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All 206 posts on

crocodile mystery

'Tis the season for almanacs
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'Tis the season for almanacs

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Author
Sarah Werner

December crocodile As our two commenters on the last post sussed out, this month’s crocodile mystery is a detail from an almanac, the black “Swallow” overprinting the red “Dove” the names of authors of two different almanacs. Below is the full…

"What manner o' thing is your crocodile?": December 2013
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"What manner o' thing is your crocodile?": December 2013

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Author
The Collation

Now that we’re back to our regular twice-weekly schedule of posts, it’s time to bring back our crocodile mystery series! Can’t remember why we refer to these things as crocodiles? It’s a reference to a line from Antony and Cleopatra—check…

Can you spot the differences?
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Can you spot the differences?

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Author
Erin Blake

Have a look at the coat of arms worn by Edwin Booth (1833–1893) in the title role of Shakespeare’s King Richard III. Notice something wrong? Richard III tunic worn by Edwin Booth in the 1870s. Hint: The conventions Victorian aesthetics…

Don't try this at home (unless you are a professional brewer)
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Don't try this at home (unless you are a professional brewer)

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Author
Heather Wolfe

Here’s a little transcription exercise for our Crocodile readers: Folger MS V.a.429, fol. 29r. This is the title of a recipe in a book of culinary and medical receipts compiled between approximately 1675 and 1750 by a few generations of…

Is that bleed-through?
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Is that bleed-through?

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Author
Sarah Werner

In some ways, this image is a perfectly ordinary one (well, ordinary if it’s possible to think of an autograph manuscript of Mary Wroth’s important sonnet sequence Pamphilia to Amphilanthus  as ordinary): Mary Wroth’s Pamphilia to Amphilanthus (fol. 65r) Heather Wolfe…

It's the details thnt matter
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It's the details thnt matter

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Author
Sarah Werner

There were two odd things happening in last week’s crocodile mystery, which featured an opening from the first English edition of Nicolàs Monardes’s Joyfull newes out of the newe founde worlde (STC 18005). The first was the easier to spot, assuming you…

"What manner o' thing is your crocodile?": July 2013
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"What manner o' thing is your crocodile?": July 2013

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Author
The Collation

What shall we make of this? July crocodile (click to embiggen) And what can we learn from it? Leave your thoughts in the comments below and then come back next week for the reveal!

Annotating and collaborating
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Annotating and collaborating

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Author
Sarah Werner

This month’s crocodile mystery was, as Andrew Keener quickly identified, an image from Gabriel Harvey’s copy of Lodovico Domenichi’s Facetie and (Folger H.a.2): Gabriel Harvey’s heavily annotated copy of Facetie (fol. 1v-2r) There is a lot that could be said about Gabriel…

"What manner o' thing is your crocodile?": June 2013
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"What manner o' thing is your crocodile?": June 2013

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Author
The Collation

The last few crocodile mysteries have zoomed in on details. Here, for a change of pace, we’re zooming out to a full-page spread: June crocodile (click to enlarge) In the past crocodiles have been about categories of objects, not necessarily…

Pen facsimiles of early print
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Pen facsimiles of early print

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Author
Sarah Werner

As the commenters on last week’s crocodile guessed, the mystery image showed writing masquerading as print or, to use the more formal term, a pen facsimile (click on any of the images in the post to enlarge them): pen facsimile…

"What manner o' thing is your crocodile?": May 2013
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"What manner o' thing is your crocodile?": May 2013

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Author
The Collation

Another month, another mystery for your riddling. What might be going on in this image? I’m not asking you to identify the text Revelation 21:1-6 but to look at it and speculate on what we might see and say about…

Secret histories of books
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Secret histories of books

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Author
Sarah Werner

This month’s crocodile mystery was a bit more challenging than recent ones (perhaps not helped by my cryptic “suitable for April” introduction), but Aaron Pratt guessed the gist of it: the image was a detail of a page printed in…

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