A Brief History of the Book: From Tablet to Tablet

From ancient clay tablet and scrolls, to medieval manuscripts and printed books, to personal computers and iPads, this guide examines the fascinating history of books from 4000 BCE to the present. Taking an archaeological approach, the work presents books not only as vehicles for texts but also as physical artifacts that carry with them important evidence of the cultures that produced them.

Moving chronologically from the ancient world to the present, the book shows how written communication media evolved from cuneiform to the Kindle. Focusing on key technologies and vital periods of historical transition, it traces an evolution that elucidates the history of the written word, at each step examining and evaluating aspects of technologies such as memory capacity, readability and write-ability, durability, recyclability, information security, ease and mode of access, and cost. Additional attention is paid to how these technologies were made, how they were circulated, and who was reading them.

Steven K. Galbraith, PhD, is curator of the Cary Graphic Arts Collection at Rochester Institute of Technology and former Andrew W. Mellon Curator of Books at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC.