word-play upon the page include the elaborate, intricate, and beautiful picture-poems favoured among some authors, not least at in the early medieval period. We display specimens by the Carolingian author Hrabanus (or Rabanus) Maurus Magnentius (circa 780 – 856), Archbishop of Mainz (from 847). His poem De laudibus sanctae crucis (“In Praise of the Holy Cross”), which survives in multiple copies, contains a series of poems laid out as rectangular constructions in which each line contains the same number of letters as any other.

Their patterns make it possible to lay out the letters not only in horizontal lines but also in vertical rows, strictly in line with each other. Moreover, it is possible to read key portions vertically as well as horizontally. Reading vertically in a line using the initial, medial, or final letter of each line yields an acrostic, mesostic, or telestic. Such forms of cross-word puzzles can produce wonders of legibility, requiring the attention in steps of time to gain comprehension of the message as a whole. Adding images to the ensemble increases the layering of meanings, and the possibilities of wonderment through resonance.

Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Cod. 652, fol. 20v (scan 50 of 109). Hrabanus Maurus, De laude sanctae crucibus. Mainz or Fulda, 9th century (circa 830-840). Carmen figuratum with four Evangelist symbols surrounding the Lamb of God. Image via https://viewer.onb.ac.at/10048D05/.

Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Cod. 652, fol. 27v: Figura XXII.
Image https://viewer.onb.ac.at/10048D05/.

Other celebrated cases include the elaborate ornamental pages developed by Anglo-Saxon and Insular scribal artists for the openings of the different Gospels – as well as for the ‘Christmas Reading’ of Matthew 1:18, which begins Christi autem generatio sic erat, treated as if an opening in its own right. These pages, drawn out with intricate decorative patterns and figural elements, offer challenges to the process of reading and expansions of wonderment as the words and images interplay. A favourite appears in the 8th-century Southern English Gospel book now in Stockholm, known as the Codex Aureus.

Stockholm, National Library of Sweden, Codex A. 135, page 23. Image digitized by the National Library of Sweden, via https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Codex_Aureus_(A_135)#/media/File.

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Sanskrit and Prakrit Manuscripts, Continued: More Leaves for Manuscript Sample XII

June 23, 2026 in Manuscript Fragments, Manuscript Studies, Photographic Exhibition

Continuing to explore the dispersal and find-places for manuscript fragments of many kinds, on parchment or paper and in a wide range of languages and genres, we note with pleasure the discoveries which may await the attention, observation, and recognition by scholars and researchers worldwide, given the opportunity to see postings online of materials of interest.

Responding to a message from a visitor to this RGME blog on Manuscript Studies, we have asked the private owner of the item in question for further information about the page (or single side of a leaf) which we posted as Manuscript Sample XII (in our own numbering, for convenience in the blogpost).

First, we reprise that posting, extracted from the set of specimens in the blogpost on

Sanskrit and Prakrit Manuscripts

To whit:

XII. Manuscript Leaf on Paper
with a Bordered Rectangular Frame and Polychrome Lines of Text

The column of 6 long lines of text stands within a bordered rectangular frame comprising a nested series of bands. The broadest band is filled with a pale reddish or orange pigment. The lines of text alternate in color regularly between red pigment, black ink, and gold leaf laid within ink outlines.

Purchased from an online seller.

Next, with thanks to the collector for responding so swiftly, we report more information.

Measurements

Measurements: leaf, 9.5 × 14.4 cm; border, 6.0 × 10.3 cm.

Structure and Companion Pages

The page is part of a bifolium.

We are permitted to reproduce it, front and back. The polychrome sample page used for “Manuscript XII,” with gold pigment as well as red and black for the other pages, stands as the recto of Side 1 of the bifolium.

Private Collection, “Manuscript Sample XII”, bifolium: both sides. Top: Side 1. Bottom Side 2. Photograph by the Owner, Reproduced by Permission.

Do you know of other leaves from this manuscript or by the same scribal artist? Do you have information about the text, original manuscript, pattern of distribution after fragmentation, or other features?

We would be glad to learn.

Please contact us.

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RGME Pop-Up Poster Exhibition for the 2026 ICMS

May 11, 2026 in Announcements, Bāḥra ḥassāb: Knowledge Transmission in Ethiopia and Eritrea From Antiquity to Modern Times, Co-Sponsorships with the RGME, International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, Koller-Collins Center for English Studies, POMONA, Postal History at Kalamazoo, Rossell Hope Robbins Library at the University of Rochester, Societas Magica, Theme of the Year

Posters
for RGME Activities at the
2026
International Congress on Medieval Studies
(ICMS)

[Posted on 10 May 2026]

RGME Pop-Up Poster Displays at the Congress

For the 2026 ICMS, we present a suite of posters (printed and digital) announcing and celebrating our activities. For details and schedule of these activities, see their HomePage:

2026 International Congress on Medieval Studies: Program

For information about the 2026 Congress as a whole, see its website:

International Congress on Medieval Studies

Poster Exhibition as Precedent for the 2024 ICMS

Here we renew an approach from the 2024 International Congress on Medieval Studies, when our Congress activities formed part of our Anniversary Year, celebrating 25 years as a nonprofit educational corporation and 35 years as an international scholarly society. For 2024, our Theme for the Year was Bridges, so that, by bringing our customary set of Posters (displayed on site at Congresses before they became partly hybrid) into a Virtual Exhibition of their own online, we could offer a bridge between our customary webpost for a given Congress, our printed Posters for the in-person event and for souvenirs afterward, and for download in digital form from our website.

For that prototype Virtual Exhibition, you can still visit the

Home Page for our 2024 ICMS Activities
RGME Pop-Up Poster Exhibition for the 2024 ICMS

Poster Exhibition for the 2026 ICMS

Our website Home Page for our 2026 ICMS Activities describes each of these events in turn (in the sequence in which they are set to occur), with descriptions about their scope and aims, instructions for directions to them, and information about the programs of the individual sessions, also with the speakers’ abstracts for their presentations.

Set in RGME Bembino, the Posters celebrate the Organizers, Presenters, Presiders, and Co-Sponsorships with other institutions:

Societas Magica
P.-O.M.o.N.A.
Postal History at Kalamazoo
Rossell Hope Robbins Library & Koller-Collins Center for English
at the University of Rochester
Bāḥra ḥassāb:
Knowledge Transmission in Ethiopia and Eritrea From Antiquity to Modern Times
at the University of Münster

For all their contributions, we give thanks.

The Posters on Display

In thanks to our co-sponsors, organizers, presenters, presiders, respondents, and Congress host, we offer posters both here for virtual display and in downloadable pdfs as souvenirs. Over the years, we have happily learned that participants take home posters to display on their office doors or the walls of their studies, and give them to their mother, department chair, and others as record. We hope that you enjoy them and the collective contributions that brought them into being.

I. RGME Business Meeting

2026 Business Meeting Poster

II. Sessions
(in order of presentation in the Congress Program)

IIa. Group Poster for 2026 RGME Sessions at the ICMS

Poster designed by Hannah Goeselt via Canva, modelled upon her Poster for the Call for Papers, and updated from that state to reflect the sessions with their assigned times and session numbers. We warmly thank Hannah for this contribution.

IIb. Posters for all RGME Sessions
at the 2026 ICMS

By request, in keeping with RGME tradition, individual sessions have their own posters. Each session has a pair of Posters, so that they might not only honor our co-sponsors and celebrate the people involved in organizing, presiding, presenting, and responding, but also illustrate the subjects with representative images.

Where our co-sponsors have logos, we include them with permission on the posters as a sign of shared collaboration.

