Price data for the Philosophical Transactions 1665-2015

  This   spreadsheet gathers all the evidence we have to date on the pricing of the   Philosophical Transactions (1665-1886) and its successor series A and B   (1887-2015)   

Any attempt to analyse price trends over   a long period of time must note that:  

 Britain used the imperial system of   currency (£ s d) until 1970, and then went decimal.   

The amount of printed material that the   Royal Society issued 'per year' or 'per volume' varied considerably, and this   is often the cause of the price variation (rather than, for instance,   increases in the price of paper or printing). 

The Royal Society did not set its prices   'per year' until 1986.   Prices before 1986 may be 'per issue',   'per six-monthly part' or 'per volume' (and there may be multiple volumes per   year, or fractional volumes per year). 

The first tab in this workbook collates   information on the prices of the 'parts' of the Transactions 1665-1886. 

The second tab recalculates that data,   where possible, into a 'price for a year's-worth of printed matter' 

The third and fourth tabs give price data   for Transactions A and Transactions B after 1887. In each tab, there is a   conversion to 'price for a year's worth of printed matter'.      

The sources from which these prices are   gathered are eclectic. 

The Royal Society has no master list of prices.   Occasionally, prices were mentioned in   the Royal Society Council Minutes (RS/CMO or RS/CMP)   Other useful sources at the Royal Society   were the Domestic Manuscripts series (for early modern prices) and various   publishing reviews in the 20th century  

The ledgers of the Taylor & Francis   archive were useful for the period when T&F printed for the Royal Society   (i.e. 1828-77)  

The English Catalogue of Books (ECB) was   useful for the late nineteenth century