Bill Sherman, director of the Warburg Institute in London, delivers the inaugural annual lecture honoring David Zeidberg, recently retired Avery Director of the Library. In his presentation, Sherman traces the modern field of cryptography back to the Renaissance and asks what role the invention of printing played in the keeping of secrets.

Decoding the Book: Printing & the Birth of Secrecy

The early modern era describes the period in Europe and the Americas between 1450 and 1850. The Huntington collections are particularly strong in Renaissance exploration and cartography, English politics and law in the early modern era, the English aristocracy from the later Middle Ages through the 18th century, and 18th-century British and American military history. The USC-Huntington Early Modern Studies Institute supports advanced research and scholarship on human societies of this era, sponsoring lectures, conferences, workshops, and seminars.

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Decoding the Book: Printing & the Birth of Secrecy

Decoding the Book: Printing & the Birth of Secrecy