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Journal article
Collecting Revolution: George Thomason and the ‘Thomason Tracts’
The approximately 24,000 pamphlets, manuscripts and newspapers collected by the London bookseller George Thomason are an invaluable source for the study of the political events of 1640 to 1663. This introduction surveys the articles, based on a conference held at the British Library, which are brought together in eBLJ 2023.Peacey, Jason
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Journal article
Chinese plates fit for an Acehnese queen
All over Southeast Asia is found a particular type of coarse Chinese export porcelain traditionally known as ‘Swatow’ ware but now more accurately identified as originating from Zhangzhou, dating from the late Ming period, from the end of the 16th to the early 17th centuries. One characteristic type of large...Gallop, Annabel Teh
Acehnese ninefold seal, Zhangzhou, Cap Sikureueng, Chinese porcelain, Chinese plates, Aceh, and Swatow
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Journal article
Working at scale: what do computational methods mean for research using cases, models and collections?
Open access, peer-reviewed article published in Science Museum Group Journal, as part of a double-length special issue for the AHRC TaNC discovery project, 'Congruence Engine'. The article gives a critical overview of how 'scale' operates as a keyword within computational humanities as well as reviewing a number of cognate fields,...Wilson, Daniel C S
machine learning, AI for GLAM, STS, scale, computational humanities, history, and congruence engine
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Journal article
Abroad Among Our Kind: Sylvia Townsend Warner’s Spanish Civil War Love Poems
In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content: Sylvia Townsend Warner and her partner Valentine Ackland arrived in Barcelona in the fall of 1936, two months after the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War. They had come to help with the relief operations being organized...Aguirre, Mercedes
Love Poems, Spain, and Civil War
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Journal article
Great Doxology with Miaphysite Trisagion
The article contains the edition and study of three ostraca in the British Library (Ostracon 5878) which join with another fragment in the Metropolitan Museum, New York (P.Mon.Epiph. 607). The join of these pieces helps to date the British Library fragments to the turn of the 6th-7th centuries and assign...Toth, Peter
Monastery of Epiphanius, Liturgical ostraca, Apa Moses, Great Doxology, and Coptic liturgy
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Journal article
Data Analysis and Network Visualisation as Tools for Curating Hybrid Correspondence Archives
This pilot project uses data analytics in Python and network analysis in Gephi to interrogate the ways in which digital and analogue correspondence files (letters and e-mails) function within the Archive of Harold Pinter; reflecting upon what these patterns might mean for archivists, curators and researchers working with hybrid correspondence...Mckean, Callum
visualisations, data science, hybrid archives, and Harold Pinter
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Journal article
Scientific investigation of the Minsterley Maidens’ crowns
25 samples were taken from seven eighteenth-century commemorative Maidens’ Garlands and Crowns from Minsterley, Shropshire. The samples were investigated by digital microscopy, macro-X-ray fluorescence scanning, Raman microscopy and scanning electron microscopy with energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy. The study intended to obtain as much information as possible on the making of the...Risdonne, Valentina ; Melita, Lucia Noor ; Burgio, Lucia ; Morris, Rosie
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Journal article
Challenging legacies at the British Library
The British Library established a corporate Anti-Racism Project (2020) designed to encourage participation via six subgroups, with staff recommendations incorporated into “Enacting Change”, the Library's Race Equality Action Plan (2022). The research and recommendations of the Cataloguing and Metadata subgroup fed into a pilot project proposed as a proof of...Danskin, Alan
Caribbean, anti-racism, South Asia, Cataloguing, and Metadata
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Journal article
FAST the Inside Track: Where We Are, Where Do We Want to Be, and How Do We Get There?
