This collaborative collection considers the packaging, presentation and consumption of medieval manuscripts and early printed books in Europe 1350–1550. It showcases innovative research on the history of the book from a range of established and younger scholars from the US and Europe in the fields of English and French Studies, History, Music, and Art History. The collection falls naturally into three sections:

• Packaging and Presentation: The physical context of the manuscript and printed book including its binding, visual presentation and internal organization
• Consumers: Producers, Owners, and Readers
• Consuming the Text: The experience of the audience(s) for books

These three strands are interdependent, and highlight the materiality of the manuscript or printed book as a consumable, focusing on its ‘consumability’ in the sense of its packaging and presentation, its consumers, and on the act of consumption in the sense of reading and reception or literal decay.