The French Book and the European Book World

This work offers a series of linked studies of European print culture in the sixteenth century, focusing particularly on France and the regional, provincial experience of print. France, in the sixteenth century, was one of the great centres of the European publishing industry. But in the second half of the century the established dominance of Paris and Lyon was increasingly challenged by other new printing centres, stimulated in part by the religious and political crisis of the French Wars of Religion. Drawing on the data collected by the St Andrews French book project, the author reconstructs the enigmatic history of a number of previously unstudied printers. The focus throughout is on popular print, and the growth of mass market for news, entertainment and religious instruction. Customers interested in this title may also be interested in French Vernacular Books, edited by Andrew Pettegree, Malcolm Walsby and Alexander Wilkinson.