The following sketch will consist of a number of cursory remarks upon the calligraphy and the ornamentation of medieval manuscripts; preceded by an historical sketch, arranged in chronological paragraphs, of the beginnings and the gradual diffusion of the art of writing throughout the world. _The Beginnings of Writing_ Palæography is the branch of science which deals with ancient writing ([Greek: palaia graphê]). As the Greek word for writing comprises a great deal more than the work of pen and ink, palæographical study would be imperfect if it did not take into consideration the ancient inscriptions upon stone and metal which are usually left to numismatists and other archæologists. In a small treatise like the present, no such ambitious and comprehensive treatment is intended. The object is mainly to summarise the results of other men's labour, and to give a general idea of what is known at the present day about the diffusion of the art of writing and the methods of producing books before the sixteenth century. The name for _book_ in various ancient languages is indicative of the earliest stage in the history of writing. The English word itself appears in its oldest written form in the Gothic Scriptures of the fourth century, in which _boka_ = writing, and _bokos_ = things written = books. This is {3}believed to be derived from the name of the tree we call _beech_ and the Germans _buche_, because it is supposed that the bark or wood of that tree was used for cutting runes upon. Similar to this is the Latin _liber_, which originally meant the inner bark of a tree, and afterwards came to mean book, because leaves were made from that inner bark for the purpose of writing. _Diphthera_, in ancient Ionic-Greek, was equivalent to book, because it meant a polished skin (like parchment or leather) used for writing upon before the Greeks adopted papyrus (_byblos_, _biblos_) from the Egyptians. Then the name for papyrus became the name for a book, and has been retained in modern speech in the word Bible. The word _diphthera_ passed into use among the Persians about five hundred years before Christ, as the material was borrowed by them from the Ionians for the use of the scribes who kept the royal records, and it still remains in the speech of the modern Persians as _defter_ = book. The Hebrew word _sepher_ = engraving, and is therefore used to designate a book; and the same sense underlies the Arabic word _Kitab_. Writing was a scratching or incising of symbols representing sounds (or ideas) upon stone or metal, upon wood, or bark, or leaves (folia), dressed leather, parchment, papyrus, wax tablets, and paper.