The Ones That Got Away

As the exhibition ‘A body of knowledge’ draws to a close (its last day is 23 July 2026, so plan your visit now if you haven’t been yet!), I’ve been reviewing the processing of putting it together and showing it to visitors over the last several months.

My mind’s been drawn to those books that didn’t make it into the exhibition; there are, sadly, always more potential exhibits than space in the display cases for them. As I wasn’t able to put these books on public display this time, I thought I’d share them with you here instead, with a little of the rationale for their exclusion.

Title page of a book where title is surrounded by images of food on platters.

Georg Philipp Harsdörffer, Vollstandiges und von neuem vermehrtes Trincir-Buch [Complete and newly expanded carvery book], published 1657. Photography by Mike Fear.

Georg Philipp Harsdörffer, Vollstandiges und von neuem vermehrtes Trincir-Buch [Complete and newly expanded carvery book], published 1657

I’ve blogged about this book and its spectacular illustrations more than once before. It’s a volume I happened upon by chance when I was new in my job here, and it captivated me instantly. The illustrations of how to carve cuts of meat are certainly not to everyone’s taste – a lot of them still have faces, after all – but the overall impression of luxury and extravagance is hard to miss.

Diagrams showing napkin folding patterns.

Harsdörffer, Trincir-Buch [carvery book], published 1657, p. 27 Photography by Mike Fear.

The book would certainly have made a lovely exhibit to illustrate the breadth of RCP collections: and it complements the many objects in the silver collection that reflect the institution’s own history of fine dining. However, it’s had quite a bit of time in the limelight already, with a month as a ‘Curator’s Curiosity’ highlight in 2018, a loan to the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge in 2019, and frequent outings at in-person events. I thought it (like a joint of meat fresh out of the oven) deserved a bit of a rest. And I still haven’t determined for certain when the RCP came to own the book: did it inform the presentation of 18th-century physicians’ feasts at Warwick Lane, or was it a much more recent acquisition?

Richard von Krafft-Ebing, translated by Charles Gilbert Chaddock, Psychopathia sexualis with special reference to contrary sexual instinct: a medico-legal study, published 1895.

Richard von Krafft-Ebing, translated by Charles Gilbert Chaddock, Psychopathia sexualis with special reference to contrary sexual instinct: a medico-legal study, published 1895

Sexual pathology might seem a hard sell for a general exhibition about libraries and their history. And to be fair, most of the content of this book is some combination of one or more of very densely written, sexually explicit, or offensive, having been written about non-conventional sexual desires and practises in the 19th century.

Fragment of handwritten letter reading "best sheltered from layman's eyes. / Please give it such shelter; & oblige / yours faithfully / H Seymour Branfoot" follower by the donor's qualifications.

Fragment of the letter from the donor instructing the library to shelter the book from laymen's eyes.

However, there’s a marvellous story about how the book came to the library: it was donated by an elderly physician who wanted it ‘sheltered from layman’s eyes’. Maybe he didn’t want his family or friends to find it after his death, either because of how it would reflect on him or because of its potential to ‘corrupt’ them? This segregation of knowledge into that which would be fine for ‘ordinary’ people and that which is only safe to be accessed by specialists would have made an ideal inclusion in the exhibition display case called ‘Knowledge Keepers’. The only reason it wasn’t? I completely forgot about it until it was too late. Oops.

Engraving showing two castles, one on land, one seeming to float on the sea, with fires blazing on tops of turrets, shooting cannons at each other. In the sea around the castles there are many boats and some fantastical creatures such as mermaids, a hyppocampus, a dragon and a sea monster.

John Babington, Pyrotechnia or, A discourse of artificiall fire-works, published 1635, plate after p. 68.

John Babington, Pyrotechnia or, A discourse of artificiall fire-works, published 1635

There are some absolutely stunning illustrations of firework displays in this book, including animated scenes of group and individual battles. The book over all is a curious combination of precision engineering information (fireworks are, after all, a kind of artillery fire, and this book was writing by a military engineer) and extravagant drama all very much in support of the Royalist cause. The mass seaborne displays proudly display the banner of Charles I throughout: after all, the book was published only 30 years after the Gunpowder Plot.

Sadly, the book isn’t in great physical shape and is fairly large: not a winning combination for squeezing it into a display. Hopefully once we’ve been able to send it for specialist conservation we’ll be able to show it off rather more.

Page of printed text, with a section in the centre in red ink.

