Recycled Medieval Documentary Fragments: Methodological Remarks

This article focuses on the reuse or recycling of medieval documents and their survival as fragments. It examines their status and the methodology of their analysis within the broader study of manuscript fragments. Hitherto, emphasis has been place on fragments of book manuscripts, rather than media bearing texts of documentary nature. Despite the general disregard of documentary fragmentary sources, they are relevant and heuristically promising, and they represent a largely untapped source of research topics and teaching opportunities. Reflecting on the phenomenon of discarded and reused medieval documents calls for the adoption of new methodologies and at the same time represents a new and exciting challenge opening up interesting new avenues of research.