William and Mary Libraries logo
Perspective view of study carrels flanked by two lines of bookshelves in the Law Library
Special Collections Blog Topics

Special Collections Blog Topics

Book Printing

  • Title page of a history book

    Printing Anti-Spanish Propaganda for European Purposes

    Posted

    <p>It may seem like Spanish empire in the Americas would have little to do with European politics, but we should not assume that the Atlantic world of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries

  • The decayed spine of a book reveals the headbands used in its binding

    The ties that bind: How the decay of a binding shows its construction

    Posted

    <p>Swem Library has a great many books in very bad bindings. Most modern books, for instance, are held together only by glue at the spine. Even modern hardcovers have the same binding.

  • Drawer full of type

    The World Before QWERTY

    Posted

    <html><body><p>Can you type without looking at the keyboard? This used to be a skill taught to people who wanted secretarial or clerical jobs.

  • Page of a travel book with a fictional description of Formosa

    Believable Lies

    Posted

    <p>The island of Taiwan, once commonly known in the West by the Portuguese name of Formosa, has recently resurfaced in the news in connection with the One China policy.

  • Title page and illustration in the 1698 edition of Las Casas, printed in French

    Propaganda and the Beginnings and End of Spanish America

    Posted

    <html><body><p>The arrival of Europeans in the Americas was an event of global importance, and its effect on the people already living here was devastating.

  • Engraving of printing presses

    Lasting Impressions: Printing from the Fifteenth Century to Today

    Posted

    <html><body><p>In the basement of Swem Library is a room used mostly for storage. Along two walls are machines and wooden cases full of drawers.

  • Woodcut of a boy and man with book

    Art in the SCRC Collections

    Posted

    <html><body><p style="text-align: left;">SCRC has an active instruction schedule during the academic year, as professors from all departments bring their students in to

  • All Wrapped Up: The Montebourg Manuscript

    Posted

    <html><body><p><drupal-media data-align="right" data-caption="Montebourg Manuscript wrapper (Collection of French Language Manuscripts, 1633-1942, Mss.

  • From the Cradle of Printing into the Classroom

    Posted

    <html><body><p>One of the titles we will be showing in two upcoming instruction sessions this week, the 1483 <a href="