This is an overview of the development of FAST (Faceted Application of Subject Terminology) from its inception in the late 1990s, through its development and implementation to the work being undertaken by OCLC and the FAST Policy and Outreach Committee (FPOC) to develop and promote FAST. FPOC members explain how... -
Journal article
Writing Milan and Turin in the Light of (Failed) Utopia: Luciano Bianciardi and Paolo Volponi
This article examines a series of novels by Italian writers, Luciano Bianciardi and Paolo Volponi, that capture the transformations brought about by the post-World War II economic growth in the urban-industrial society of Northern Italy. The analysis draws on utopia as, in Ruth Levitas’s words, a ‘desire for a better...Brecciaroli, Giulia
Paolo Volponi, Utopia/dystopia, Turin, Luciano Bianciardi, Literary Urban Studies, Milan, and post-war Italian literature
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Journal article
Kaitiakitanga: Utilising Māori Holistic Conservation in Heritage Institutions
It is imperative that heritage institutions deal with the legacies of colonialism within their collections, the way this material is retained, preserved, displayed and interpreted, and the impact that this will have on local and global audiences. Failing to do so risks such organisations being perceived as the beneficiaries of...Nolan, Scott Ratima
empowerment, Māori, collections, custodianship, inclusion, and Kaitiakitanga
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Journal article
Vehicularizing the vernacular: using the periodical press to popularize vernacular languages in Soviet Turkic communities
The study of language and script change among the Turkic communities of the Soviet Union often focuses on the switch from Arabic to Latin scripts. Less attention is paid to adaptations of the Arabic script to Turkic vernaculars, and to attempts aimed at convincing the literate masses of their usefulness....Erdman, Michael J.
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Journal article
The British Library – rethinking physical storage
Purpose The British Library (BL) faces a significant challenge with storage space predicted to run out within the next three years. However, alongside a plan to create additional capacity, the BL also intends to take the opportunity to rethink the integration of storage and workflows in order to implement a...Appleyard, Andrew H.
storage, library, automated, sustainability, and repository
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Journal article
Current Issues with Cataloging Printed Music: Challenges Facing Staff and Systems
This paper explores the challenges currently faced by music cataloguers, with particular regard to their training and the systems they work with. It asks whether music catalogers feel they have enough support and training to do their work; it investigates the skills they require, and how they might be taught....Fisher, Meg ; Rafferty, Pauline
cataloging printed music, cataloging training, and Cataloging research
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Journal article
A literature review of palm leaf manuscript conservation—Part 2: historic and current conservation treatments, boxing and storage, religious and ethical issues, recommendations for best practice
Abstract The closure of the British Library during the 2020–2021 COVID-19 pandemic allowed the conservation department to undertake a treatment review of the conservation of palm leaf manuscripts in order to make better-informed decisions about the treatment of these complex objects. As part of the review a questionnaire was posted...Wiland, Julia ; Brown, Rick ; Fuller, Lizzie ; Havelock, Lea ; Johnson, Jackie …
traditional preservation methods, palm leaf, ethical conservation, boxing, and long-term storage
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Journal article
A literature review of palm leaf manuscript conservation—Part 1: a historic overview, leaf preparation, materials and media, palm leaf manuscripts at the British Library and the common types of damage
Abstract The closure of the British Library during the 2020–2021 COVID-19 pandemic allowed the conservation department to undertake a treatment review of the conservation of palm leaf manuscripts in order to make better-informed decisions about the treatment of these complex objects. As part of the review a questionnaire was posted... -
Journal article
Deconstruction and ‘Re-Volumization’: The Thomason Collection in the Past, Present, and Future
The Thomason Tracts that arrived at the British Museum as the gift of George III were in a rigorous chronological order, which was mirrored by Thomason’s own twelve-volume manuscript catalogue. Though Thomason boasted that by means of the catalogue even a single sheet could be found ‘instantly’, even more important...Mendle, Michael
