A study on anonymous printers of seventeenth-century English books.

• Project/Area Number: 16K13201
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Literature in English
• Research Institution: Kyushu Institute of Technology
• Principal Investigator: Nagase Mariko 九州工業大学, 教養教育院, 准教授 (80636506)
• Project Period (FY): 2016-04-01 – 2019-03-31
• Project Status: Completed (Fiscal Year 2019)
• Budget Amount: ¥2,210,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,700,000、Indirect Cost: ¥510,000); Fiscal Year 2018: ¥780,000 (Direct Cost: ¥600,000、Indirect Cost: ¥180,000); Fiscal Year 2017: ¥780,000 (Direct Cost: ¥600,000、Indirect Cost: ¥180,000); Fiscal Year 2016: ¥650,000 (Direct Cost: ¥500,000、Indirect Cost: ¥150,000)
• Keywords: 書誌学 / 無記名印刷者特定 / 無記名印刷者同定 / 17世紀英国古版本

Outline of Final Research Achievements

This study has succeeded in identification of the printers of 17 books that were published in 17th century England with no printer's name. Exploring the contemporary stationers' networks has enabled the printers' identities to be detected with high probability. Besides, the introduction of an image comparison software‘MIIDEL’has helped identify photographic images of damaged types and damaged ornamental devices with more precision, which has led to confirmation of their owners.

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

印刷出版業者のネットワーク調査を元に印刷者の特定件数を向上させる手法を採用した点で単一版本の印刷者特定を最終目的とし、かつ特定の成功率も低かった従来の研究方法を克服した。特定の手法として1991年に提唱された欠損活字の同定を主軸とする一方、差分比較ソフトウェアの導入により目視では同定の難しい微細な欠損部も科学的に同定する方法を提案している。本研究の成果によりESTCの登録情報が修正されることになる。