News Archives

Forgeries, Facsimiles & Sophisticated Copies (Online)

Course Length: 22 hours
Schedule: 11 a.m.–5 p.m. ET (including breaks), 9–13 January 2023
Format: Online
Course fee: $1,000

This course offers an introduction to the technologies historically and currently used to produce typographical forgeries and facsimiles, as well as tools for their detection. It is designed for individuals already familiar with the hand-press book, but who would like to develop their sense of the changes—especially those done to deceive—which have been wrought upon books over the course of their lives.

Drawing from the RBS teaching collections and other materials, students will examine the various means—typographical, […]

Why Black Bibliography Matters

Course Length: 30 hours
Course Week: 21–26 July 2024
Format: in person, Princeton University in Princeton, NJ
Fee: $1,495 

In the 1970s, librarians, cataloguers, and researchers confronted an issue that was barely conceivable to previous generations: a surplus of Black-authored books. Prior bibliographers had taken stock of a delimited set of authors from the eighteenth through the early twentieth centuries. The field shifted dramatically after World War II, however, when the number of authors and types of books increased to a dizzying degree. After a veritable revolution in Black print in the 1960s, […]

Descriptive Bibliography: The Fundamentals

Length: 10 hours
Format: Online

This 10-hour online course is intended for persons who desire a better understanding of the physical examination and description of printed books, especially of the period 1550–1850. It is designed both for those with little formal exposure to this subject and for those with some general knowledge who seek a systematic discussion of (or refresher to) the elements of physical description as set forth in Fredson Bowers’ Principles of Bibliographical Description.

This abbreviated course differs from G-10 in that it focuses more narrowly on the creation of a basic bibliographical description, […]

Paper as Bibliographical Evidence

Course Length: 30 hours
Course Week: 8–13 June 2025
Format: in person, University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, MI
Fee: $1,495

This course will focus on bound, printed works in the West from the eighteenth century, when all paper was made by hand, through the nineteenth century when the introduction of two machines—the fourdrinier and the cylinder—changed the manufacture of paper and some of its characteristics. In addition to learning about traditional hand- and machine-papermaking materials and technologies, participants will apply what is taught in lectures directly to the examination and identification of a wide variety of papers found in bound artifacts. […]

Identifying and Understanding Twentieth-Century Duplicating Technologies

Course Length: 30 hours
Course Week: 6–11 July 2025
Format: in person, University of Virginia in Charlottesville, VA
Fee: $1,495

This course will examine the history and identification of twentieth-century duplicating processes. Students will learn how these technologies operated, and, from that understanding, learn the capabilities and characteristics of each in order to effectively identify the process used on a given document or text.

We will cover the nineteenth-century origins of duplication, common duplicating processes like spirit, mimeography, xerography, and offset—as well as more unusual methods like verifax, […]

Physical Bibliography for Book Conservators

N.B. Enrollment for this course is currently limited to participants in the RBS-Mellon Library and Archives Conservation Education (LACE) Consortium Program.

The course is intended for book conservators who seek a richer understanding of the physical features of printed books, especially of the period 1500–1900, and of standard bibliographical methods for describing those features. The course will cover typography (type sizes, fonts, and non-textual material); letterpress composition and printing; paper and illustration as bibliographical evidence; provenance (ownership markings, inscriptions, bookplates, and the ways in which books have been physically altered by owners and readers); and the analysis and description of book structure (format, […]

Forgeries, Facsimiles & Sophisticated Copies

Course Length: 30 hours
Course Week: 8–13 June 2025
Format: in person, University of Virginia in Charlottesville, VA
Fee: $1,495

This course offers an introduction to the technologies historically and currently used to produce typographical forgeries and facsimiles, as well as tools for their detection. It is designed for individuals already familiar with the hand-press book, but who would like to develop their sense of the changes—especially those done to deceive—which have been wrought upon books over the course of their lives.

Drawing from the RBS teaching collections and other materials, […]

Advanced Descriptive Bibliography

A continuation and extension of Introduction to the Principles of Bibliographical Description (G-10), this course is based on the intensive examination of a representative range of books from the c16-c19. The goal of the course is to deepen students’ familiarity with the physical composition of books; to gain further experience in the use of Fredson Bowers’ Principles of Bibliographical Description; and to consider critically some of the uses of Bowers’ method (and its limitations) in the production of catalogs, bibliographies, critical editions, and histories of books and reading.