1. “Moving the Mail”

2026 AZO Posters v2a Moving the Mail Poster 1

2026 AZO Posters v2a Moving the Mail Poster 2

2. “Magic, Manuscripts, and Material Culture”

2026 Congress Posters: Magic MSS Poster 1

2026 AZO Posters v2a Magic MSS Poster 1

2026 Congress Posters: Magic MSS Poster 2

2026 AZO Posters v2a Magic MSS Poster 2

3. “Alchemy and the Pedagogy of Learning”

2026 Congress Posters: Alchemy Poster 1

2026 AZO Posters v2a Alchemy Poster 1

2026 Congress Posters: Alchemy Poster 2

2026 AZO Posters v2a Alchemy Poster 2

4. “Chronology and Divination Beyond the Medieval West”

2026 Congress Posters: Chronology & Divination Poster 1

2026 AZO Posters v2a Chronology Divination Poster 1

2026 Congress Posters: Chronology & Divination Poster 2

2026 AZO Posters v2a Chronology Divination Poster 2

5. “Grimoires of the Greater West”

2026 Congress Posters: Grimoires Poster 1

2026 AZO Posters v2a Grimoires Poster 1

2026 Congress Posters: Grimoires Poster 2

2026 AZO Posters v2a Grimoires Poster 2

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Episode 24. “Life with Books” (Interview with John Windle)

March 25, 2026 in Announcements, Event Registration, Interview, Manuscript Studies, Research Group Episodes for The Research Group Speaks

“The Research Group Speaks”

Episode 24 (Saturday 9 May 2026)
“Life with Books”
An Interview with
John Windle, Antiquarian Bookseller

For Episode 24 (rescheduled from April), we invite our friend John Windle to reflect upon his life with books and share stories about experiences with them and their readers, makers, collectors, and devotees. We plan an informal interview, with opportunities for conversation.

See:

As an indication of range, dedication, and expertise, the scope of John’s antiquarian bookshop, based in San Francisco (About), demonstrates clear focus:

We buy and sell books and manuscripts in all fields, especially medieval illuminated and text manuscripts; material on California, Hawaii, and Pacific voyages; illustrated books and fine bindings from the 15th through the 20th century; children’s books from 1750 to 1950; and fine press printing. William Blake, Mary Wollstonecraft, and Thomas Frognall Dibdin remain special interests.

We hope you will contact us for any of your book needs: restoration and repair of books and manuscripts; bibliographical information and up-to-date retail and auction prices; informal valuations to formal appraisals of single items or entire collections; auction purchases worldwide (including eBay); and of course, purchases for and sales of your own collections. We guarantee every transaction unconditionally and, as members in good standing of the ABAA, ILAB, and PBFA, we subscribe to the code of ethics endorsed by reputable antiquarian booksellers worldwide.

About the person and the life, we quote from his website (About John Windle):

John Windle was born in England in 1945. Educated at St. Ronan’s, Wellington College, the Université de Poitiers à Tours, Sussex University (B.A. hons. English and European studies), and the University of California Berkeley (Ph.D. fellowship in the library school — incomplete with honorable withdrawal), he moved to California after training with Bernard Quaritch Ltd. in London. He worked for John Howell-Books in San Francisco from 1971 to 1974, and opened his own business at 68 Post Street in partnership with Ron Randall to form Randall and Windle on April 1, 1975. That business later moved to 185 Post Street before Ron left for Santa Barbara in 1980 (where he ran Randall House until 2020) and John took the decade off to move to Venice CA, write and publish two bibliographies, travel around India studying Tibetan Buddhism and traverse America (on foot), finally reopening his shop in 1989 in San Francisco where he maintains his bookshop and gallery to this day. He has published or contributed to numerous books and articles including studies of William Blake, Mary Wollstonecraft, Thomas Frognall Dibdin, William Morris, and the Grolier Club “100 Books Famous in Children’s Literature”, along with two slim volumes of poetry from his own press. . . .

We look forward to learning more.

Registration

Registration is free. We encourage you to Pay What You Can with the option for a Voluntary Donation. This year, the RGME has undergone setbacks with grants and funding, so that we ask your help. Any amount will give encouragement and contribute to recovering momentum. We thank you for your support.

Donations, which may be tax-deductible, help us to continue with our activities and sustain our mission for an organization principally powered by volunteers.

Please note:

After you register, Eventbrite will send you a confirmation by email, with your unique order/ticket number.

In addition, Eventbrite might ask you to “Log in to keep your tickets handy” or suggest “Take me to my tickets.” These are options, not requirements. Neither of those steps will have the Zoom Link.

The RGME will send you the Zoom Link for the event a day or two before it is scheduled to take place. We send it to you directly by email, with the heading “Zoom Link for [Event Name].” For security reasons, we do not distribute tickets or links through Eventbrite or Zoom.

We use these measures to protect the security of our events.

If you have questions or problems with registering, or accessing the link,

Contact the RGME, not Eventbrite or Zoom,
via rgmesocial@gmail.com

We look forward to welcoming you to the event.

Word and Image Combined

London, British Museum, Asset number 38787001, Full: Front. William Blake, The Ancient of Days (1794). Frontispiece to Europe a Prophecy, copy D, plate 1. Image © The Trustees of the British Museum. Shared under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) licence.

About the Image

London, British Museum, Asset number 38787001, Full: Front. William Blake, The Ancient of Days (1794). Frontispiece to Europe a Prophecy, copy D, plate 1. Colour relief etching and white-line etching in blue, black, red and yellow; with added hand colouring. depicting a bearded nude male (probably Urizen) crouching in a heavenly sphere, its light partially covered by clouds, reaching down with a pair of compasses in his left hand, and measuring the surrounding darkness with them.
Image © The Trustees of the British Museum. Shared under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) licence.

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More Leaves from the Book of Numbers in the Chudleigh Bible

March 19, 2026 in Announcements, Manuscript Studies, Workshops on "The Evidence of Manuscripts"

More Leaves
in the Book of Numbers
from the Chudleigh Bible

in the Collection of Richard Weber

Latin Vulgate Bible
Northern France
Sant-Vaast Abbey?
Circa 1220–1230

Text written in Gothic Bookhand
Laid out in Double Columns of 56 lines
with Running Titles, Rubrication,
Text-Initials in Red and Blue,
and Marginalia within Frames

[Posted on 19 March 2026]

Collection of Richard Weber. Chudleigh Bible Leaf 42, recto, top left. Photograph by Richard Weber.

Continuing our series of posts describing discoveries for the study of manuscript fragments (see Manuscript Studies Blog: Contents List), this post augments our post introducing two leaves which belonged to the Book of Numbers in the medium-format Latin Vulgate Bible now known as the Chudleigh Bible:

Two Leaves in the Book of Numbers from the Chudleigh Bible

Those are leaves (which we introduced as Leaves 1 and 2) are numbered in pencil as Folios 38 and 43, apparently once the outermost leaves of a quire.

Previous blogposts have celebrated portions of the collection of manuscripts of our Associate Richard Weber. For example:

Before

We quote from our previous blogpost:

The Two Leaves [Folios 38 and 43]

We introduce a pair of non-consecutive leaves from the Book of Numbers in the Chudleigh Bible. The modern Arabic numbers written in pencil at the center directly below the columns of text label them as “38” and “43” respectively. Presumably they designate the folio numbers for them in a consecutive sequence entered before the separation of the leaves from each other.

So far we have not identified any surviving leaves which formerly stood between them or adjacent to them within the same Biblical Book.

That was then. This is now.

More Is More

Now we introduce four more leaves in the Collection of Richard Weber. Together they form a consecutive group from a former quire within the same Book of the Old Testament in the originally complete Latin Vulgate Bible. They came with an explanatory label, which describes in 7 lines of italic font some salient points about the leaves, their consecutive text (or testo consecutivo, however unidentified), features of layout, and notice of attributed origin.

