Forensic Bibliography

This article traces the genealogy of “forensic bibliography” in the Anglophone world from the sixteenth century to the twenty-first century. It argues that many of the methods and procedures now associated with bibliographical analysis—including the identification and dating of type, ornaments, and watermarks—were originally developed to detect the perpetrators of crimes, including seditious libel, treason, piracy, forgery, and counterfeiting. In the early twentieth century, these established techniques of forensic analysis became ensnared with the practice of historical bibliography. As a consequence, the bibliographical “habit of mind” has been and continues to be ineluctably shaped by the priorities of “detective work” and criminal justice. These priorities are not simply an unintended result of the questions asked by bibliographers, but are deeply enmeshed with the methods they use. The article closes by asking what it would take to dismantle some of these assumptions, and whether such a thing is possible or desirable.