Commonplace
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During the Renaissance (especially in England), commonplaces (or commonplace books) were for some people a popular way to compile knowledge, usually done by writing information into books. During the height of their prolificacy, commonplaces were used by readers, writers, students, and humanists as an aid for remembering useful concepts or facts they had learned.
Producing a commonplace is frequently known as commonplacing.
They are similar to web logs in that they collect useful quotations from a variety of sources (though not of course with hyperlinks), but different in that they were normally private.
External Links and References
- Extraordinary Commonplaces (http://www.nybooks.com/articles/article-preview?article_id=13942), New York Review of Books
- "Monkeymagic: Thoughts on Thinking" (http://www.monkeymagic.net/blog/archives/2004_02_27.html#000130).
- Schools in Tudor England ISBN 0918016282
- Commonplace Books (http://www.assumption.edu/users/lknoles/commonplacebook.html) by Prof. Lucia Knoles, Assumption College.