Collection of Richard Weber. Seller’s Printed Label for Group of 6 Leaves (6 fogli) from the Chudleigh Bible. Photograph by Richard Weber.

Name by Association

As recap, the name of the dismembered and dispersed manuscript derives from one of its former owners, the eleventh Baron Clifford of Chudleigh. The place Chudleigh itself is an ancient wool town in Devon in Southwest England. About this Baron:

Charles Oswald Hugh Clifford (1887–1962), Lord Clifford of Chudleigh (Devon, England)
See also:
“We Remember Charles Oswald Hugh Clifford”

The name by which the fragmented book has become known does not celebrate or refer to its origin, artistry, creativity, or accomplishment in its own right, but attaches to an imposing nomenclature by association, attachment, or latter-day ownership. Current usage gives it the claim to ascendance in referring to this book and no other.

The Numbers Game:
Numbers of Leaves; Numbered Leaves,
and the Book of Numbers

Formerly, as described in its sales catalogue descriptions while still intact, the manuscript comprised a single volume of 411 vellum leaves, with its text laid out in double columns of 56 lines each. Initials opening Books of the Bible contained historiated scenes and decorative elements; some 90 or 91 of them were historiated.

The volume as such was sold at auction in London several times first by Sotheby & Co and then by Christie’s. Its appearance on the market began at the hands of its former owner, Charles Oswald Hugh Clifford, the eleventh Lord Clifford of Chudleigh. By that ownership it acquired its modern name.

Our first interest in the manuscript arose through the gift of two leaves, generously donated to the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence by our Associate, Richard Weber. From within the Book of Numbers, they are Leaves 38 and 43, as numbered in pencil at the center of the lower margin of the rectos. Our research continues to investigate the growing evidence for surviving leaves from the original book, along with their journeys from that book to their current homes.

Our first blogpost about about survivors, in the light of the two leaves from the Book of Numbers, surveys some known cases and outlines the scholarly assessments about the probable date and place of origin of the manuscript. Those assessments center upon books or articles by art historians and manuscript scholars, and descriptions by owners, vendors, and their agents, including catalogues for auctions or a given collection. See:

Two Leaves in the Book of Numbers from the Chudleigh Bible

Since that blogpost, further developments were reported in some of our events:

Here we report some updates, with thanks to Richard Weber who shares information from his collection.

I. Two Leaves from the Book of Numbers

Previously we presented Folios 38 and 43. See below for their images and an account of their textual contents. These two leaves came apparently from the front back of a quire, to judge by their features.

II. Four More Leaves from the Book of Numbers
in the Collection of Richard Weber

With permission, we reproduce images of four more leaves, accompanied by details and observations. The modern pencil numbers of the leaves stand in the center of the lower margins. We use those numbers as reference points.

Folios 39–42

These specimens comprise Leaves 2, 3, 4, 5 in an original quire apparently of 6 leaves. Our previous blogpost introduced Leaves ‘1’ and ‘2’ of the pair of leaves which comprise Folio 38 and Folio 43; formerly they stood respectively at the front and the back of the quire. Together the group has significant evidence to show about the formation and construction of the original quire, manuscript, and its binding. We celebrate the opportunity to see the unit as a whole and to learn from its evidence.

1. Folio 39

Recto

The page continues and completes Chapter IV through column a and partway through column b, then opens Chapter V in the lower part of column b, with an enlarged decorative initial L embellished with pen-line flourishing.

Collection of Richard Weber. Chudleigh Bible Leaf 39, recto. Photograph by Richard Weber.

Verso

The page completes Chapter V in column a, opens Chapter VI which it finishes partway through column b, then opens Chapter VII apparently mistakenly in the lower part of column b, as its rubricated chapter number is cancelled with a horizontal cross-stroke.

Collection of Richard Weber. Chudleigh Bible Leaf 39, verso. Photograph by Richard Weber.

Detail

Collection of Richard Weber. Chudleigh Bible Leaf 39, verso: lower. Photograph by Richard Weber.

2. Folio 40

Recto

The page completes Chapter VI in column a, opens Chapter VII in line 7 modestly with an enlarged in-line initial and the chapter number VII entered within a paraph in the inner margin, continues the chapter through the rest of the page to continue on the verso.

Collection of Richard Weber. Chudleigh Bible Leaf 40, recto with guide. Photograph by Richard Weber.

Verso

The page completes Chapter VII in column a, opens Chapter VIII in the penultimate line of that column, and opens Chapter IX in the last line of column b; these chapters open with an initial L in each case, rendered respectively in red pigment or blue pigment, with pen-line flourishing in the opposite color.

Collection of Richard Weber. Chudleigh Bible Leaf 40, verso with guide. Photograph by Richard Weber.

3. Folio 41

Recto

The page contains the end of Chapter IX in column a, completes its text in the first two lines of column a, and opens Chapter X directly with an initial L in red.

Collection of Richard Weber. Chudleigh Bible Leaf 41, recto with guide. Photograph by Richard Weber.

Verso

The page completes Chapter X in the upper part of column a and opens Chapter XI with a blue initial L.

Collection of Richard Weber. Chudleigh Bible Leaf 41, verso with guide. Photograph by Richard Weber.

4. Folio 42

Recto

Collection of Richard Weber. Chudleigh Bible Leaf 42, recto with guide. Photograph by Richard Weber.

Verso

Collection of Richard Weber. Chudleigh Bible Leaf 42, verso with guide. Photograph by Richard Weber.

Traces of Stitching, Ruling, Pricking,
and other Processes of Production and Use

The ability to see adjacent leaves reveals significant evidence of shared processes of production, along with various traces of use. We celebrate the ability, with thanks to the generosity and perspicacity of the collector and the quality of his photographs!

Collection of Richard Weber. Chudleigh Bible Leaf 42, recto, top left. Photograph by Richard Weber.

The Outer Limits

We review the two known leaves which once directly preceded and followed the four leaves in the Weber Collection from the Book of Numbers in the Chudleigh Bible, as reported in our previous blogpost about them and their manuscript.

Two Leaves in the Book of Numbers from the Chudleigh Bible

Opening of Quire (Leaf ‘1’): Folio 38

This leaf must have directly followed the opening leaf of the Book, as it starts partway within Chapter 1. That leaf would have carried the opening initial for the Book, with L for Locutusque. Its present location is unknown, but the contents of its illustrated initial have been recorded to indicate a depiction of the figures of God, Moses, and Joshua at an altar. (p. 69 and 72 note 8)

Text (recto and verso)

Numbers 1 36 [De filiis Benjamin per generationes et familias ac domos] cognationum suarum recensiti sunt nominibus singulorum a vigesimo anno et supra, omnes qui poterant ad bella procedere, 37triginta quinque millia quadringenti.

Numbers 2 1 Locutusque est Dominus ad Moysen et Aaron, dicens

Numbers 3 1 Hæ sunt generationes Aaron et Moysi in die qua locutus est Dominus ad Moysen in monte Sinai.

7 et observent quidquid ad cultum pertinet multitudinis coram taberna // culo testimonii,

Numbers 4 1 Locutusque est Dominus ad Moysen et Aaron, dicens

14 ponentque cum eo omnia vasa, quibus in ministerio ejus utuntur, id est, ignium receptacula[, fuscinulas ac tridentes, uncinos et batilla.]

Recto

Formerly Collection of Richard Weber, Leaf 1 from the Chudleigh Bible: Recto.

Verso

Formerly Collection of Richard Weber, Leaf 1 from the Chudleigh Bible: Verso.

