Rare Books
There's rare books and then there's even more rare scrolls. From the BBC:
For the first time, words have been read from a burnt, rolled-up scroll buried by Mount Vesuvius in AD79.
The scrolls of Herculaneum, the only classical library still in existence, were blasted by volcanic gas hotter than 300C and are desperately fragile.
From the New York Times (scroll about halfway down to Found in the Margins):
In the last few months, foundations have given out hundreds of thousands of dollars to support research on the scribbles in the margins of old books.
Via the Washington Post: A yellowing piece of parchment covered in Latin, the Magna Carta now on view at the Library of Congress is as charming as a tax form. Hey, no one ever said cornerstones of constitutional law and civil liberty had to be pretty.
A copper box sealed for over 113 years inside the head of a piece of statuary, a lion, at the Old State House in Boston has finally been opened.
Inside... there was a surprise book with a red cover...but we don't know the title or contents. Historians deem the book and other contents of the box too fragile to be quickly examined. They will need to be examined in a temperature and pressure controlled environment.
From the New York Times a fascinating look at how invaluable historical documents and artifacts are secured while in transit.
A British man named Joseph Heath was ordered to pay $3,000 to Becker College library after stealing 100 rare books, including one signed by Abraham Lincoln, The Telegram reports.
The 53-year-old Leicester native had smuggled around $115,000 out of the antique book collection of the library. One of the books he took was a first edition o Harriet Beecher Stowe’s “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.”
From The Washington Post:
"We Virginians, we really love our history,” said Laura Wickstead, director of the Virginia Room at the City of Fairfax Regional Library. “That’s for sure.”
The Cleveland Public Library Found a Lost First Edition Copy of 'A Christmas Carol'
http://www.theatlanticcities.com/arts-and-lifestyle/2013/12/cleveland-p…
From CNN.com: "The world's most valuable book sold Tuesday for $14.16 million at Sotheby's in New York, according to the auction house.
The rare Bay Psalm Book is the first book ever written and printed in what is now the United States. Its sale set a record for a book sold at auction, Sotheby's said."