This was both a powerful and artful memento mori: an elegant woman looking into the mirror, and rapidly aging with the paper flap. This was printed in 1510 Germany, #skystorians

Early Modern Women: An Interdisciplinary Journal | Vol 20, No 2

Our spring 2026 issue is out! Featuring four articles, the annual Conversations on Early Modern Women and Race, three exhibition reviews, and twenty-five book reviews www.journals.uchicago.edu/toc/emw/curr... #EarlyModern

Might be the greatest opening paragraph of anything ever.

Sleep, Scent, and Household Medical Care in Early Modern England Abstract. Sleep loss was a vital health concern for early modern people, and inducing sleep was essential to healthcare practices. This article traces how

Delighted that my new article in @historyworkshop.org.uk, co-authored with @drhollyfletcher.bsky.social, is now published! Thanks to all who read and heard earlier versions of this @wellcometrust.bsky.social funded research :)
academic.oup.com/hwj/advance-... [track.smtpsendmail.com]

Richard Roach, writing in 1725 about the great female authors and spiritual leaders of his era. He assumed that when the history books were written they would all be put on the public stage “with applause and admiration”. 300 yrs later and we’re only just learning their names #earlymodern

I added more imprints to a corpus with enough going on, and I found another woman in the London book trades that has been assumed to be a man.

Meet Sarah Surman Cliff Cruttenden. She trades as S. Cliff and S. Cruttenden. Sources assume man, so no one caught a woman as the same person with 3 names.

I taught a session in my digital manuscripts class yesterday on the BL ransomware attack, and it yielded probably the most engaged discussion we’ve had so far, about cultural heritage, remediation, labor, and access. The word “ontology” was used correctly, and not by me!

A merwoman holding a comb and a mirror, riding a big fish. This is the colophon from this book: https://www.e-rara.ch/zuz/content/zoom/8532285

Entering the weekend like this angry-fish riding, mirrow and comb holding, slightly smiling merwoman in 1530 on a printer's mark from the Zurich-based Augustin Frieß... #bookhistory

A human skull positioned on a sundial with the inscription "INEVITABILE FATUM" (inevitable fate) staring into the void, avoiding eye contact to you, the reader, since 1557.

Staring with his mouth agape since 1557.

Circular engraving with man with long hair and a finger raised to his lips.

Slightly browned version of same print, no surrounding letterpress.

KNEW I'd Seen That Somewhere

Bought a 1657 pamphlet with this little man telling you to be be quiet a while back...
Looks like I saw it first in this album of mostly devotional prints at #artinstitutechi assembled in 1798!
1/?

#NewberryLibrary i-share-nby.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/01...

Italian-made and one French-made cameo depictions of African women and men, mid-16th century to early 17th century (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien)

A putto is sitting on an early modern type case, a box made for the different types during the hand-press era. One needed to pick up each type for a letter or symbol etc. and compose each word, text, and page. The putto blows also soap bubbles: in each bubble is a letter, and the word formed is VANITAS, meaning "vanity". This detail was published in a German speaking newspaper, "Monatliche Nachrichten einicher Merkwürdigkeiten" in 1751. VD18 90722892.

A putto blowing soap bubbles, sitting on a type case full of type, and the letters in the bubbles read as: VANITAS (vanity).

A beautiful reflection of human writing and publishing, #skystorians

1/2

That cult of Elizabeth I was really something else. The frontispiece to the 1593 edition of John Case's Sphaera Civitatis. (Royal Collection Trust, HM CIII)

Special thanks to Daniela D'Eugenio for organizing, and @richardkirwan.bsky.social for moderating!

Me presenting my research on Lucretia and Cleopatra in early modern printing emblems!

Presented at @rsaorg.bsky.social on Lucretia and Cleopatra in early modern printing emblems. #RSA26, you were so good to me! #rensa26

This is amazing!!

A human skull in the ornament of a book printd in 1717 Stuttgart. Under the ornament the text passage starts with a "TEXT." headline. Source: VD18 13976346

They said, why not start the new book with a spectacular detail like a screaming skull or something, then enter a placeholder text, and wait for the inspiration to finally kick in...

I will plant companionship thick as trees along all the rivers of America, and along the shores of the great lakes, and all over the prairies; I will make inseparable cities, with their arms about each other's necks; By the love of comrades, By the manly love of comrades.

teaching Whitman tomorrow, thinking about

'VARIOUS ANCIENT PAPERS' written on an old envelope. The envelope is being held above a wooden table with a box on it.

Nice and specific, cheers.

Dummy board of a woman peeling apples, c. 1690, of English make (Victoria & Albert Museum) Dummy boards were life-size images placed in stairwells or in front of fireplaces in summer time. They were designed to amuse and also to startle visitors.

A fox on the helmet of a human knight. The knight sits on a fabulous beast. The handdrawn image is part of a 1447 German manuscript (Staats- und Stadtbibliothek Augsburg, 2* Cod. 160).

Just a regular fox taking an #earlymodern Uber. Nothing to see here. #skystorians

Living Precariously - Pittsburgh Review of Books Sport that wrinkled Care derides,And Laughter holding both his sides.L’Allegro, 31-2.

Part Milton criticism, part John Carey obit, & part reflection on his own cancer treatment, Willy Maley's moving essay is an astonishing testament to lives in criticism and reason 1A I'm so proud that @cmuenglish.bsky.social launched the @pghreviewofbooks.bsky.social pghrev.com/living-preca...

This is a stunning resource, beautifully presented - congratulations to Ros Smith Kathy Acheson and their team emwmlibrary.com

A black and white illustration of a pregnant woman sitting on a chair. Another woman is supporting her from behind, while a second woman is sitting in front of her, ready to help deliver the baby.

For centuries, a “gossip” was a woman who attended another woman's delivery. The word was a corruption of “god-sib” or “god-sibling,” meaning “sister in the Lord.” The gossips offered support to mother & midwife. Only later did it become derogatory.

More info: www.historyextra.com/period/gener...

Thank you, John!!!!

Barnabe Rich wasn't the first to say that books and cheese are alike in that no specific example suits everyone's tastes: John Heywood included this among a hundred epigrams in 1562:

www.jstor.org/stable/41723...

Image of title page of my new article, The Dangers

If you're interested in reading about the series of Sophonisba plays written in early modern England, my article with
earlytheatre.bsky.social is live!
muse.jhu.edu/pub/286/arti...