TREASURE IN MANUSCRIPT
THE OLDEST MANUSCRIPTS IN NEW ZEALAND, by David M. Taylor; New a Council for Educational Research, 42/-. T New Zealand book sales we occasionally come across that mysterious word "incunabula," which means "swaddling clothes," and which denotes works printed before 1500 A.D., when
printing was in its infancy. Mr. Taylor tells us that of the 40,000 surviving incunabula 181 are in New Zealand. How they got here is another mysterious thing, and Mr. Taylor was at first excited to discover each one. But he found so many that he decided to confine his researches to those writings in New Zealand which were done by hand (not printed) in the year 1500 or earlier. He found 76-47 in Auckland, 13 in Wellington, one in Christchurch and 15 in Dunedin. This book describes and discusses the manuscripts in detail, reproduces some of the outstanding pages (particularly those having illustrations) and in a final chapter analyses an example of 15th century printing to provide a connection between the manuscript and the mass-produced book. Palaeography-the study of ancient written documentsis new to this part of the world, and as the author is a graduate of Canterbury College and of the Melbourne College of Divinity, we can rejoice that we have helped produce a man worthy of Sir George Grey’s library and that we have a New Zealand Council of Educational Research with the wisdom and vision to make publication possible.
W. B.
Sutch
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19560420.2.22.6
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 34, Issue 872, 20 April 1956, Page 14
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242TREASURE IN MANUSCRIPT New Zealand Listener, Volume 34, Issue 872, 20 April 1956, Page 14
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
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