The article reviews O. A. Shashkova’s ‘... Call the Mute Artifacts to Speech.’ Essays on the History of Archaeography of the 15th - Early 20th Century. Wide array of sources and broad geographical frameworks allow Shashkova to present emergence and development of Russian and European archaeography from the 15th to early 20th century intelligibly enough for educational purposes. A whole chapter is devoted to the manuscript tradition and publishing of sources before Gutenberg. When considering the formation of archaeographical tradition, the author uses comparative method. O. A. Shashkova offers a historical overview and analyzes theoretical and practical issues of archaeography. The reviewer notes the significance of the chosen topic due to a need to reconsider the development of publishing in light of modern views on archaeography and to make it accessible to students and non-professionals. She notes traditional academic approach of O. A. Shashkova to presentation of the development publication practices. The review considers the possibility of using the ‘Essays...’ in studying the history of archaeography and offers possible directions for a broader consideration of historical experience, in particular, of Novikov’s publication projects. The review notes the controversial nature of the author’s approach to systematization of her large historical material in order to consider issues concerning the study of archaeographical practices. It stresses that coverage of issues of development of methods of preparation of publications separately from its historical and practical aspects hinders successful mastering of the material by an untrained reader. It concludes that the publication has high practical value for specialists in archaeography and students.