End of Quire (Leaf ‘6’): Folio 43

Text (recto and verso)

Numbers 15 9 [dabis per singulos boves similæ tres decimas consper]sæ oleo, quod habeat medium mensuræ hin

Numbers 16 1 Ecce autem Core filius Isaar, filii Caath, filii Levi, et Dathan atque Abiron filii Eliab,

28 Et ait Moyses : In //hoc scietis quod Dominus miserit me ut facerem universa quæ cernitis, et non ex proprio ea corde protulerim :

[Possibly struck through incorrect marking for chapter 16 at]

Numbers 16 36 Locutusque est Dominus ad Moysen, dicens

Numbers 17 1 Et locutus est Dominus ad Moysen, dicens

Numbers 18 1 Dixitque Dominus ad Aaron

11 Primitias autem, quas voverint et obtulerint filii Israël, tibi dedi, et filiis tuis, ac filiabus tuis, jure perpetuo : qui mundus est [in domo tua, vescetur eis. ]

*****

Recto

Formerly Collection of Richard Weber, Leaf 2 from the Chudleigh Bible: Recto.

Verso

Formerly Collection of Richard Weber, Leaf 2 from the Chudleigh Bible: Verso.

III. A (Disconnected) Quire as Witness

Thus we advance our on-going project to study the surviving witnesses to medieval manuscript fragments. As promised in our first blogpost on the Chudleigh Bible, we encourage and cultivate the study of the leaves and their context, in the quest to identify and virtually reconstruct the former volume. This second blogpost reports more information as more leaves are revealed.

The generic characteristics of the printed label accompanying the ensemble of 6 leaves (see above), giving no indication of the text to identify a particular part of the manuscript, implies that the seller may have prepared groups of leaves, such as intact quires, to sell in themselves. If so, there might be other quires or former quires which found their way through such a dealer and might, in time, surface among various collections around the world. We look forward to more discoveries.

IV. The Book

IV.1. A Single Volume

The subject of this quest? Notice of the manuscript whilst still intact, with some black-and-white images of its illustrated elements, appeared in print for its sale by successive owners, starting with Charles Oswald Hugh Clifford, the eleventh Lord Clifford of Chudleigh.

Formerly, as described in its sales catalogue descriptions while still intact (see our previous blogpost), the manuscript comprised a single volume of 411 vellum leaves (with its text laid out in double columns of 56 lines each). Mention is made of 139 illuminated initials, some of which are historiated. Initials opening Books of the Bible contained historiated scenes and decorative elements; some 90 or 91 of them were historiated. Mention is also made of some damage to the volume, including losses of leaves.

1) Sold by Sotheby & Co, London,
7 December 1953, lot 51 (pp. 00? in catalogue)

Catalogue of fine Western and Oriental manuscripts and miniatures . . . : which will be sold by auction by Messrs. Sotheby & Co. . . . at their large galleries 34 & 35 New Bond Street, W.1

Bought by Maggs Bros., London, for £680.

2) Sold by Sotheby & Co, London,
Wednesday, 8th July 1970 as Lot 104 (pp. 78–79 in catalogue)

Catalogue of important Western manuscripts and miniatures . . . : which will be sold by auction by Sotheby & Co. . . . at their large galleries, 34 and 35 New Bond Street, W.1 . . . ; day of sale: Wednesday, 8th July, 1970

The entry cites 139 illuminated initials, some of which are historiated. It mentions some defects, including many margins “to some extent stained” and damage to some initials, of which “5 are badly damaged and 15 slightly damaged.” Some losses were discernible, with “the first two leaves largely defective” and “a few leaves missing at the end of the Interpretations [of Hebrew Names]”.

Facing the catalogue entry, the companion page of “Illustration” shows 8 cropped images with historiated initials (sometimes two in succession on the same page), encompassing 10 initials altogether. Their locations in the manuscript are not indicated.

“The text is the normal text of a thirteenth-century Bible, i.e. the modern Vulgate with the addition of Esdras III, which is called Esdras II, the modern Estras II being called Nehemiah. Acts follows the Pauline Epistles. . . . Marginal annotations in red and plummet are fairly numerous. Many are enclosed in red cartouches.”

IV.2. Individual Leaves or Groups of Leaves

Thereafter leaves appeared in various catalogues, including these (which I have not yet seen):

Quaritch cat. 1147 (1991), no. 15
Maggs Bros, Fine Books and manuscripts, cat. 1167 (1993), no. 2
Sotheby’s, Western Manuscripts and Miniatures, 6 December 2005, lot 16

Sometimes the manuscript might receive notice on its own account. For example:

Christopher de Hamel, Scribes and Illuminators. Medieval Craftsman Series (Toronto, 1992), page 43 and plate 36.

An account especially of the illuminated components appears by Peter Kidd:

Peter Kidd, The McCarthy Collection, III: French Miniatures (London, 2021), no. 17 (pp. 69–73)

His companion blogpost seems to have disappeared, along with the blog as a whole:

Manuscript Provenance: McCarthy Catalogue, Volume III (French Illuminations).

IV.3. Some Specimens

Our previous blogpost has gathered a selective list of specimen leaves which have circulated through the marketplace on their own or in groups. To some extent, this list follows the order of the Books in the Vulgate manuscript; sometimes a catalogue listing groups into one entry a set of several leaves from the manuscript.

In time, in combination with other resources, this list might aid a full virtual reconstruction of the manuscript, not only of its illustrated leaves, but also leaves of text like the Weber/RGME leaves from within the text of the Book of Numbers.

*****

Further blogposts and/or other reports may offer more information about the manuscript and its identifiable fragments. The goal is to build towards a fuller recognition of the survivors, their characteristics, and their locations.

Do you know of other leaves from this manuscript? Do you know of other work by its scribal hands?

We look forward to hearing from you.

*****

Questions? Suggestions?

Leave your comments or questions below
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*****

Collection of Richard Weber. Chudleigh Bible Leaf 39, verso: lower. Photograph by Richard Weber.

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Medieval Missal Fragment as Early-Modern Cover

February 28, 2026 in History of Printing, Manuscript Studies, Photographic Exhibition, Reports, Research Group Workshops, Reused Binding Fragments, Workshops on "The Evidence of Manuscripts"

A Medieval Missal Fragment
in Latin on Vellum
Reused
as the Early-Modern Binding Cover
for Erasmus Reinhold,
Prutenicae Tabulae (1585)

Mildred Budny

Reinhold (1585), Front Cover. Collector’s Photograph.

[Posted 25 February 2026, with updates]

In a Private Collection, we learn of an early-modern printed book on paper which reuses a medieval vellum binding fragment as cover for the card covers of its binding. Gladly we offer some first fruits of examining this evidence, in the process of work-in-progress process to learn about the original manuscript, the identity of its genre of book, its context, its reuse, and its fate within the printed book which ensured its survival, at least as a partial witness, to its former, intended, state.

With permission, we share the owner’s photographs of the ‘beginning, middle, and end’ of this specimen, or the ‘front, back, and side’.

I. The Printed Book

We introduce:

Erasmus Reinholdus, Prutenicae Tabulae Coelestium Motvem (Wittenberg, 1585)

Opening the book reveals the title page facing an originally blank page containing multiple entries, mostly in ink, in hand-written additions by different hands. Principal among them is the full-page single-column entry relating to the book and its context.