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Journal article
From The Queen’s College to Montagu House: The History of the Thomason Tracts after the Restoration
Although the Thomason collection is rightly regarded as one of the treasures of the British Library, its survival was by no means inevitable. This chapter revisits the convoluted history of its fortunes after Thomason ceased collecting in 1661, shedding new light upon his own hopes and expectations regarding its fate,...Stoker, David
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Journal article
Scattered about the Streets: George Thomason’s Annotations and Ephemeral Print during the English Revolution
Thomason is rightly famous for his tendency to annotate individual pamphlets, and his notes have long been exploited by scholars in order to trace his connections with various authors, to contextualise individual items, and to enhance our appreciation of writers and the debates in which they participated. This chapter subjects...Peacey, Jason
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Journal article
Milton’s Sonnet XIV and the poetry of George Thomason
It has long been recognised that Thomason was well connected, and that his friends included men like John Milton. This essay uses the sonnet that Milton wrote in honour of Thomason’s wife as the springboard for a discussion of a neglected aspect of the Thomason tracts: its poetry. It thus...Nevitt, Marcus
Thomason Tracts, George Thomason, Catharine Thomason, and John Milton
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Journal article
The Politics and Meaning of Thomason’s Tracts
This article takes as its starting point the reputation of Thomason's collection as royalist in orientation. It examines whether Thomason’s collection reflects 1640s and 1650s press output more broadly - offering a quantitative account of this - and whether the items he chose to purchase, and those he did not,...Raymond, Joad
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Journal article
The Thomason Tracts and Presbyterian Mobilization
This chapter uses the Thomason Tracts as a collection, as well as the partisan attitudes of Thomason himself, to assess the use of print in the bitter conflicts that divided parliamentarians in the 1640s. It compares the stress on division revealed in printed accounts of two particularly fraught episodes in...Hughes, Anne
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Journal article
Search and Seize: Partisan Publishers and Press Controls in Thomason’s London
The Thomason collection is recognised as being vital for exploring the dramatic developments in print culture that accompanied the English Revolution, not least those that were made possible by the collapse of press censorship in 1641. Less widely appreciated is that it also sheds valuable light upon the attempts that...Como, David R.
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Journal article
John Hammond and the Explosion of Print in 1641: Commercial and Political Opportunities
One of the great values of Thomason’s collection of civil war tracts and newsbooks is the opportunity that it affords for analysing the nature of the print trade during a key phase of the so-called ‘print revolution’. Given the so-called ‘explosion’ of cheap print that accompanied the descent into civil...Braddick, Michael J.
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Journal article
George Thomason and London in the 1650s
Thomason’s involvement in public politics, which had been extensive during the 1640s, brought him considerable personal trouble following the execution of Charles I, an event that he clearly opposed. Like many others who had been active Presbyterians before 1649, he became an opponent of the republican regime, and this chapter...Vernon, Elliot
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Journal article
‘Honest George’: George Thomason and London during the Civil War and Revolution
Part of the fascination with Thomason is that he was more than merely a prominent bookseller who collected a vast collection of civil war pamphlets and newspapers. He was also an active participant in public life, in terms of the workings of the Stationers’ Company and in terms of political...Lindley, Keith ; Peacey, Jason
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Journal article
Cretaceous gnetalean yields first preserved plant gum
Some liquid plant exudates (e.g. resin) can be found preserved in the fossil record. However, due to their high solubility, gums have been assumed to dissolve before fossilisation. The visual appearance of gums (water-soluble polysaccharides) is so similar to other plant exudates, particularly resin, that chemical testing is essential to...Roberts, Emily A. ; Seyfullah, Leyla J. ; Loveridge, Robert F. ; Garside, Paul ; Martill, David M.
