Analysis of some bibliographical marginalia in a work by one of the founding figures of our discipline enables us to discuss their implications for our knowledge of early-sixteenth-century drama and possibly of early printing in Alcalá de Henares.

Lot 268 at the auction of printed books held at Bonham's in London on 12 March 2002 was a copy of Nicolás Antonio's Bibliotheca Hispana (2 volumes; Romae: ex officina Nicolai Angeli Tinassii, MDCLXXII). Its condition is not good; the catalogue description of them as suffering ‘browning and staining, some mainly marginal tears and repairs, worming to last few leaves of vol. 1 with some loss, vol. 2 with frontispiece repaired on verso, modern buckram, worming to hinges’ is entirely fair. What makes these two volumes exceptionally interesting and important, however, despite their poor condition, is that both are extensively annotated in manuscript by a number of early readers who had a special interest in authors associated with Alcalá de Henares and its university. The verbal annotations take three principal forms: the addition of entirely new entries concerning individuals who are not listed by Nicolás Antonio; the insertion of information to fill blanks left in the record given by him; and the addition of further details to his accounts. There are also some non-verbal annotations, by way of single or double oblique marginal strokes and other marks to draw attention to particular entries; sometimes points are under-lined in the text with or without further marginal comment. In the case of one annotator in particular, numerous of the marginalia added by this reader record details of works written by authors educated and/or teaching at Alcalá, and among these are several that offer details of early dramatic texts from the sixteenth century. In this category, of particular interest are those which give dates or other information not previously recorded in the sources available to us.

Faced with the potential importance of this, it is necessary first to establish a chronology for the annotations, and then to determine both the basis of the annotators’ knowledge of the material they record, and, as far as possible, its reliability.