Scriptorium: the term and its history

Abstract

What is a scriptorium and how does it fit into the notion of atelier? Broadly speaking, both terms have come to refer to places where people met in the past or meet today to work together on collaborative projects. While the term scriptorium is usually associated with the writing of religious books in a monastic context in the early Middle Ages, the notion of a place of communal work, workshop or atelier is in place in the Livre des métiers composed by Étienne Boileau († 1270). Boileau descri...