About

This proposal focuses on bindings found on naval logbooks assisting in the navigation of vessels from the main European maritime empires, Great Britain, France, The Netherlands and Spain, from the 16th to the early 19th century. Although the content of these unique archival documents has been used as evidences for European maritime history, their physical structure and the history of their manufacture have never been fully explored. The overall aim of this project is therefore to understand the material history of these logbooks, their manufacture, the types of structure that were used to bind them and more generally, the place they occupy in the history of the booktrade in Europe. In addition to investigating a little-studied aspect of the book history, this research will also explore and compare the material culture of a diverse group of navigators during more than two centuries across Europe. The core of the research will be based on the systematic description of the binding structures, using a newly developed standardised terminology complemented by the analysis of archival documents and the existing literature on the history of bookbinding and the booktrade. The proposed research also intends to develop a step-by step method that could  significantly reduce the time to describe the bindings and record these descriptions. This will allow for a representative sample of book structures to be described and could be used in other areas than naval logbooks, by anyone willing to describe bindings. In addition to the written thesis, the outcome of this research will also include the organisation of an exhibition highlighting the different types of logbooks across Europe.