User:RowellSK/Sandbox
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Scriptorium (plural scriptoria) comes from the medieval Latin script-, scribere (to write), where -orium is the neuter singular ending for adjectives. Thus, a scriptorium is literally "a place for writing". In its proper use, scriptorium refers to a room in medieval European monasteries devoted to the hand-copying of manuscripts by monastic scribes. When monastic libraries and scriptoria arose in the early 6th century (the first European monastic writing dates from 517), they defined European literary culture and preserved the literary history of the West. By the start of the 13th century, secular copyshops had developed to write for the laity, which were closely followed by urban bookshops c. 1250.[1]