The number of manuscript copies that circulated is one of the criteria for gauging the impact of a medieval text. Above a certain number, it provides a relevant basis for evaluating the reception of texts in a particular domain and gives some idea of the audience reached by the work.

FAMA compiles information on the number of surviving witnesses of the most widely read medieval texts in Latin. These data are arranged according to genre, date of composition, and number of copies of each work, as well as by country of origin, date of copy, and former provenances of manuscripts. FAMA provides a point of reference for current studies allowing a global approach to cultural phenomena.

FAMA takes special care to indicate critical editions and studies on the diffusion of a work, where the geographic and chronological distribution has been established, thus reflecting the evolution of its readership and conditions of transmission (geographical, institutional, cultural milieus), and possibly its later disaffection.

FAMA currently contains 1582 entries for texts and 20316 manuscripts

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