An almanack for the yeare 1655 Electronic version according to TEI P5.1 Fragmentarium - Digital Research Laboratory for Medieval Manuscript Fragments

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 Odense Syddansk Universitetsbibliotek Herlufsholm 742.1 An almanack for the yeare 1655 1655 Oxford Front cover v English Calendar and astrological prognostications William Burton Back cover r English Highways in England and Wales, fairs & late mutations William Burton Paper Two uncut sheets330 x 209 mm

For each pastedown, a full uncut sheet of eight leaves was used, meaning the fragments constitute an entire copy of this 16-leaf edition. There is some loss of text on the edges of the sheet.

Octavo format, two quires á 16 pages.

Mix of antiqua and English Gothic typeface.

 Red ink used for some headings and emphasis of certain words. The print contains a zodiac man illustration. This almanac was pulled from the market during or shortly after production because of a conflict between the London Stationers’ Company and the University of Oxford. According to Oxford bibliographer Falconer Madan, the university was paid a yearly fee by the company for the exclusive right to print amongst other genres almanacs, but no such payments had been made since 1643. As a reaction, the university started printing their own books again, resulting in the Stationers’ Company beginning to pay again in 1655. A condition of the conflict’s resolution was that books printed that year, like Burton’s Almanack, were to be destroyed. Hence, it only survives in a few binding fragments at the Bodleian Libraries and Oxford college libraries. Madan notes that none of the known bindings contain more than the first sheet - the calendar and prognostications - questioning if the second sheet reached production at all. This present fragment proves that it did - it is the only known surviving example of the second half relating to highways, fairs, and late mutations. Oxford Description by: Charlotte Epple, Fragmentarium, 2026 Holck, Jakob Povl. Den Gamle Verdens Magi: Bogsamlingen Fra Herlufsholm På Syddansk Universitetsbibliotek. Syddansk Universitetsbibliotek, 2015.  Holck, Jakob Povl. ‘Herlufsholm-Samlingen På Syddansk Universitetsbibliotek Og Forskningspotentialet–Om Forskellige Fund Af Fragmenter’. Studier i Nordisk, nos 2016–2018 (2022): 5–40.  Madan, Falconer. Oxford Books: A Bibliography of Printed Works Relating to the University and City of Oxford or Printed or Published There (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1931), iii, p. 43.