'OVID WITH A LITTLETON': THE COST OF ENGLISH BOOKS IN THE EARLY SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

Abstract

Almost fifty years ago, in two detailed and influential articles, Francis R. Johnson and H. S. Bennett reviewed retail book prices in England in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries.2 They drew partly on annotations by owners in books, or on accounts kept by customers (most notably Humphrey Dyson, notary public in London);3 and Johnson examined the extent to which legislation agreed by the Stationers' Company in 1598 to control the price of books was followed or ignored. Altogether, they published prices or values of almost seven hundred books and pamphlets. Details of very many more book prices have been published since,4 and very much more is now known of