Dirty Jobs: Processing
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Processing a collection can be a straightforward task: papers (or a collection) arrive here at the SCRC and we can easily discern the logic behind original the order of the collection. If no order is present, then we devise one as we process the collection. But sometimes you receive a collection like this…
Accounting for Enslaved People
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The records of the Office of the Bursar are some of the earliest and most comprehensive records of William & Mary, some from the 18th century survive to the present day! The accounts document the financial interactions of William & Mary and its personnel in the 18th-19th centuries.
All Wrapped Up: The Montebourg Manuscript
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When a 1633 French legal document was donated to Special Collections, a creased, torn, dirty piece of paper was wrapped around it. This wrapper may seem like something that should be thrown away, but it has its own stories to tell.
"Exceptional in Any Age": The Library of Lady Jean Skipwith
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The Library of Congress's reconstruction of Thomas Jefferson's library now receives many visitors who wander through the remarkable library of a remarkable man, institutionalized at the very heart of the US government. The importance and preservation of the libraries of "great men" has been a part of our history for a long time; and most national, university, college, and other institutional libraries are based around those of white men.
A Rebel's Book of Napoleon
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The origins of Napoleon and His Times were a mystery when it arrived in Special Collections in October, 2015. Clues on the front free end paper and title page helped to unravel the mystery, though, and revealed the serendipity of this book finding its way back to the Historic Triangle.
Doing Archaeology in the Archive
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For the past several weeks, Prof. Michelle Lelievre's Anthropology 201 class—Lost Worlds and Archaeology—has been visiting the Special Collections Research Center to learn about the kind of work anthropologists and archaeologists do when not in the field. Students in this course have been using maps, blueprints, photographs, letters, documents, and old issues of the Flat Hat newspaper to uncover information on a little-known structure on campus—an old amphitheater located near the present-day Matoaka Amphitheater.
From the Cradle of Printing into the Classroom
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One of the titles we will be showing in two upcoming instruction sessions this week, the 1483 Leaves from the Ninth German Bible (Biblia Nona Germanica), is the only one of our nine titles printed before 1500 that is in a language other than Latin.
Chinese New Year
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On the first day of the Chinese New Year, these pages from a book purchased for Swem Library with support from the Vinyard Endowment Fund serve as an excellent reminder of the connection between printing and calligraphy. The character visible behind the printed page was actually brushed in by hand, so the book in question is unique despite being part of a print run. Just as in the early days of European printing, when books were finished by hand with colorful initials and flourishes, so this book reminds us that even in our modern world, the production of printed books is not totally divorced from the handmade or the individual.
The Royal Charter on Display
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The Royal Charter will be on display in the Special Collections Research Center on the first floor of the Earl Gregg Swem Library on both Charter Day (10-6pm) and Saturday, Feb. 6th (10-2pm).
Children's Letters
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Parents keep their children's letters and drawings, now often putting them on the refrigerator. Unless the children were sent away for education, in the eighteenth and nineteenth-century, most stayed close to home and probably only wrote if a parent were away. There are some letters in our collection written by older students away at boarding school or college, but letters by very young children are few.
Nineteenth-century Valentines
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Before superhero and princess Valentine's Day cards, we had Lord Byron.
Sarpi's History of the Council of Trent and Captain Nicholas Humfrys
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None of the books from the first library of William & Mary survived the1705 fire, except, that is, for this one, Paolo Sarpi's History of the Council of Trent , found in England during the Second World War.
A Window into Nineteenth-century Parlor Music
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Nineteenth-century bound sheet music offers a window into domestic music making. The accouterments of musical life—instruments and sheet music—were recognizable symbols of elite taste and education. Much nineteenth-century sheet music was bound together into volumes by owners, sometimes with ornate, personalized covers and marbled endpapers.
Sir Henry Chicheley after Bacon's Rebellion
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In Swem Library's Special Collections Bound Manuscript Collection, there is a handwritten transcription of some documents from the 1677-1686 Entry Warrant Book of Charles II of England, Scotland and Ireland.
Pressing On Into the Future
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In this digital age we often hear predictions about the end of the book, but the technology that transformed the world 560 years ago is holding on. Beyond the continued popularity of novels sold at airports and hardcovers at signings, however, is a continued interest in books as art objects, generally printed in small numbers by private presses.
Conservation of Alexander Galt Diary
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Alexander Galt was an American sculptor born in Norfolk, Va. in 1827. He spent time studying in Italy from 1849-1853. He received important commissions in the United States and returned to Italy in 1856, coming back to Virginia in 1860. The outbreak of the Civil War saw him working for the Confederate army and doing a few private commissions.
In Alphabetical Order
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At Homecoming this year, Special Collections opened a new exhibit showcasing selected items from our holdings arranged from A to Z. In Alphabetical Order: A Selection of Materials from Swem Library's Special Collections was developed through a team effort with several staff and student workers involved.
Spell-Bound – Setting the Stage for Magic!
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The semester, and with it class visits to Special Collections, are in full swing. One book that is a popular choice for a whole range of classes ever since it was purchased with support from the Vinyard Fund in 2012, is Portable Mayan altar : pocket books of Mayan spells.
Get to Know Cuban Artists' Books with Ediciones Vigía
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Last summer, as part of the growing Cuban book arts and poster collections, Special Collections acquired a number of handmade books from Ediciones Vigía, an artist collective and publishing house in Matanzas, Cuba. Cuban poet Alfredo Zaldívar and designer Rolando Estévez cofounded Ediciones Vigía in 1985.