Poetry, Authorship, and Attribution

When considering the authorship of an early modern poem, it is important distinguish between ascriptions, written attestations of authorship in early modern manuscripts, and attributions, assignments of authorship that may or may not be correct and for which there may be no material evidence. Ascriptions may lead to attributions, but attributions can also be made without ascriptions on the basis of other evidence, including accounts from contemporary or later commentators, contextual clues, and stylistic comparisons. This entry shows that attributions and ascriptions are not simply historical facts but formal properties of all poetry, written by women or not.