The Gilded Page: The Secret Lives of Medieval Manuscripts

Product Description

A breathtaking journey into the hidden history of medieval manuscripts, from the Lindisfarne Gospels to the ornate Psalter of Henry VIII
“A delight—immersive, conversational, and intensely visual, full of gorgeous illustrations and shimmering description.” –Helen Castor, author of She-Wolves
Medieval manuscripts can tell us much about power and art, knowledge and beauty. Many have survived because of an author’s status—part of the reason we have so much of Chaucer’s writing, for example, is because he was a London-based government official first and a poet second. Other works by the less influential have narrowly avoided ruin, like the book of illiterate Margery Kempe, found in a country house closet, the cover nibbled on by mice. Scholar Mary Wellesley recounts the amazing origins of these remarkable manuscripts, surfacing the important roles played by women and ordinary people—the grinders, binders, and scribes—in their creation and survival.
The Gilded Page is the story of the written word in the manuscript age. Rich and surprising, it shows how the most exquisite objects ever made by human hands came from unexpected places.
“Mary Wellesley is a born storyteller and The Gilded Page is as good as historical writing gets. This is a sensational debut by a wonderfully gifted historian.” —Dan Jones, bestselling author of The Plantagenets and The Templars

Review

“A historian examines the origins and maintenance of famous manuscripts, revealing the pivotal work of binders, scribes and dedicated women in keeping the work of many celebrated writers and thinkers from ruin.”―
New York Times

“This book is an expression of love… Sublimely conceived and beautifully written…”―
Gerard DeGroot, The Times (UK)

“Fascinating information… Wellesley writes about creators, authors, scribes and parchment makers. Manuscripts establish a personal bond across the centuries between her and the men and women who made them. Few people have described the experience so eloquently. The range is remarkable.” ―
The Spectator

“To Wellesley, books are objects, tangible things, a million miles away from Kindles, which are inert. Her taste is not for ‘the sanitised, ordered blandness of the modern edited text.’”―
Daily Telegraph

“Fascinating.” ―
BBC’s History Revealed

“Wellesley’s subject matter holds an irresistible hook, for not just historians but anyone who loves reading.”―
Library Journal

“
The Gilded Page is a delight—immersive, conversational, and intensely visual, full of gorgeous illustrations and shimmering description. Mary Wellesley explores the lives of medieval manuscripts, and the men and—importantly—women who made them, with deep learning and unmistakable love.”―
Helen Castor, author of She-Wolves

“Mary Wellesley is a born storyteller and 
The Gilded Page is as good as historical writing gets. Wellesley draws on her deep scholarly knowledge of medieval manuscripts to weave a captivating tale, told through generations of ‘tremulous hands’ and forgotten artistic geniuses, whose works inform so much of what we know today about the Middle Ages. This is a sensational debut by a wonderfully gifted historian.”―
Dan Jones, bestselling author of The Plantagenets and The Templars

“Authors may write their books, but they don’t make them. Here is the chance to meet the women and men who actually made the cathedrals and palaces of medieval English literature, from the St. Cuthbert Gospel to the Luttrell Psalter, from Beowulf to Chaucer. Mary Wellesley tells us about the authors, but more important, she introduces us to the artists, the ink-makers, vellum preparers and pigment grinders—and all the others who contributed their different gifts to these great communal achievements. To read this book is to meet the makers of the English literary Middle Ages.”―
Neil MacGregor, Former Director of the British Museum and author of A History of the World in 100 Objects

“In an age moving ever more quickly away from the physical book,