In this paper Hendrik van Gorp discusses four key issues in historical descriptive translation research: firstly, the adequate description and delineation of the corpus of texts in a certain period – genre-related problems, translation versus other forms of text adaptation; secondly, the precarious status of certain interesting texts: pseudo-translations, apocryphal works, intermediary texts; thirdly, the status and interpretation of secondary texts - criticism, reviews, shortened versions, parodies; and fourthly, the socio-economic location of the texts in question – translation and royalties, translation commerce. Van Gorp examines these issues by looking at Dutch (when possible) or French and German translations of the English genre of the gothic novel