The widespread adoptions of the handwritten codex on the one hand and of the printing press on the other hand seem to dominate modern media histories.

Yet, between these two historical milestones, medieval scribes witnessed an explosion of different types of information technologies in many forms. While the codex became a dominant form of mediating knowledge in the European Middle Ages, the particular forms of books that exist from the period demonstrate a more nuanced media ecology. For example, abundant evidence survives to show that loosely-collected gatherings of booklets were just as widely used as bound codices. Similarly, there was no standard form for books, as they ranged in physical size, quality, and contents. Some are so massive that several people are required to move one, while others are little enough to fit into a satchel or even a small pocket; some are thin like modern-day notebooks, while others are nearly as thick as they are tall or wide.

Even more, the very forms of the contents of medieval books reveal much more about the media diversity of the Middle Ages. Medieval books contain countless different types of texts, glosses, images, charts, diagrams, infographics, and other types of information. The manuscripts held in Bristol libraries contain a similar diversity of manuscript media, which we may understand as varying expressions of medieval information technologies. These manuscripts therefore offer an opportunity to reflect upon how information is categorised, systematised, and organised – essential issues in understanding media across the many centuries of the longue duree.