The Lucida uses a projected laser line and two tiny cameras to record the form of each surface of the seal. Bodleian Library, Sigill. Aram. V.
An essay by John Barrett, Senior Photographer, Bodleian Libraries, about discoveries from the ARCHiOx imaging project, which has been funded by the generous support of the Helen Hamlyn Trust. See also: ARCHiOx: research and development in imaging – The Conveyor
By far the earliest collection of originals to be recorded for the ARCHiOx project originate from the Achaemenid Empire, and date to between 500 and 400BC. The following image shows a clay seal, or letter-bulla, bearing the impression of the seal of Aršāma, a Persian prince and regional governor. It is one of eight seals, which would have accompanied letters sent to the steward of Aršāma’s estates in Egypt. The impression made on this example, and six other bullae from the collection were made using the same cylindrical seal. Lost to time, this incredibly intricately carved tool would have been rolled over the surface of each of these tiny clay seals, which measure little more than four centimetres. The clay which forms these seals is unfired and consequently these small originals are incredibly fragile. In some cases, the seals are held together by the string which would have attached them to the letters they accompanied. Recording such vulnerable originals is of great importance to ensure their preservation.
A one-hundred-megapixel medium format digital camera has been used to photograph the four source images. In place of the custom flash modules, each seal has been illuminated using a studio flash unit. The flash unit is moved to an equidistant position to the original at 90 degrees from the previous location, and the process repeated.
Recording the seals in this way has made it possible to capture them at over six and a half million pixels per square inch, but at this resolution the depth of field is extremely shallow. Focus stacking is a technique whereby multiple images are photographed from a static position with an incremental adjustment made to the focus between exposures. The resulting stacks of images are then combined in software. In this way the depth-of-field is extended and the recording appears absolutely sharp from top to bottom. Perfect alignment of the four focus-stacked source images to enable photometric stereo processing is the most challenging element within the process.
An impression of the seal of Aršāma from Sigill. Aram. V.
The final recordings are incredibly impressive. Every tiny detail of the impression, historic repair and even the fingerprints of the maker are clearly visible. These features can be explored using a 3D viewer within GIS software. Moving over the surface of the recording is similar to flying over the surface of a desert landscape, where each granular element becomes a geographical feature. This new method of recording represents an important advance in imaging for the purposes of preservation. The recordings of the seals will allow researchers to study originals in a way that has never before been possible.
In the left-hand example below, the shaded representation of the recorded surface has been generated by positioning a virtual light source at 60 degrees from the surface on which the original rests. In addition, other shaders can be applied, as shown in the right-hand example, which uses a spectrum of colour to represent height.
A different perspective. Two renders of the surface of Sigill. Aram. VIII made with data recorded with from the Selene. Left: a greyscale shaded render. Right: a heat map, using a spectrum of colour to represent variations in height.
Recording the seals in this way has made it possible to capture them at over six and a half million pixels per square inch, but at this resolution the depth of field is extremely shallow. Focus stacking is a technique whereby multiple images are photographed from a static position with an incremental adjustment made to the focus between exposures. The resulting stacks of images are then combined in software. In this way the depth-of-field is extended and the recording appears absolutely sharp from top to bottom. Perfect alignment of the four focus-stacked source images to enable photometric stereo processing is the most challenging element within the process.
Combining focus-stacking and photometric stereo. Though the thickness of the seal is a mere 7.5mm, limited depth-of-field due to recording at such a high magnification only allows for acceptably sharp capture of the top 2mm. The benefits of focus stacking are particularly notable at the edges of the seal as they taper down. Left: single exposure. Right: focus-stacked image. Sigill. Aram. V.
Every tiny detail of the impression, historic repair and even the fingerprints of the maker are clearly visible. These features can be explored using a 3D viewer within GIS software. Moving over the surface of the recording is similar to flying over the surface of a desert landscape, where each granular element becomes a geographical feature. This new method of recording represents an important advance in imaging for the purposes of preservation. The recordings of the seals will allow researchers to study originals in a way that has never before been possible.
3D views of the reverse of Sigill. Aram. VIII. The wonderfully preserved string from this letter bulla still holds a fragment of parchment from one of the letters to which it was originally attached.
The image below shows one of the fourteen parchment letters from the Aršāma collection. The Aramaic text is reasonably well preserved, and has been almost fully transcribed. The letter suggests that Aršāma valued not only horses, two of which feature on his seal, but also three-dimensional artworks. Addressed to Nakhthor, the steward of his estates in Egypt, Aršāma commissions the production of statues to be made by a sculptor believed to be Hinzani.
A letter addressed by Aršāma, Persian Satrap of Egypt to Nakhthor the steward of his estates in Egypt. An excerpt of the text is translated as follows. …‘And let him make statues (on) which there shall be horsemen (?), and let him make a statue of a horse with its rider, just as previously he made before me, and other statues. And send (them), and let them bring (them) to me at once, with haste’… Pell. Aram. III.
