Hobus & Hammerstamp's All-Purpose Almanac

An annual publication, produced by the Valliné-based publishers Hobus & Hammerstamp, 'Hobus & Hammerstamp's All-Purpose Almanac' is one of the most widespread pieces of literature produced in The Kingdom of Vallanna.
Beginning its life as a reference document for farmers, fishermen and working professionals of many types, the Almanac contained useful facts and figures, such as weather forecasts, tide tables, seed-planting dates, lists of religious events and phases of the moons.

In the years since its orignal publication, however, the Almanac has since grown into a widely-consumed general-interest magazine/anthology, which has found its way into all corners of the kingdom. Nowadays, the Almanc contains, alongside its original reference material, a wide variety of articles, news items, columns, and works of short fiction, among many other items of miscellany.

Historical Details

History

Initially published in 1146 AoU by the publishers Aldred Hobus and Thaddeus Hammerstamp, as a means of testing and offsetting the costs of Hammerstamp's newly invented printing press, the Almanac has become a widespread staple of the literary landscape of Vallanna, especially among the common folk.
In its early years, the Almanac was written almost exclusively by Aldred Hobus personally, in consultation with various experts in the fields of agriculture, meteorology, astrology and oceanography, who provided the data listed within. In this form, the Almanac was a rather dry piece of reference material, mostly consisting of various tables of weather predictions, seed planting times, tide tables and other calendar events. This incarnation sold modestly, and remained a passion project of Hobus until his death in 1171 AoU.
Following Hobus' death, Hammerstamp delegated much of the Almanac's production to other employees of the now-growing publishing house, preferring to spend time in his workshop, tinkering with new improvements and iterations of his printing presses, and content to collect his sizable share of the profits.
It was during this era that Hammerstamp's daughter Sigrid took over the stewardship of the Almanac. Under her shrewd guidance, for the first time, the Almanac was expanded beyond its original form of reference tables, to include summaries of important events which had occured in the kingdom, becoming something of annual record. Year after year, seeing the demand for the Almanac increase, the variety of different features in the publication was widened in scope.
As such, modern incarnations of the Almanac now include, alongside the original reference material (which still holds pride of place in the opening pages of the now much thicker book), horoscopes, reports of courtly intrigue, foreign news, advice columns (of a multitude of different flavours), published journals and musings, and a variety of short fiction and extracts from other Hobus & Hammerstamp publications.
Much of this supplemental material, which now comprises the majority of the Almanac's bulk, is submitted by enthusiasts, experts and intriguing (and indeed intrigued) personalites from across Vallanna. Nowadays, Hobus & Hammerstamp maintains a small office dedicated to sorting through the multitudinous unsolicited submissions for the Almanac which arrive on its doorstep every year, ensuring that only the best make it to print.

Public Reaction

In the first years of the almanac's publication, prior to the inclusion of the a wider array of articles and reader-submitted additions, reaction from the public was positive, if limited. Generally the almanac was purchased by farmers, fisherman and other professionals, as they made use of the tide tables and agricultural information contained within.
The expansion of the scope of the almanac to include other, more general interest content saw its circulation explode dramatically, however, eventually leading to the almanac being one of the most widely read publications in all of The Kingdom of Vallanna. This interest skyrocketed with the inclusion of reader-submitted articles and columns, with many readers purchasing their annual copy of the almanac in order to keep up with the writings of popular columnists and storytellers whose work may very well have been the only thing they had read all year.
Perhaps one of the most popular, if mildy scandalous inclusions, which, the publishers would admit, certainly drives a healthy portion of sales, is that of short romance stories by the reclusive author, E.S. Viridian. Branded obscene by certain moralistic critics, these stories have nonetheless proved extremely popular; garnering something of a cult following.
Conversely, the Almanac is regarded with some disdain by those who publish more academic works of literature, considering it somewhat low-status and not worthy of acclaim. The fact remains however, that the huge circulation of the Almanac each year dwarfs the limited quantities of which most, perhaps more scholarly, works are sold in.

Term

An edition of the almanac is published each year; typically in the final quarter. The Almanac is printed at the Hobus & Hammerstamp presses in Valliné, and carried to all corners of the kingdom via road and sea.
Almost as soon as one edition is published, the effort of collecting and selecting material for the next year's edition begins.

Type

Text, Magazine

Medium

Paper