About the book itself, the work of the astronomer Erasmus Reinhold (1511–1553), a summary appears on Wikipedia (currently):

The Prutenic Tables (Latin: Tabulae prutenicae from Prutenia meaning “Prussia“, German: Prutenische oder Preußische Tafeln), were an ephemeris (astronomical tables) by the astronomer Erasmus Reinhold published in 1551 (reprinted in 1562, 1571 & 1585). They are sometimes called the Prussian Tables after Albert I, Duke of Prussia, who supported Reinhold and financed the printing. Reinhold calculated this new set of astronomical tables based on Nicolaus Copernicus‘ De revolutionibus orbium coelestium, the epochal exposition of Copernican heliocentrism published in 1543. Throughout his explanatory canons, Reinhold used as his paradigm the position of Saturn at the birth of the Duke, on 17 May 1490. With these tables, Reinhold intended to replace the Alfonsine Tables; he added redundant tables to his new tables so that compilers of almanacs familiar with the older Alfonsine Tables could perform all the steps in an analogous manner.

— Prutenic Tables

The first edition was printed in Tübingen in 1551 (see the copy for sale via Swann Galleries and an online digital facsimile of another copy via Google Books).

The edition under our consideration appeared in 1585. It was printed in Wittenburg by Matthaeus Welack (see another copy: via Swann Galleries or Swann Galleries).

At the front of the copy, the first verso (the pastedown on the inside front cover) carries a page of annotations in ink and pencil, facing the title page. At the top and bottom of the margins on both pages there gather some sellers’ or owners’ marks, codes, or notations: for example, 1R, N27, F858, 454, apparently to identify the item, such as within one or other individual collection. We note that some of these marks are crossed out or erased. A full-page single-column entry on the pastedown closes with the date ‘1632’, approaching a half-century after the printing of the book.

Reinhold (1585), Opening to Title Page. Collector’s Photograph.

Title Page

Reinhold (1585), Title Page. Collector’s Photograph.

II. The Reused Manuscript Fragment

The reused vellum fragment reveals its characteristics only partly, because the presentation as the covering of the boards of a binding for another set of contents turns one side of the vellum sheet to the back, hidden from view. As it is presented on the front cover, spine, back-cover, and turn-ins of the boards, we might glimpse parts of two columns of text on each of two pages on a single bifolium, plus some of the margins, including the intercolumns, inner columns, and original gutter.

On the cover, the text of the reused sheet stands upright with relation to the printed book. Let us start with the Front Cover of the Printed Book, move to the Spine, and turn to the Back Cover. However, be it noted, taking the original text in columns reading from left to right on a page, let us observe that the reused sheet constitutes a pair of leaves, for which the text starts with the ‘verso’ of the first leaf of the bifolium on the back cover, turns to the portion overlying spine of the volume, and moves to the ‘recto’ of the second leaf on the front cover.

Front Cover of the Printed Copy:
Side 1 of the Reused Manuscript Fragment

Here, with added ties to close the printed book, appears part of a 2-column page of text written in ink, with enlarged 2-line inset initials rendered alternately in blue or red pigment, rubrication written in red pigment for headings, and added strokes of red pigment to mark and highlight in minor text initials within the columns. Red lines set out the rulings for the lines and columns of text.

Reinhold (1585), Front Cover. Collector’s Photograph.

Spine

Reinhold (1585), Spine. Collector’s Photograph.

Back Cover
Side 2 of the Reused Manuscript Fragment

Reinhold (1585), Back Cover. Collector’s Photograph

Details

Back (Middle): Column B, Inner Margins, Gutter, and Initial of Column A

Reinhold (1585), Back Cover, Midsection. Collector’s Photograph

Front (Middle)

Reinhold (1585), Front Cover, Middle. Collector’s Photograph

*****

The Medieval Fragment

The RGME offers to the Private Collector and the wider world a preluminary report on “The Reinhold Missal Fragment.” It is available freely for download on our website.

With thanks to our Research Consultant, Leslie J. French, its preliminary findings can be summarized thus:

The two visible pages are consistent with a Roman Missal containing texts near the end of the Temporale. Another extant missal containing exactly the sequences on these pages has not been located, so it is not yet possible to determine for which Use the original might have been constructed. The following texts have been identified and matched against missal entries in the Usuarium database (https://usuarium.elte.hu/).

See the report:

Reinhold Missal Fragment

******

Would you like to join the quest to discover more about the original manuscript, and if possible to identify its producers, place of origin, and audience? Please let us know.

*********

Tags: Erasmus Reinhold, history of printing, Medieval Latin Missals, Medieval Manuscript Fragments, Prutenicae Tabulae Coelestium Motvem, Reused Binding Fragments
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2026 RGME Colloquium at The Grolier Club: Report

February 27, 2026 in Announcements, Bembino, Friends of the Research Group on Manuscript Evience, Manuscript Studies, Theme of the Year, Visits to Collections

Report

2026 RGME Colloquium
at The Grolier Club

“Transformations and Renewals”
Examining and Celebrating
Treasures of the Grolier Club Library

Wednesday 11 February 2026
Hybrid, in Two Events:
Workshop
+
Roundtable

[Posted on 18 February 2026, with updates, now including a link to a Recording of the Roundtable]

New York, New York. Front entrance of The Grolier Club. Photo courtesy of The Grolier Club.

We celebrate the successful accomplishment of the 2026 RGME Colloquium at The Grolier Club of the City of New York on Wednesday 11 February. We give thanks to Jamie Elizabeth Cumby, Grolier Club Librarian who offered to give the Workshop which set the plan in motion, the contributors, the staff of the Grolier Club, RGME advisers, and members of the RGME Production Team supporting both the hybrid and in-person aspects of the pair of events.

The events comprised two parts:

1) “Show-Off-and-Tell” Workshop in the upstairs Council Room

2) “Transformations and Renewals” Roundtable with Lightning Talks, open to the public, in the downstairs Exhibition Hall.

For a description and the Program, please see:

2026 RGME Colloquium at The Grolier Club

Here we celebrate the Colloquium, describe its characteristics as accomplished, and, with permission, share some photographs. For their photographs inside the Club, we credit and thank the photographers: Mildred Budny, Hannah Goeselt, Justin Hastings, and Beppy Landrum Owen.

Entering The Grolier Club (11 February 2026). Photograph by Hannah Goeselt.

The Nature of the Event

This first hybrid event for the RGME in the Year 2026 — for which we have chosen the Theme of “Transformations and Renewals” for exploration across our activities and projects — brought the RGME to The Grolier Club of the City of New York, in central Manhattan, for a curated set of hybrid events on Wednesday 11 February 2026. In keeping with the RGME’s dedication to accessibility for events reaching a wider audience, these events were designed to be available both in person and online.

We gathered a generous team of specialists, collectors, and curators of books — all Grolier Club Members and mostly RGME Associates— to examine, reflect on, and celebrate selected treasures of the Grolier Club Library. On offer: reports and conversations about research discoveries, work-in-progress, and the joys of experiencing the materials directly and also sharing their stories.

