Review

"Honkapohja provides an in-depth analysis of the codicological detail, dialect, and multilingual character of the manuscripts. The aim is to see whether further analysis can provide clues as to their production circumstances, audience, and intent. In seven chapters, Honkapohja offers a wealth of information on these manuscripts, which he has clearly studied with scrupulous care. . . . .There is no doubt that Honkapohjas book advances our knowledge of text production and dissemination of scientific texts in late medieval England. While the in-depth analysis sometimes simply appears to confirm Voigtss earlier suggestions, we do see important nuancing of her ideas and new discoveries and correctives as well. Among other interesting findings, the close inspection of language mixing and dialect points out significant distinctions between the different manuscript subgroups, and between medical and alchemical works." --Peter J. Grund, University of Kansas, Speculum 95/1 (January 2020)

Long Description

The Voigts-Sloane group of Middle English manuscripts, first described by Professor Emerita Linda Voigts in 1990, has attracted much curiosity and scholarly attention. The manuscripts exhibit a degree of uniformity that may originate from systematic copying of medical and alchemical manuscripts (possibly for speculative sale) in London or its metropolitan area in 1450s and 1460s--only decades before William Caxton established his printing press in Westminster. Some of the manuscripts share a strikingly similar mise-en-page, others present a standard anthology of medical treatises in a standard order. This book provides a thorough re-examination of these manuscripts through a combination of codicological and linguistic methodologies. It examines different procedures which may have facilitated the production of the manuscripts, including speculative production and copying of separate booklets. The study also addresses the dialect of the manuscripts, and code-switching between Latin and Middle English. By showing that the manuscripts sharing a similar layout are also written in the same dialect, the book thus provides important new information on the dialects of medical writing, and shows that dialect is a further defining feature for this manuscript group. The book also highlights late medieval concerns over alchemy and medicine, explaining the apparent contradiction of the inclusion of alchemy (which was illegal) in commercially copied manuscripts. This study thus provides both a comprehensive new description of these manuscripts, and sheds new light on the commercial and cultural contexts of book production in late medieval England.

Review Text

"Honkapohja provides an in-depth analysis of the codicological detail, dialect, and multilingual character of the manuscripts. The aim is to see whether further analysis can provide clues as to their production circumstances, audience, and intent. In seven chapters, Honkapohja offers a wealth of information on these manuscripts,which he has clearly studied with scrupulous care. . . . .There is no doubt that Honkapohjas book advances our knowledge of text production and dissemination of scientific texts in late medieval England. While the in-depth analysis sometimes simply appears to confirm Voigtss earlier suggestions, we do see important nuancing of her ideas and new discoveries and correctives as well. Among other interesting findings, the close inspection of language mixing and dialect points out significant distinctions between the different manuscript subgroups, and between medical and alchemical works." --Peter J. Grund, University of Kansas, Speculum 95/1 (January 2020)

Details