Creating a Reading Public

Chapter 1 examines the creation of a reading public in early modern Scotland. It charts the expansion of basic education both in the formal setting of schools and the informal environment of the home. It highlights the way in which the ability to read a simple printed text in English spread down through Lowland Scottish society so as to become commonplace. The price of cheaply printed works in the form of single sheets, pamphlets, and unbound tracts is documented and set alongside the data of wages and prices so as to assess the changing cost of such material in real terms and emphasise its relative affordability. Finally, the broader context of press regulation and output in Scotland is surveyed across the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries.