Keeping a «book of account and reason» in early modern Provence (16th-18th century): Domestic writing and a tale of one’s self

Abstract

This article explores both the material and social aspects of 87 «books of account and reason» written in French in the region of Provence from the 16th-18th century. Although the books share common contents and forms, they reveal a diversity that allows each writer to personally appropriate the narratives. These «books of account and reason» are therefore a form of egodocument that cannot be defined as a literary genre or as testimonies to the self, but as empirical processes used by each writer to provide an account of his or her own life.