1. Name some of the earliest devices for communicating ideas to the absent.

2. What was the most important of these devices, and why?

3. What is an ideogram?

4. What is a phonogram?

5. Tell how phonograms became alphabets.

6. Who were the Egyptians and what kind of characters did they use?

7. Who were the Assyrio-Babylonians and what kind of characters did they use?

8. Who were the Cretans and what kind of characters did they use?

9. Who invented the alphabet?

10. Where did they get the material for the alphabet?

11. What is papyrus, and how was it made?

12. What is vellum, and how was it made?

13. Who invented paper, and when?

14. Who introduced it into Europe, and when?

15. What made the use of paper common, and why?

16. What writing material was invented in the 19th century?

17. What are some of its advantages and disadvantages?

18. What are tablets and how were they made and used?

19. What kind of ink did the ancient people use?

20. When were irongall inks invented?

21. What kind of ink did the early printers use?

22. What did the ancient writers write with?

23. What was the form of the ancient papyrus book?

24. What effect did the use of vellum have on the form of the book?

25. Describe the evolution of the bound book.

26. When did books become popular as compared with rolls?27. What were some of the advantages of the book as compared with the roll?

28. What can you tell of the make-up and appearance of a manuscript roll?

29. What can you tell of the make-up and appearance of a vellum book?

30. What can you say of the lettering, spacing, etc. of early manuscripts?

31. Give some account of the introduction of (a) word separation, (b) paragraphs, (c) sentences, (d) punctuation.

32. What did the writer do when the words did not fit the line?

33. What can you say about titles, running heads, and numbering of pages?

34. How were quotations indicated?

35. How were mistakes treated?

36. What use was made of abbreviations and contractions?

37. How do you pronounce “ye” and “yt,” abbreviations for “the” and “that,” and why?

38. What is a palimpsest?

39. What did the old writers do to make their books beautiful?

40. What is the present value of the book decorations of the middle ages?

41. What are the oldest libraries we know anything about?

42. What is the oldest one of which any part has been preserved?

43. What was the most famous library of classical time, and what became of it?

44. Have we any remnants of the libraries of the classical period? Why?

45. To what do we owe the preservation of classical literature?

46. How did the monasteries come to have libraries?

47. What was the scriptorium of a monastery?

48. How was the work done there?

49. How were books cared for in the middle ages?

50. How were they loaned and under what conditions?51. What can you say of the value of books in the middle ages, both in money and in sentiment?

52. Who besides the monasteries had libraries?

53. What had the universities to do with the growth of libraries?

54. What did the universities do to secure the multiplication of books and the correctness of copies?

55. How old is the practice of marking letters or words by some sort of stamp?

56. What early experiments did the Chinese make in printing?

57. Did these experiments have any effect in Europe?

58. What is a block book?

59. When were block books first made, and why?

60. Describe some famous block books.

61. Describe the process of making a block book.

62. What determined the form of the letters composing the text of block books?

63. Describe the four types of handwriting and their principal varieties.

64. Tell how and why the first half of the 15th century was ready for the invention of typography.