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Journal article
The Use of Risk Management to Support Preventive Conservation
Risk management approaches have been increasingly used at the British Library to inform and support collection care decisions. This paper addresses the ways in which these methods have been used to address specific preservation issues at the Library, using appropriate case studies: rehousing the microfilm collection, adapting pest management protocols,...Garside, Paul ; Bradford, Karen ; Hamlyn, Sarah
collection care, preservation, risk management, and risk assessment
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Journal article
Reframing Magna Carta – Comprehensive Planning and Pragmatic Outcomes
In preparation for the British Library’s exhibition to mark 800 years of Magna Carta, the Library’s copies of the charter, and three related documents, were reframed. There were several requirements: minimal intervention; allow re-treatability; fully show rectos and text; present the charters as documents rather than artworks. Comprehensive risk assessments...Garside, Paul ; Rogerson, Cordelia ; Moorhead, Gavin ; Matsuoka, Kumiko ; Duffy, Christina
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Journal article
The conservation of the burnt Cotton Collection
The Cotton Collection is one of the British Library's foundation collections and represents the single greatest known resource of medieval and early modern British history and literature. Its care and conservation are of great importance to allow access to the collection both now and in the future. The collection had...Beltran de Guevara, Mariluz ; Garside, Paul
burnt parchment, damage, survey, scientific research, and conservation treatment
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Journal article
An investigation of weighted and degraded silk by complementary microscopy techniques
A number of silk samples, comprising historic materials and modern surrogates, were examined by light, electron and atomic force microscopy, to determine the extent to which such assessments would allow the nature and condition of the materials to be determined. The integrity of these materials had previously been investigated using...Garside, Paul ; Mills, Graham A. ; Smith, James R. ; Wyeth, Paul
silk, textiles, microscopy, atomic force microscopy, conservation, and scanning electron microscopy
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Journal article
Categorizing tin phosphate/silicate-weighted silks on site by near-infrared spectroscopy
One of the most versatile instrumental analytical techniques for the non-interventive characterization of organic artefacts is near-infrared spectroscopy. In the case of textiles, methodology has recently emerged for assessing the condition of historic silks on site and a corresponding protocol that allows the simultaneous weighting categorization of silks would be...Garside, Paul ; Wyeth, Paul ; Zhang, Xiaomei
costume, silk, tin weighting, near-infrared spectroscopy (NIR), weighting classification, and multivariate analysis
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Journal article
Use of near IR spectroscopy and chemo‑metrics to assess the tensile strength of historic silk
Silk is a culturally important textile, found in many artefacts of historic significance including clothing, upholstery, banners and decorations. However, it is a fragile material and is prone to deterioration via a variety of mechanisms, particularly after certain historically common processing methods such as bleaching and weighting. Therefore it is...Garside, Paul ; Wyeth, Paul ; Zhang, Xiaomei
silk, spectroscopy, and conservation
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Journal article
Increasing the profile and influence of conservation—an unexpected benefit of risk assessments
Risk assessment prior to treatments, exhibitions or loans is vital to conservation, allowing potential problems to be identified and mitigated. After recent work on British Library ‘Treasures’, including the Magna Carta and the Lindisfarne Gospels, it became apparent that these assessments also served to significantly raise the profile and influence...Rogerson, Cordelia ; Garside, Paul
risk assessment, loans, stakeholders, decision making, pragmatic, and conservation
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Journal article
Looking beneath Dalí's paint: non-destructive canvas analysis
A new analytical method was developed to non-destructively determine pH and degree of polymerisation (DP) of cellulose in fibres in 19th–20th century painting canvases, and to identify the fibre type: cotton, linen, hemp, ramie or jute. The method is based on NIR spectroscopy and multivariate data analysis, while for calibration...Oriola, Marta ; Možir, Alenka ; Garside, Paul ; Campo, Gema ; Nualart-Torroja, Anna …
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Journal article
A Gold Girdle Book and its Connection with Anne Boleyn
The miniature prayer book with the shelfmark Stowe MS. 956 has long attracted attention because of a story associating it with Anne Boleyn. According to an oft-repeated account, this tiny girdle book with a gold metalwork binding was handed by Anne to one of her maids of honour on the...Jackson, Eleanor
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Journal article
Understanding the ageing behaviour of nineteenth and twentieth century tin‐weighted silks
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries silks processed in Europe were frequently weighted with tin phosphate/silicate. There is particular concern over these silks in collections, since they appear susceptible to catastrophic deterioration. The aim of this research was to better understand the consequences of tin weighting on the...Garside, Paul ; Wyeth, Paul ; Zhang, Xiaomei
humidity ageing, light ageing, thermal ageing, tin weighting, preventive conservation, and silk
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Journal article
AI training resources for GLAM: a snapshot
We take a snapshot of current resources available for teaching and learning AI with a focus on the Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums (GLAM) community. The review was carried out in 2021 and 2022. The review provides an overview of material we identified as being relevant, offers a description of... -
Journal article
Under the Impression: Multispectral Imaging of Lord Frederick Campbell Charter XXI 5
Lord Frederick Campbell Charter 5 is the only surviving English document that still has an authentic, legible, pre-Conquest seal attached to it. The text purports to be a writ of Edward the Confessor (1003x5–1066) granting a slew of rights to Christ Church Cathedral, Canterbury. We examined the writ using multispectral...Hudson, Alison ; Duffy, Christina
multispectral imaging, digital humanities, conservation, seals, early medieval history, writs, and Norman Conquest
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Journal article
Effects of soothing images and soothing sounds on mood and well‐being
Objectives Mental health problems are increasing at an alarming rate, calling for the need for more cost-effective and easily accessible interventions. Visual images and sounds depicting nature have been found to have positive effects on individuals' mood and well-being; however, the combined effects of images and sounds have been scarcely...Witten, Emily ; Ryynanen, Jasmiina ; Wisdom, Stella ; Tipp, Cheryl ; Chan, Stella W. Y.
