08/24/2026
Before printing transformed Europe, books had to be copied by hand.
A medieval scribe could spend enormous amounts of time reproducing a manuscript.
Parchment was valuable.
Ink had to be prepared.
The handwriting had to remain consistent.
A mistake could require careful correction.
Books were therefore expensive objects that represented significant labor.
Imagine spending months working on a single manuscript.
Today, we can copy millions of words in seconds.
For medieval scribes, every page represented hours of human effort.
Could you spend six months creating one handwritten book?