Książka rękopiśmienna w życiu społeczeństwa w Wielkim Księstwie Litewskim w XIV – połowie XVI wieku
The manuscript book and the life of the society on the Grand Duchy of Lithuania from the XIVth until the middle of the XVIth centuries

Summary/Abstract: The aim of the article – is to analyze changes in the society’s view on the manuscript book and the reception of it. In order to realize this aim, it is planned to investigate the way in which society was manifested reception of the book and how it is reflected in the sources of the time. Manuscript books, archival sources and objects of art were used as the sources in the research. It is established that the book satisfied official, social and personal needs of the society of that time. As books and collections became increasingly numerous and the relationship with books diversified, the idea of the book in the GDL’s society also underwent a change. If during the early stage of the studied period a book was understood as a static and uniform sacral object, little influenced by man, from the XVth century it was considered to be a mobile, mutable object much affected by persons directly connected with the book. Codices migrated both in the geographical and living space. In the early XVIth century the concept of a book as a unit underwent a change. The concept of a codex as an object that physically joined separate works (books, liber) was replaced by the idea of a codex as an integral unit (a new work) possessing unifying internal and external elements of a book.

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