depression, Project Soothe, mood, sounds, well-being, images, nature, and anxiety
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Journal article
Italian Futurist Books (1909-1944) at the British Library
The Futurist book was instrumental in the circulation of Futurist ideas and represents a very experimental phase in book production, paving the way for the book object, the artist’s book, advertising and design. The purpose of this article is to produce a survey of the Italian Futurist collections held at...Mirabella, Valentina
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Journal article
The London Stage 1660-1800: A Short History, Retrospective Anatomy, and Projected Future
The London Stage, 1660-1800, a day-by-day performance calendar spanning 140 years, was for its time a magnificent achievement published in eleven volumes (1960-1968 [recte 1970]) running to 1058 pages of introductory matter and 7182 pages of text, plus 672 pages of volume indexes. A one-volume cumulative index compiled from scratch...Hume, Robert D.
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Journal article
Discovering the local in national cultural heritage collections. How web maps can help the UK public engage with their ‘own places’
Identity is a critical influence on the public’s engagement with cultural heritage. This article emphasises the role of geographical scale in this relationship examining how the presentation of local heritage can foster meaningful engagement with collections. The geographical information embedded in digital collections – such as where objects were made... -
Journal article
The New Media Writing Prize Special Collection
This article introduces the New Media Writing Prize (NMWP) special collection (https://www.webarchive.org.uk/en/ukwa/collection/2912) created on behalf of the six UK Legal Deposit Libraries and hosted by the UK Web Archive. It is divided into two sections, presenting the perspectives of the archivists and the organizers of the prize respectively. The first...Rossi, Giulia Carla ; Pyke, Tegan ; Pope, James ; Skains, R. Lyle ; Wisdom, Stella
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Journal article
Boccherini as Chamber Composer to Friedrich Wilhelm II of Prussia: some insights from the Catalogues of the king’s Music Collection
King Friedrich Wilhelm II of Prussia (1744-1797) had a strong interest in Boccherini’s music already from his time as Crown Prince. His collection contained almost the complete published oeuvre of the composer, acquired before Boccherini’s official employment with him begun. In October 1783 the prince sent a letter of interest...Drosopoulou, Loukia
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Journal article
Articulation markings in Manuscript Sources of Luigi Boccherini’s String Quintets
Unlike many eighteenth-century virtuoso violoncellists, Luigi Boccherini did not write a string treatise. His influence and contribution to historical performance practice is widely known today through his solo works, his violoncello sonatas and concertos, which best reflect his virtuosic techniques and overall use of the instrument. Yet, his chamber works...Drosopoulou, Loukia
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Journal article
Facts, Fictions, and Fascism: A Life of Actor Mary Taviner (1909-1972)
Despite an acting career spanning both silent film and talkies, as well as London and regional theatre, Mary Taviner was not a household name. In fact she attracted more press coverage for her political views, being an active fascist from the 1930s to the 1960s. She fell in with, and...St John-McAlister, Michael