scriptorium

(noun)

A room in a monastery set aside for the copying, writing, or illuminating of manuscripts and records.

Related Terms

Examples of scriptorium in the following topics:

  • Illuminated Manuscripts

    • Larger monasteries often contained separate areas, known as scriptoriums, for the monks who specialized in the production of manuscripts.
    • By the 14th century, the cloisters of monks writing in the scriptorium had almost fully given way to commercial urban scriptoria, especially in Paris, Rome and the Netherlands.

  • Ottonian Illustrated Books in the Early European Middle Ages

    • The scriptorium of Reichenau housed a scriptorium and artists' workshop that has a claim to having been the largest and artistically most influential in Europe during the late tenth and early eleventh centuries.

  • Illuminated Manuscripts

    • By the 14th century, the production of luxury manuscripts by monks writing in the monastic scriptorium had almost fully given way to commercial urban scriptoria, especially in Paris, Rome, and Burgundy.