Scriptorium

A scriptorium (from the Latin scriptorium — 'a place for writing') is a workshop for copying books, which usually operated at medieval monasteries, princely courts, or cathedrals. In a scriptorium worked copyists (scribes, calligraphers), rubricators, illuminators (masters of miniatures and initials), and binders; here the entire cycle of producing a manuscript book was carried out — from preparing the parchment to binding. Scriptoria were centers of book learning, education, and culture, places for preserving and multiplying the written heritage. In Rus', major centers of book production were the scriptoria at the St. Sophia Cathedral, where, according to the chronicle, Prince Yaroslav the Wise 'gathered many scribes' to translate and copy books, and at the Kyiv Caves Monastery in Kyiv. With the spread of printing (from the 15th–16th centuries), scriptoria yielded to printing houses, though the manuscript tradition continued in places. The study of the output of scriptoria is a subject of codicology and paleography.