Raoul Lefèvre, translated by William Caxton, The recuyell of the historyes of Troye, published 1473 or 1474. Photography by Mike Fear.

Raoul Lefèvre, translated by William Caxton, The recuyell of the historyes of Troye, published 1473 or 1474

This is a real star item: it’s one of twenty-or-so surviving copies of the first book ever printed in the English language. (Although it was actually printed in the Low Countries in either Bruges or Ghent: printing came to England a few years later.)

Being 550 years old, the English isn’t quite as we’d recognise it today: it’s much closer to the Middle English of Chaucer than the language we speak today, and the font used is a close replica of the manuscript handwriting of the day, making it tough for modern readers. However, the translator’s description of how he turned to the new technology of printing to take away the strain of copying books by hand provides a moment of human connection across the centuries:

Page of printed text, transcription left.

'Translator's note' to the printed book.

Phus ende I this book whyche I have transla-

ted after myn Auctor as nyghe as god hath gy-

uen me connyng to whom be gyuen the laude &

preysyng / And for as moche as in the wrytyng of the

same my penne is worn / myn hande wery & not stedfast

myn eyen dimmed with ouermoche lokyng on the whit

paper / and my corage not so prone and redy to laboure

as hit hath ben / and that age crepeth on me daily and

febleth all the body / and also be cause I haue promysid

to dyuerce gentilmen and to my frendes to adresse to hem

as hastely as I might this sayd book / Therefor I haue

practysed & learned at my grete charge and dispense to

ordeyne this said book in preynte after the maner & forme

as ye may here see / and is not wreton with penne and

ynke as other bokes ben / to thende that euery man may

haue them attones

(Thus I end this book which I have translated after my author as near as God (to whom be given praise) has given me intelligence. And for as much as in the writing of the same my pen is worn, my hand is weary and not steadfast, my eyes dimmed by too much looking at the white paper, and my courage not as ready and willing to work as it has been, and that age creeps on me daily and makes all my body feeble, and also because I had promised diverse gentlemen and friends that I’d deliver this book to them as quickly as I could, therefore I have practised and learned at great cost and expense to have this book printed in the way you see here. And it is not written with pen and ink as other books are, with the result that every man may have them at once.)

Large semicircular map of the world, seen from the north pole and missing the American continent.

Map of the world as seen from the north pole, note the absence of the Americas.

Ptolemy, edited and expanded by Marcus Beneventanus, Giovanni Cotta and Joannes Ruysch, Geographiae, published 1508

This is another pretty massive book – it’s 49cm tall by 36 cm wide (19” x 14”). If I wanted to display it open, it would take up at least half a display case all on its own. And I really did want to display it: it’s chock full of spectacular maps, including the second oldest known printed map of the Americas, at the far left-hand side of this proto-world map.

It’s also in an unusually-decorated binding. The edges of the pages have been gilded, then gauffered (impressed in decorative patterns with a hot iron), and then painted on top of that. It was clearly a book whose early owners valued greatly.

But I didn’t quite value its inclusion enough to show it in place of 3 other, smaller books. We did have the chance to show its binding to the public in the 2023 exhibition ‘Unfamiliar’, when Theo Deproost’s photography of it captured some of its charm.

A shelf of books, mostly seen with the page edge facing the viewer, some with spines out.

Books from the library of John Dee. (Photography by John Chase)

Probably the most famous books in the Heritage Library are those that were once owned by the Renaissance polymath John Dee (1527–1609). Those books took the limelight in our 2016 exhibition ‘Scholar, Courtier, Magician’, but that was already 10 years ago: isn’t it time they got another airing? Well, frankly, probably yes. But how to mention Dee casually, in passing, without him stealing the show? I couldn’t work it out, and couldn’t pick between all the stunning books we’re lucky enough to care for, packed full with Dee’s annotations.

Small doodle of a ship on he sea in the lower corner of a page from a printed book.

Cicero, Opera omnia, published 1539–40. Photography by John Chase.

Dee’s five-hundredth birthday is coming up in 2027, so watch this space: his books might get a bit more attention then.

Until that time, come along to see ‘A body of knowledge’ until 23 July, and join us on the evening of 2 July to see some of these books that got away in person.

Katie Birkwood, rare books and special collections librarian

Library, Archive and Museum

Related pages

Fine dining and fancy carving: baroque cookery in the RCP library

On libraries: thoughts of a rare books librarian

Reading Euclid, seeing Euclid: annotated maths books in the RCP library

Anatomy, X-rays, sex and morals: recent donations to the heritage library