The article analyses popular prayer books preserved in regional museums of Bohemia and described in the Inventory of the 17th and 18th century manuscripts from the Museum collections in Bohemia I-II (they comprise in total 3298 manuscripts from 94 museums). After a short introduction dealing with the principal characteristics of these manuscripts (viewed partly as an instance of entrepreneurial manuscript publication), their potential scribes and the way these books were read and used as magical objects, it classifies them according to the date of origin, the language used and the gender and social status of their scribes and owners.