A vueltas con un enredijo bibliográfico: la impresión del Discurso sobre el fomento de la industria popular (1774) por Antonio de Sancha

This study, following the principles of material bibliography, aims to re-examine the complex and puzzling production process in the presses of Antonio de Sancha of the Discurso sobre el fomento de la industria popular (1774), one of the most influential texts of Spanish Enlightenment, with a view to establish a clearer chronology of its printing. In order to do this, we will analyse the formal characteristics of the three known editions –the «restricted» one, initially presented by Campomanes to the members of the Council of Castile; the one included in Rubín de Celis’s translation of Marcandier’s Tratado del cañamo; and the definitive, significantly amplified version, of which a hitherto unheard print run was made, which was massively distributed throughout Spain and its colonies. To these editions, we will add an up to now unknown issue of the definitive text, discovered in the Biblioteca Histórica Municipal de Madrid.