The Invention of News: How the World Came to Know About Itself

Students writing home had two things uppermost in mind: to impress their parents with their progress in the art of letter writing, and to ask for cash.26 The medieval epistolary style was formal and highly structured, and students, often destined for a career as an official or a clerk, were keen to demonstrate their progress in mastering this art.

These songs were clearly intended not only to entertain but also to inform. The anonymous author of a poem about the battle of Ravenna in 1512 told his audience that his principal intention in composing the work was ‘not because you would take pleasure from it, but so that you might have some indication of this event’. Events moved fast in this con

In many respects the four prime considerations that governed the business of news – its speed, reliability, the control of content and entertainment value – were remarkably unchanging in these centuries. At different times one or other of these priorities would matter more to consumers of news than others; sometimes they would be in direct conflict

With so much at stake there were inevitably those who would attempt to steal a march on their competitors. ‘If you engage in trade, and your letters arrive together with others,’ wrote Paolo da Certaldo in a merchants’ handbook of the mid-fourteenth century, always keep in mind to read yours first before passing on the others. And if your letters a

In 1472 the first printers in Rome, Konrad Sweynheim and Arnold Pannartz, appealed to the Pope for help. Their publishing house stood on the brink of failure. Their printing shop, according to their piteous petition, was ‘full of printed sheets, empty of necessities’.5 They had to this point manufactured an impressive 20,000 copies of their printed

Louis's scheme called for the establishment of relay stations on all of the main routes leading through and out of the kingdom.46 Salaried postmasters were appointed to man each station; their duties required them to maintain horses for the royal couriers speeding through. Following the practice established in the Roman Empire, and continued by the

We know from the letter-books of King Jayme II of Aragon (1291–1327) that he cultivated an extensive network of informers in Italy and elsewhere. His surviving letter-books record an impressive fifteen thousand items of incoming intelligence.33 The king received information from a wide variety of correspondents, including Cristiano Spinola, a merch

To prevent the sermon becoming an undignified scrum, senior clerics would negotiate their arrival in advance. This was the case with the great master of the indulgence campaign, Raymond Peraudi, whose appearances were carefully orchestrated in a flurry of printed pamphlets.65 So at this level a sermon was always news, and as often as not it was pre

The printed news pamphlets of the sixteenth century were a milestone in the development of the news market, but they further complicated issues of truth and veracity. Competing for limited disposable cash among a less wealthy class of reader, the purveyors of the news pamphlets had a clear incentive to make these accounts as lively as possible. Thi