Speakers and/or Panelists

Participants offered comments and/or lightning talks. Speakers made comments at the afternoon workshop over original materials, and Panelists gave lightning talks at the early-evening roundtable:

Jamie Elizabeth Cumby (Grolier Club Librarian)
“ ‘Show-Off-and Tell’: A Curated Selection from the Grolier Club Library”
Beppy Landrum Owen (also Oral History Project: Beppy Landrum Owen)
“ ‘That skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once. . .’
Lost Stories of the Making of the Bremer Presse’s 1934 (but 1935) Vesalian Icones anatomicae”
John T. McQuillen (Morgan Library & Museum, Associate Curator of Printed Books & Bindings)
“Blockbooks Dismembered”
Note:
Watch for the coming exhibition at the Morgan later this year:

“Late Medieval European Blockbooks: The First Printed Picture Books” (6 November 2026 to 16 May 2027)
Mildred Budny (Director of the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence)
“A Medieval Missal Fragment from the Otto F. Ege Collection and its Provenance”
Note:
“Break-Up Books and Make-Up Books: Encountering and Reconstituting the Legacy of Otto F. Ege and Other Bibliocasts” (See 2025 RGME Autumn Colloquium on Fragments)
Reid Byers (Reid Byers, Author)
“Secrets in Secrets in Secrets”
Note:
Reid Byers, Imaginary Books: Lost, Unfinished, and Fictive Works Found Only in Other Books (Oak Knoll Press and Le Club Fortsas, 2024)
Richard Kopley (Distinguished Professor of English, Emeritus, Penn State DuBois, and Author)
“William Gowans, New York Bookman and Poe Family Boarder”
Note:
Richard Kopley, Edgar Allan Poe: A Life (2024)
Mark Samuels Lasner (Mark Samuels Lasner)
“A Gift from William Morris to the Grolier Club”
Note:
Wilhelm Meinhold, Sidona the Sorceress (Kelmscott Press, 1893), translated by “Francesca Speranza” / Jane Francesca Agnes Wilde, Lady Wilde—a novel drawn from the life of the Pomeranian noblewoman Sidonia von Borcke (1548–1620), accused of witchcraft and executed.
Mary Crawford (Co-Curator, current exhibition at the Grolier Club; Bio)
“From ‘By a Lady’ to Global Superstar: Curating 250 Years of Jane Austen”
Note:
Grolier Club Exhibition. “Paper Jane” (to 14 February 2026)
Online exhibition. Exhibition Gallery
Online curators’ tour. Tour of Paper Jane
Catalogue. Catalogue

Presider/Moderator for Roundtable

Anna Siebach–Larson

Book-Signings at Roundtable for Grolier Authors’ Publications

Reid Byers, Mary Crawford, Richard Kopley, and Mark Samuels Lasner

Beppy Landrum Owen prepares for her comments at the Workshop and Lightning Talk for the Roundtable. Photograph by Mildred Budny.

I. The “Transformations and Renewals” Roundtable
in the Grolier Club Exhibition Hall
(Hybrid, Live-Streamed)
6:00 to 7:30 pm EST (GMT-4)

Open to the public both in-person and online
Book-signings available

Overview

Friends of the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence, a Princeton-based 501(c)(3) educational organization, visited the Grolier Club for an in-person/hybrid ‘Roundtable’. In lightning talks, several Club members discussed a curated selection of books, manuscripts, and prints on the RGME’s 2026 organizational theme of “Transformations and Renewals. Open to the public, this event offered offer book-signings for Club member guides who recently published works discussed.

Panelists for the Roundtable: Mildred Budny, Beppy Landrum Owen, John T. McQuillen, Reid Byers, Richard Kopley, Mark Samuels Lasner, and Mary Crawford

Presider: Anna Siebach–Larsen

The Panelists prepare

After the Workshop (see below), our panelists gathered for the “Transformations and Renewals” Roundtable with Lightning Talks in the ground-floor Exhibition Hall.

Here we see, at the front, beneath the display screen, and between the display cases for the current exhibition, the panelists take their seats in speaking order, from right to left.

2026 RGME-Grolier Colloquium Roundtable: Left-Hand Side with Podium. Photograph by Hannah Goeselt.

The RGME Executive Director introduces the Panel

2026 RGME-Grolier Colloquium Roundtable: Right-Hand Side with Podium. Photograph by Hannah Goeselt.

The Roundtable Presider introduces the Panelists

Anna Siebach-Larsen presides over the Roundtable. Photograph/Screenshot by Justin Hastings.

II. The “Show-Off-and-Tell” Workshop
in the Grolier Club Council Room
(Hybrid, Zoom Meeting)
2:30 to 4:30 pm EST (GMT-4)

Open to the public online;
In-person seats limited, for Grolier Members and invited RGME Guests

Overview

As a prelude to the Roundtable on “Transformations and Renewals”, Friends of the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence and Grolier Club Members had a hybrid “Show-Off-and-Tell’ Workshop to examine, up close, the original materials (as book, manuscript, print) to be discussed further at the evening Roundtable in lightning talks. The curated selections comprised favorites from the Grolier Club Library which have given rise to detailed study and discoveries for them and their contexts.

Like our pair of hybrid workshops recently over original manuscript and printed materials in Special Collections at the Princeton University Library, held by our Associate Eric White at the 2025 RGME Colloquium on Fragments (see below), this hybrid workshop took place over original materials at the Grolier Club, guided by the Librarian Jamie Cumby (see also Jamie Cumby).

We shared experiences of delight and wonder, to celebrate the joys of learning from original materials at the Club and their relatives in other collections, especially in combination, to learn more about the rich range of the Grolier Club Library, and to give thanks for responsible access to it and for its curators. Open to the public online and to an invited audience in person (limited seating), this event was designed to be accessible widely by interactive Zoom Meeting.

Speakers (in order of presentation):
Jamie Elizabeth Cumby, Beppy Landrum Owen, John T. McQuillen, Mildred Budny, Reid Byers, Richard Kopley, and Mark Samuels Lasner

Setting the stage

Reid Byers prepares for the RGME Workshop in the Council Room. Photograph by Beppy Landrum Owen.

Preparing the Projection

Setting up the projection and internet connection for the Workshop and its audiences both onsite and online. Photograph by Hannah Goeselt.

Describing the genre, challenges, and accomplishments of BlockBooks

John T. McQuillen describes characteristics of BlockBooks. Photograph by Hannah Goeselt.

The Table Laid for Display of Original Materials

Original Materials from The Grolier Club Library, laid out for display and examination. Photograph by Hannah Goeselt.

Checking details

Mark Samuels Lasner examines a Favorite Book for the RGME Workshop in the Council Room. Photograph by Beppy Landrum Owen.

Closer Looks

Mark Samuels Lasner and Jamie Elizabeth Cumby examine materials for the RGME Workshop in the Council Room. Photograph by Beppy Landrum Owen.

The Long View as the Table is Set

Participation at the RGME Workshop in the Council Room. Photograph by Beppy Landrum Owen.

Comparing Notes

Conversations following the RGME Workshop in the Council Room. Photograph by Beppy Landrum Owen.

Hybrid Access

Conforming with our two organizations’ shared commitments to hybrid access for events which take place in person, the two parts of the Colloquium were granted hybrid functionality to reach our wider audiences.

Taking into account the policies, practices, and arrangements in place for hybrid access

1) to public events at The Grolier Club and
2) for the RGME’s visits to Special Collections (since 2024),

both sponsoring organizations agreed to share the responsibilities for such access by covering one each of the two different rooms to be used for the Colloquium. Accordingly,

The Grolier Club provided hybrid access for the Roundtable through its Eventbrite registration and YouTube live-streaming, for which recordings become available on its YouTube channel.
The RGME provided hybrid access for the Workshop through our RGME Eventbrite registration and RGME Zoom Meeting.

For the Workshop, we took care to bring exactly the same RGME Production Team, to operate in-person and online, that had worked so well together for the widely-admired pair of Workshops held (in two sittings) in Special Collections at Princeton last November for the 2025 RGME Autumn Colloquium on Fragments. For this new venue for a hybrid RGME visit to original materials, we arranged to bring additional, event-specific, equipment following the technical rehearsal in January for the Workshop.

Background and Foreground:
An Approach with Grounding

The plan for hybrid access by the RGME for the Workshop at The Grolier Club was grounded on our experiences, techniques, and teamwork (on-site and online) as has been developed and honed for our series of In-Person Visits to Special Collections. These visits have progressed from collection to collection, both private and institutional, by using equipment on site and in our mobile travelling kit, adapting from venue to venue, as the approach and implementation improves resourcefully. So far:

RGME Visit to the Collection of Steven Lomazow, M.D., in affiliation with the Student Friends of Princeton University Library, in November 2024 (with an updated, hybrid, visit to the Collection by our Director in January 2026)
RGME Meeting in association with the Princeton Bibliophiles & Collectors for a Guided Tour of selected highlights from the Collection of Ronald K. Smeltzer (brought to the Princeton Public Library for an illustrated talk by Ronald Smeltzer on Émilie du Châtelet, Woman of Science) in April 2025
2025 RGME Visit to Vassar College, to examine manuscript materials at the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center and Special Collections of the Vassar College Library, in May 2025
RGME Visit to Special Collections at Princeton University Library, in association with the Friends of Princeton University Library, to examine a curated selection of “Fragments at Princeton” in Workshops in two sittings led by our Associate Eric White, as part of our 3-day hybrid 2025 RGME Autumn Colloquium on Fragments in November 2025
and now the guided Workshop, led by the Grolier Club librarian and accompanied by selections and comments by Grolier Members and RGME Associates, for the 2026 RGME Colloquium at The Grolier Club in February 2026

Poster 3 for 2025 Autumn Colloquium. Workshops on “Fragments at Princeton”

In pursuing this generous goal for hybrid events, the RGME has striven to improve its methods, techniques, and travelling ‘kit,’ albeit with limited resources, as it continues to hold visits and other events at selected locations. Likewise it takes care to listen to feedback, suggestions, and requests by both in-person and online attendees, and respond as resourcefully as possible, as it works to grow its abilities for the purpose. Thus we thank our hosts, participants, and audiences, to learn and improve together, so as to offer a worthwhile experience of engagement as best might be.

Sometimes the process encounters circumstances beyond our control, despite careful, informed, and resourceful preparations. Such was the case for some parts of the plan here. (See Hybridities and Curiosities).

We commend all those in the Grolier Club and those members of the RGME Production Team who helped consistently before, during, and after the event, to shape the collaborative hybrid process and foster its collective experience, with the aim of a good, shared outcome.

Event Publications

The Recordings for both the Workshop and the Roundtable count as publications (or publications in progress) hosted respectively by the Grolier Club (Roundtable) and RGME (Workshop).

The RGME publications for the event, both digital and printed, including our website’s announcement and report (you are here), are set in RGME Bembino. The Posters, Program Booklet, and Colloquium Booklet can be downloaded freely as pdfs.

Program

The 4-page Program Booklet for both the afternoon Workshop and early-evening Roundtable

2026 RGME-Grolier Colloquium Poster 1. Set in RGME Bembino.

2026 RGME Colloquium at the Grolier Club: Program

Posters

Both Posters for this bipartite event can be downloaded:

Colloquium Booklet

The 64-page illustrated Colloquium Booklet offers a guide and souvenir for the event. You may download it here, in two formats according with your printing and viewing preferences.

2026 RGME Colloquium Booklet: Pages (as a series of individual pages on 8 1/2″ × 11″ sheets)
2026 RGME Colloquium Booklet: Foldable Booklet (laid out for printing on 11″ × 17″ sheets, ready for folding)

The Grolier Club, View of Exhibition “Paper Jane” (to 14 February 2025). Image: Grolier Club.

*******

Recording of the Roundtable

Follow this link for the Grolier Club’s Recording for the February 11 livestream of “Transformations and Renewals: The RGME and the Treasures of the Grolier Club Library.”

Transformations and Renewals: The RGME and the Treasures of the Grolier Club Library.”

Please note that the automated captions demonstrate some misrepresentations, such as by misspellings. We look forward to a corrected version, if possible.

We thank the Grolier Club for making this recording and making it available on the Club’s Vimeo account for wider access.

*******************

2026 RGME-Grolier Colloquium Poster 2. Set in RGME Bembino.

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Front of The Grolier Club. Photograph (4 April 2008) [cropped] by participant/team W. C. Minor as part of the Commons:Wikipedia Takes Manhattan project, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license, via https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Grolier_Club.jpg.

Tags: Access to Collections, Blockbooks, Curated Workshops, Giving Thanks, Grolier Club Library, Grolier Club Members, history of printing, manuscript fragments, Manuscript studies, RGME Visits to Collections, The Grolier Club
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The Weber Leaf from Ege MS 61

February 21, 2026 in Announcements, Manuscript Studies

The Weber Leaf
from
Otto Ege MS 61

Small-Format Latin Vulgate Bible
Laid out in 2 columns of 32 lines
in Gothic Bookhand
with embellishments in red, blue, and purple pigments

Formerly part of Otto Ege Manuscript 61 (Gwara, Handlist 61)
Southern France, circa 1325

Mark 5:42 ([illi mandu-/]care) –
6:1 (Et egressus . . . ) – 6:38 (Quot panes ha[/-betis ite])

[Posted on 21 February 2026]

Collection of Richard Weber, Leaf from Otto Ege MS 61: Recto, top. Photograph by Richard Weber.

A leaf in the Collection of Richard Weber from Otto Ege MS 61 presents part of the Gospel of Mark, by laying out the text in brown ink in two columns and employing embellishments in red, blue, and purple pigments. The polychrome elements comprise the running title in both upper margins of recto and verso, the inset 1-line chapter numeral (VI for Mark 6:1) on the recto, the corresponding 2-line inset chapter initial E for Et, and its extended vertical bar of J-shaped segments rising above and below its rounded letter to edge the full length of the column finished by pen-flourishing in upper, lower, and inner margins.

Continuing our series of blogposts on leaves from that manuscript, found in a variety of locations, we present images and a description of this leaf, set into context. We thank our Associate, Richard, for the images and permission to study and reproduce them.

For our earlier posts on this fragmented manuscript, see especially:

A New Leaf from Otto Ege Manuscript 61 (Budny Handlist 7)
More Discoveries for Otto Ege Manuscript 61

Familiar features of this manuscript include the J-bar segments and delicate pen-work. For example:

Second Page of the Book of Zachariah. Courtesy of Flora Lamson Hewlett Library, Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, CA. Reproduced by permission.

The Weber Leaf from Ege MS 61

First we present the two sides of the leaf, in their full expanse, with color guide, in the collector’s photographs. The images show the leaf in full, within its mat, as the recto appears at the front, below the windowed front of Ege’s mat, and the verso may turn on the hinges of its pair of gauze tapes, characteristic of Ege’s positioning mechanism.

The Recto

Note that the chapter numeral VI and the enlarged chapter initial E for Et opening the phrase Et facto sabbato designate Mark 6:2 as the opening of the chapter. In the standard Vulgate, Chapter 6:1 opens with Et egressus inde abiit, continuing to discipili eius to close the verse. That verse occupies the first three lines on the page — ending with the inset chapter numeral and following the last part of the last word of the previous chapter (5:41, [mandu-/]care).

Collection of Richard Weber, Leaf from Otto Ege MS 61: Recto. Photograph by Richard Weber.

The Verso

The verso continues the text of the chapter through most of its course, in a chapter comprising 56 verses. It closes mid-word within chapter 38. Apart from the washes of red pigment in the verse initials, the embellishment on this page constitutes the polychrome running title: MAR– naming the evangelist author or his book.

Collection of Richard Weber, Leaf from Otto Ege MS 61: Verso. Photograph by Richard Weber.

Next, we will describe features of the leaf, its former manuscript, and characteristics of the settings in which its fragments appear.

Watch this space.

Other Fragments from this Book?

Do you know of other leaves from this manuscript? Please let us know.

********

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Announcing the Launch of RGME Bembino WP

February 16, 2026 in Announcements, Bembino, Design, Events, Manuscript Studies, Research Group Speaks (The Series)

“Announcing the Launch
of RGME Bembino WP:

A High-Quality Font
for Word-Processing”

Launch Date: 25 March 2026

[Posted on 14 February 2026 with updates]

The full, 16-file, professional, level of our digital font RGME Bembino has been available for a while, with several updates in response to requests for more languages or features. We are thrilled to announce the launch of BembinoWP, a 4-file subset bringing our font to the Mac and Windows Word-processing Communities at large (by request).

