Abstract
This paper discusses early modern European precedents to contemporary debates about the material dimensions of written artefacts. It demonstrates that materiality was a major concern for producers and users of both print and manuscript written artefacts already in the seventeenth and eighteenth century. Several reasons alerted early modern Europeans to the material features of manuscripts and prints. Against a broader survey of these developments, one particular line of thought is explored more in detail. Starting from two texts by Thomas Bartholin (1670) and Franz Ernst Brückmann (1727), the essay highlights especially how experiences of loss by fire contributed to early modern awareness of the materiality of writing.
