Daily calligraphy practice! Yep, I still hate writing Gothic.

I understand the excitement about technology “rediscovering lost texts.” I do, & I get the media hype. But I wish people knew that there are hundreds of thousands of “lost” texts just sitting in manuscripts in libraries, which have never been published outside of those single manuscripts. 1/n

I have been doing a lot of critical reevaluation of Roman and medieval historians recently because I am living through the kind of end to an autocratic regime that very sober, serious modern historians have footnoted with phrases like "an unreliable account from a hostile chronicler."

Trying to read a classical author: you have your choice of Loeb, OCT, Budé, Teubner, green and yellow, and multiple free editions online. Trying to read a medieval author: this text was last printed in 1683. It has never been digitized. Only 26 copies still exist and half of them are in Heidelberg.

Today's existential dread can wait its turn, I'm still spending quality time with yesterday's.

Daily calligraphy practice: uncial! Bonus mistakes added free of charge. Practice is supposed to be messy; don't compare your real practice to someone else's carefully curated video.

This is BNF Latin 2290, c850, Greek text in Latin letters. The transcription suggests Greek was still a living language to the scribe (ke epi gis irini). It belonged to St Denis near Paris, which used Greek in its liturgy to support its claim to have been founded by St Dionysius the Areopagite.

Daily calligraphy practice #2: gothic quadrata. It's a bit sloppy and that's ok. What's the use of this? No use at all, thank God.

My gardening assistant may not know the scientific names of plants, but he accepts payment in scritches.

We interrupt your daily scheduled doomscrolling for cat.

Daily calligraphy/paleography practice after years of neglect #1: Luxeuil script! Because you don't have to be great at something for it to bring you joy.

Saturday morning is for gardening and paleography! Thanks to @rarebookschool.bsky.social for letting me see, handle, and photograph these beauties, includng a Renaissance riddle long hidden on the back of a fragment.