BembinoWP has been circulating in a provisional version over recent months, for review, feedback. and corrections. Now we launch it more widely, for all to try out and use.

Find it here:

Bembino WP for Word-Processing

This release enables the font to reach desk-top publishers and report-writers using widely-available text-processing tools including Microsoft Word and PowerPoint. The BembinoWP variant offers a migration path to the full version of the font for higher-quality typesetting through professional tools such as Adobe InDesign or Quark.

Watch for its official Launch on 25 March 2026. This date marks the anniversary of the very first printed text set in Bembino: a “Happy Birthday” greeting for our Director.

For the launch, the RGME offers some occasions where you could meet the font, hear from its maker and users, and join the Q&A.

Set in RGME Bembino

Read the rest of this entry →

Tags: Bembino Digital Font, history of printing, Launch Announcement, RGME Publications, The Research Group Speaks
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2026 RGME Visit to The Grolier Club

February 6, 2026 in Uncategorized

This Link Redirects you to:

2026 RGME Colloquium at The Grolier Club

Thank you for your understanding.

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“Manuscripts at Play and as Play: Temporalities and (Re)Configurations as Reading Methods”

Session Sponsored by the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence at the 2026 International Medieval Congress (In person or Hybrid) 6–9 July 2026

Organisers: Michael Allman Conrad and Mildred Budny

Session 609 Tuesday, 7 July 2026 11:15 am –12:45 pm British Summer Time (= GMT+1)

Hybrid: Laidlaw Library, Teaching Room 2 and online for Congress Registrants

The Name of the Game

“Manuscripts at Play and as Play: Temporalities and (Re)Configurations as Reading Methods”

The Plan: Locating Manuscripts in Their (Mobile) Temporalities

Aims

Our Session

“Manuscripts At Play and As Play: (Re)Configurations as Reading Methods”

Sponsor:

Organisers:

Moderator:

Presentators

Respondents

Posters to Display and Keep

Images

Questions or Suggestions?

XII. Manuscript Leaf on Paper with a Bordered Rectangular Frame and Polychrome Lines of Text

Measurements

Structure and Companion Pages

Posters for RGME Activities at the 2026 International Congress on Medieval Studies (ICMS)

RGME Pop-Up Poster Displays at the Congress

Poster Exhibition as Precedent for the 2024 ICMS

Poster Exhibition for the 2026 ICMS

The Posters on Display

I. RGME Business Meeting

II. Sessions (in order of presentation in the Congress Program)

IIa. Group Poster for 2026 RGME Sessions at the ICMS

IIb. Posters for all RGME Sessions at the 2026 ICMS

1. “Moving the Mail”

2. “Magic, Manuscripts, and Material Culture”

3. “Alchemy and the Pedagogy of Learning”

4. “Chronology and Divination Beyond the Medieval West”

5. “Grimoires of the Greater West”

“The Research Group Speaks”

Episode 24 (Saturday 9 May 2026) “Life with Books” An Interview with John Windle, Antiquarian Bookseller

Registration

Word and Image Combined

More Leaves in the Book of Numbers from the Chudleigh Bible

in the Collection of Richard Weber

Text written in Gothic Bookhand Laid out in Double Columns of 56 lines with Running Titles, Rubrication, Text-Initials in Red and Blue, and Marginalia within Frames

Before

The Two Leaves [Folios 38 and 43]

More Is More

Name by Association

The Numbers Game: Numbers of Leaves; Numbered Leaves, and the Book of Numbers

I. Two Leaves from the Book of Numbers

II. Four More Leaves from the Book of Numbers in the Collection of Richard Weber

Folios 39–42

1. Folio 39

Recto

Verso

Detail

2. Folio 40

Recto

Verso

3. Folio 41

Recto

Verso

4. Folio 42

Recto

Verso

Traces of Stitching, Ruling, Pricking, and other Processes of Production and Use

The Outer Limits

Opening of Quire (Leaf ‘1’): Folio 38

Text (recto and verso)

Recto

Verso

End of Quire (Leaf ‘6’): Folio 43

Text (recto and verso)

Recto

Verso

III. A (Disconnected) Quire as Witness

IV. The Book

IV.1. A Single Volume

IV.2. Individual Leaves or Groups of Leaves

“Manuscripts at Play and as Play:
Temporalities and (Re)Configurations
as Reading Methods”

Session Sponsored
by the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence
at the 2026 International Medieval Congress
(In person or Hybrid)
6–9 July 2026

Organisers:
Michael Allman Conrad
and Mildred Budny

Session 609
Tuesday, 7 July 2026
11:15 am –12:45 pm British Summer Time (= GMT+1)

Hybrid:
Laidlaw Library, Teaching Room 2
and online for Congress Registrants

“Manuscripts at Play and as Play:
Temporalities and (Re)Configurations
as Reading Methods”

The Plan:
Locating Manuscripts in Their (Mobile) Temporalities

“Manuscripts At Play and As Play:
(Re)Configurations as Reading Methods”

XII. Manuscript Leaf on Paper
with a Bordered Rectangular Frame and Polychrome Lines of Text

Posters
for RGME Activities at the
2026
International Congress on Medieval Studies
(ICMS)

II. Sessions
(in order of presentation in the Congress Program)

IIb. Posters for all RGME Sessions
at the 2026 ICMS

Episode 24 (Saturday 9 May 2026)
“Life with Books”
An Interview with
John Windle, Antiquarian Bookseller

More Leaves
in the Book of Numbers
from the Chudleigh Bible

Text written in Gothic Bookhand
Laid out in Double Columns of 56 lines
with Running Titles, Rubrication,
Text-Initials in Red and Blue,
and Marginalia within Frames

The Numbers Game:
Numbers of Leaves; Numbered Leaves,
and the Book of Numbers

II. Four More Leaves from the Book of Numbers
in the Collection of Richard Weber

Traces of Stitching, Ruling, Pricking,
and other Processes of Production and Use

A Medieval Missal Fragment
in Latin on Vellum
Reused
as the Early-Modern Binding Cover
for Erasmus Reinhold,
Prutenicae Tabulae (1585)

Front Cover of the Printed Copy:
Side 1 of the Reused Manuscript Fragment

Back Cover
Side 2 of the Reused Manuscript Fragment

2026 RGME Colloquium
at The Grolier Club

“Transformations and Renewals”
Examining and Celebrating
Treasures of the Grolier Club Library

Wednesday 11 February 2026
Hybrid, in Two Events:
Workshop
+
Roundtable

I. The “Transformations and Renewals” Roundtable
in the Grolier Club Exhibition Hall
(Hybrid, Live-Streamed)
6:00 to 7:30 pm EST (GMT-4)

II. The “Show-Off-and-Tell” Workshop
in the Grolier Club Council Room
(Hybrid, Zoom Meeting)
2:30 to 4:30 pm EST (GMT-4)

Background and Foreground:
An Approach with Grounding

The Weber Leaf
from
Otto Ege MS 61

Small-Format Latin Vulgate Bible
Laid out in 2 columns of 32 lines
in Gothic Bookhand
with embellishments in red, blue, and purple pigments

Formerly part of Otto Ege Manuscript 61 (Gwara, Handlist 61)
Southern France, circa 1325

Mark 5:42 ([illi mandu-/]care) –
6:1 (Et egressus . . . ) – 6:38 (Quot panes ha[/-betis ite])

“Announcing the Launch
of RGME Bembino WP: