Trust funding virtual restoration of historic library
17 November 2008
Sloane owned around 40 000 books, a significant number of which related to medical and scientific topics. Although he bequeathed his collections to the nation - including not just books but manuscripts, drawings, medals, coins, flora, fauna and numerous other curiosities - many of his books were sold as 'duplicate' copies in the 18th and 19th centuries. As a result, Sloane's library has been dispersed across university and research collections around the world.
The Sloane Printed Books Catalogue aims to reunite all of Sloane's books in an online catalogue. This will enable historians to understand how these books were used, how Sloane managed his collection, which books were especially prized, and Sloane’s role in the scientific and intellectual networks at a critical time on the development of modern science.
As well as being a renowned physician - serving Queen Anne, King George I and King George II - Sloane was President of the Royal College of Physicians for 16 years and President of the Royal Society for 14 years. He is also credited with inventing a recipe for milk chocolate while in Jamaica.
Sloane was a great collector, and although his library's strengths were in science and medicine, he also owned items such as Chaucer's 'Canterbury Tales' printed by Caxton in 1485 and a 'Jamaica Almanack' from 1673. Sloane used his own system of numbers, codes and identifying marks to organise his collection of 40 000 books, including information on previous owners and how much he paid for each one.
Lists of medicines and remedies, lists of books owned, even pressed plants and a laundry list have been found in the collection: all these help to bring to life the way these books were used. As the Sloane Printed Books Project continues, researchers will be able to see more clearly how a great scientist at a time of significant discoveries and progress built up and used his library, and how knowledge was made available within his community.
A collaboration between the British Library and the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College London has already catalogued 15 000 titles, which are available on the new catalogue. A grant from the Wellcome Trust's Research Resources in Medical History scheme will build on this work over two years, identifying Sloane's remaining books held in the British Library and elsewhere.
The British Library's Alison Walker, lead researcher on the project, said: "The Sloane Printed Books Catalogue is an important new resource which opens up the library of a great collector. We can learn much about Sir Hans Sloane, his career, and the intellectual and scientific circles in which he lived by looking at what material he acquired and how it was used. This new catalogue aims to reconstruct Sloane's library to shed new light on scientific and intellectual networks in at a critical time in the development of modern science."
Professor Hal Cook, Director of the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL, commented: "Sir Hans Sloane was an avid collector of books throughout his lifetime, as we might expect from one of the foremost intellectual figures in 18th-century London. The prospect of reuniting his entire library as a virtual collection is tremendously exciting, and offers researchers around the world the chance to make much more use of this unique historical resource."