The method of this course is essentially the same as that of G-10, […]

Printed Books since 1800: Description & Analysis

This course is designed for librarians, booksellers, collectors, scholars, and others who seek an introductory understanding of how to recognize, evaluate and describe the physical aspects and textual significance of printed materials. Focusing on the post-1800 period, the course provides instruction and practice in identifying and analyzing books and other printed artifacts. Topics include: determining how books were manufactured, how to read a bibliographical description of a book; how to read and interpret dealer and auction descriptions; how to distinguish between edition, issue, and state; and how to assess the aesthetic, market, and research potential of materials. The course is built around hands-on interaction with RBS’s rich teaching collection of books, […]

Introduction to the Principles of Bibliographical Description

“I feel much more confident in my understanding of format and how it relates to book structure, as well as in my ability to create an in-depth analysis of an ideal copy.” — 2017 student

Course Length: 30+ hours
Course Week: 27 July–1 August 2025
Format: in person, University of Virginia in Charlottesville, VA
Fee: $1,595

This course is intended for those seeking a better understanding of best practices for the physical examination and description of printed books, especially of the period 1550–1900. […]

Analytical Bibliography

“I walked away with a much finer eye; more attuned to certain details I may have otherwise missed. I certainly feel this has broadened my horizons as a researcher.” — 2017 student

Course Length: 30 hours
Course Week: 6–11 July 2025
Format: in person, University of Virginia in Charlottesville, VA
Fee: $1,495

An introduction to techniques for recognizing, recording, and understanding the traces preserved in printed books of the hand-press period which give evidence of the methods of their manufacture. Besides revealing details of early printing technology, analytical bibliography can uncover facts about now-lost manuscripts that served as copy for the typeset texts. […]

Printed Books to 1800: Description & Analysis

“Connecting the physicality of the pressroom to format and collation gave me a great model to think through the discovery process with a new book.” — 2017 student

Course Length: 30 hours
Course Week: 8–13 June 2025
Format: in person, University of Virginia in Charlottesville, VA
Fee: $1,495

The course is intended for collectors, booksellers, librarians, educators, and others who seek an introduction to the physical aspects of books printed during the hand-press period (1450–1800). Via lectures and hands-on workshops, the course covers the identification and description of paper (laid vs. […]

Digital Approaches to Bibliography & Book History

Course Length: 30 hours
Course Week: 9–14 July 2023
Format: in person, University of Virginia in Charlottesville, VA
Fee: $1,395

This course will explore the possibilities that digital tools and methods open for the pursuit of bibliographical and book-historical investigations, as well as the questions that those tools and methods bring with them. Beyond providing a practical introduction to digital bibliography, the class will also invite critical reflection on its affordances and limitations. A central concern of the course will be the consideration of the kinds of bibliographical and book historical problems that digital methods may be best positioned to address in the future. […]

Scholarly Editing: Principles & Practice

Course Length: 30 hours
Course Week: 2–7 June 2024
Format: in person, University of Virginia in Charlottesville, VA
Fee: $1,395

This course is an introduction to the principles and practice of scholarly editing. The emphasis will be on the methodology of preparing an edition, either documentary or critical, and on the thinking that informs the decisions editors make about the issues they confront. In learning how to prepare new documents, the class will consider principles of textual criticism, that is, the study of the history of texts and the evaluation of their changes. […]

Advanced Seminar in Critical Bibliography

N.B. In 2017, enrollment for this course will be limited to RBS-Mellon Fellows or to students who have previously attended RBS course G-10 (Introduction to the Principles of Bibliographical Description) or G-45 (Analytical Bibliography) and who are currently engaged in a research project related to bibliography and material texts.

A bibliographer’s reach should seldom, if ever, exceed his (her) grasp, as there can be no substitute for the careful and knowing inspection, the haptic apprehension, of textual artifacts. Yet, it is also the case that the intellectual reach of bibliography extends far beyond its traditional work in service of textual criticism, […]