So it seems fitting that we should carry out Aršāma’s request, albeit two and a half millennia later. Producing a scaled-up three-dimensional facsimile of the fifth seal using the data recorded with ARCHiOx technology. Firstly, the Lucida scanner was used to record the general shape of the seal from each orientation. This volumetric data provided a base, over which the higher resolution, higher frequency data recorded with the Selene could be overlaid.
With the photometric stereo and laser recordings combined, elevated printing was then used to construct the facsimiles at four times the original size. Several variations were made in order to assess which might be most useful for the purposes of study. Firstly, an uncoloured version was made, showing only the volume of the seal. Two coloured versions followed, the first printed with a shaded render in order to enhance the debossed design, and the second printed with the albedo (colour) image recorded from the original seal.
Left: Two, scaled-up, 3D printed facsimiles of Sigill. Aram. V, made in the print rooms at Factum Arte, Madrid. Right: The two tiny facsimiles in the centre of the group are printed at actual size. Variations of enlarged facsimiles were produced, either uncoloured or with renders printed on their surface.
A far greater challenge would be to create a facsimile of the lost cylindrical seal which was used to make the impressions in the seven bullae. Though the fifth, seventh and eighth seals provide much of the design, some elements are clearly incomplete. A collated line drawing from Christopher J. Tuplin and John Ma’s book, Aršāma and his World: The Bodleian Letters in Context reveals two important missing elements from the design. In the drawing, the horse to the left of the soldier holding a spear appears complete. Crucially so too does the inscription above the horse. With the assistance of Professor Tuplin, these additional details were explained. Another seal bearing a partial impression, made using the same cylinder is held in the collections of the Persepolis Fortification Archive in Chicago. A photograph of this seal was used by Eduardo Lopez from Factum Arte in order to incorporate the missing elements into the digital reconstruction.
The lost cylindrical seal, remade. The design from the collated recordings 3D printed onto flexible plastic before being glued to a cylindrical base. An impression in plasticine demonstrates that the facsimile is capable of creating incredibly similar designs to those found on the original bullae.
Prior to producing the facsimile, the 3D recording was inverted so that the embossed design would be capable of creating an impression similar to those from the original bullae. Though limited by the resolution of the 3D printer, the facsimile cylindrical seal is indeed a usable tool and capable of making impressions which look very similar to those which were ordered to be made by Prince Aršāma, two and a half thousand years ago.
An essay by John Barrett, Senior Photographer, Bodleian Libraries, about discoveries from the ARCHiOx imaging project, which has been funded by the generous support of the Helen Hamlyn Trust. See also: ARCHiOx: research and development in imaging – The Conveyor
An album of Ragamala paintings at the Bodleian Library (Bodleian MS. Laud Or. 149) is a beautifully painted manuscript, dating from the early 17th century. Not long after it was produced, the volume was donated to the Bodleian by Archbishop William Laud, at some point between 1635-41.
It has been proposed that that three recently discovered paper pouncing patterns may have been used in the production of paintings in the manuscript. The patterns, which have subsequently been loaned to the Bodleian, are skilfully made. Tiny pin-pricks form the outline of illustrations which are clearly comparable with three of the paintings from the Ragamala Album.
Left: a paper pouncing pattern, photographed conventionally. Centre: an edited version of the previous image showing the position of the tiny pinholes. Right: A detail from fol. 8 of the Laud Ragamala Album. MS. Laud Or. 149.
Pouncing is a less obvious method of copying than pricking. Charcoal dust would have been transferred though the holes, duplicating the form of a design from pattern to page. Whether or not the three pouncing patterns were indeed the source of the paintings from the Bodleian’s 17th century volume remains somewhat of a mystery. In order to examine how closely the two align, the ARCHiOx team generated a set of renders from 3D recordings of the pouncing patterns and overlaid these with the colour images from the manuscript.
A layered image comprising of: Left: a painted page from the Laud Ragamala Album. Right: a mirrored heat-map render of the verso of the corresponding pouncing pattern. Centre: a composite of the left and right images. MS. Laud Or. 149.
Though some elements within the designs differ, there is a clear and extremely close correlation between the patterns and paintings. 3D imaging of the paintings themselves show no evidence of holes or depressions due to tracing, only the layers of pigment which have been applied to the paper. Though the 3D recordings have not provided a definitive answer as to whether the patterns may be the origin of the paintings, it is hoped that they may serve as a template for similar analysis.
ARCHiOx is by no means the first technology to create facsimiles of ancient texts or images. The process of copying using pinholes is evident on the largest original which has so far been captured for the ARCHiOx project. Dating to the 14th century, the Gough Map is one of the earliest maps to show Great Britain in a geographically recognisable form and served as a blueprint for maps of Britain for over 150 years.
Oblique images of the sign marking the location of Hull, East Yorkshire. Left: albedo. Right: shaded render showing the micro topography of this area of the map, in the absence of the original’s colour. Tiny indentations marking the form of the sign provide evidence that the map was copied from a precursor map. MS. Gough Gen. Top. 16.
