Pennsylvania State University

Pennsylvania State University is the institutional setting credited in the front matter of the 2007 Electronic Classics Series edition of George Fyler Townsend’s translation of Aesop’s Fables. Its role is specific but significant: the university is named as the source of the electronic-book file, while the edition’s notice carefully separates that association from responsibility for the material or its transmission.

Role in the Electronic Edition

The title page identifies Aesop’s Fables as part of the Pennsylvania State University Electronic Classics Series, with Jim Manis serving as Faculty Editor. The edition also names Townsend as translator and Aesop as the work’s traditional author. These credits place the university within a scholarly electronic-publication project rather than presenting it as the translator, author, or sole publisher.

Copyright and Institutional Disclaimer

The front matter assigns copyright for the electronic edition to Sony Connect Inc. in 2007 and for the source electronic-book file version to Pennsylvania State University in 1999. It gives the book’s ISBN as 978-1-4340-0146-7. The accompanying disclaimer states that neither the university, Jim Manis, nor anyone associated with the university assumes responsibility for the document’s contents or for the file as an electronic transmission; Sony Connect Inc. and its affiliates are likewise included in the disclaimer.

Connection to the Book’s Textual History

The university’s credit belongs to the modern electronic presentation of a collection whose preface describes a much older and layered history. That account traces the fables from oral transmission and early collections through medieval compilation, printed editions, and later manuscript scholarship. The front matter thus distinguishes the contemporary institutional source of this electronic file from the ancient and later textual traditions represented in the book: Pennsylvania State University is credited for the source file, not identified as the originator of the fables or of Townsend’s translation.