Bequeathed to the Bodleian Library by Richard Gough (1735-1809), the map is covered in over two-thousand tiny indentations which transferred the position and form of geographical features from a precursor map. Through studying these pinholes, researchers may be able to determine which features would have been present on the precursor map and in doing so, estimate when it may have been made.
This historic map has been recorded numerous times since its creation. It therefore serves as wonderful case-study in the development of copying and imaging techniques. A copper printing plate was engraved in 1780, prints from which are held in the Bodleian’s collections. Using a novel reproduction method developed at the Ordnance Survey, a photozincography recording was made in 1871. In 1958, a run of collotype prints of the Gough Map were made at Oxford University Press. The map was recorded digitally for the first time in 2006. Hyperspectral and 3D laser recordings followed nine years later, in 2015. These initial 3D recordings were conducted by the Factum Foundation’s Head of 3D scanning, Carlos Bayod.
“The recording carried out in 2015 applied the Lucida 3D Scanner to capture for the first time the topographical characteristics of this unique map. One of the first collaborations between the Bodleian Libraries and Factum Foundation, this survey allowed us to see and measure the shape and surface of the map without the colour layer, making it much easier to allocate the distribution of the pinholes, among other marks present on the relief. The information captured by the Lucida systems offers the possibility of visualizing the map’s surface on-screen as a shaded render, an image format onto which it is possible to register other layers of information such as the colour photographs. Additionally, it creates a greyscale depth map that can be used for re-materializing the data as an accurate physical reconstruction, becoming the base for creating an exact facsimile”. Carlos Bayod Lucini, Head of 3D Scanning, Factum Foundation
The new photometric stereo recording of the Gough Map captured with the Selene, was captured in June, 2022. MS. Gough Gen. Top. 16.
The photometric stereo captures made for ARCHiOx are the highest resolution recordings of the Gough Map to date. Both the front and reverse of the map were recorded at over 700,000 pixels per square inch. In order to record the map at this resolution, 85 image tiles were captured, processed and stitched together to form a single image. Prominent pinholes and scoring marks are clearly visible from the recordings. These have been analysed, using geographical information system software by Damien Bove, Researcher for The Gough Map Project and Picture Editor of Imago Mundi: International Journal for the History of Cartography
“The pricking on the Gough Map is key to its creation, marking the location and form of place signs copied through from a precursor map. Where the tool has been pressed through the skin, it has left holes. Most of these can be seen on high resolution photos and on the earlier Lucida scan. Where the tool was pressed with less force, however, it has left only small depressions. The ARCHiOx scan has allowed us to identify and measure these for the first time, giving us a fuller understanding of the earlier map.” Damien Bove, Researcher for The Gough Map Project and Picture Editor of Imago Mundi: International Journal for the History of Cartography.
Visitors examine a three-dimensional facsimile of the Gough Map, made by Factum Arte, following a presentation given by the Bodleian’s Map Curator, Nick Millea.
But the ARCHiOx recording has not only allowed for on-screen analysis. The data has also been used to create a remarkably accurate three-dimensional facsimile of the map. Currently installed in the Bodleian’s Map Room, the facsimile provides an opportunity for close examination, ensuring that the original map need not be as frequently transported or removed from its protective casing.
“Facsimiles allow us to have a more natural connection with valuable cultural objects. Thanks to the possibility of reproducing the surface relief and colour in high resolution, a facsimile can serve a triple function contributing to the preservation, study, and dissemination of the original, for the benefit of both experts and amateurs alike”. Carlos Bayod Lucini, Head of 3D Scanning, Factum Foundation
— An essay by John Barrett, Senior Photographer, Bodleian Libraries, about discoveries from the ARCHiOx imaging project, which has been funded by the generous support of the Helen Hamlyn Trust. See also: ARCHiOx: research and development in imaging – The Conveyor
An essay by John Barrett, Senior Photographer, Bodleian Libraries, about discoveries from the ARCHiOx imaging project, which has been funded by the generous support of the Helen Hamlyn Trust. See also: ARCHiOx: research and development in imaging – The Conveyor
A 9th century insular manuscript, Gregory the Great, Homiliae XL in evangelia. MS. Laud Misc. 429.
The above manuscript, Gregory the Great, Homiliae XL in evangelia, is written in Latin and dates to the first half of the 9th century. The 15th century shelfmark on folio 2, reveals that this volume was in the possession of the cathedral church of St. Kilian in Würzburg. Examples of annotations made not in ink, but through scratching the surface of the parchment using a drypoint stylus have now been discovered and recorded on twenty-five pages from this volume, using the Selene. The catalogue description for the recto of folio 74 shown in the image above, describes a drawing in the lower margin. A hunting scene, barely visible from the conventional photographic recording, but clear enough to make a partial digital annotation. Far more successful at revealing the inscription, the 3D render shows not only the illustration, but also four camouflaged letters, R, O, D, A. This demonstrates how 3D recording can compliment traditional imaging in revealing and documenting new discoveries.
A shaded render of a drypoint addition from the lower margin of folio 74r.A compiled digital annotation using conventional and 3D recordings, showing the position and form of the addition. MS. Laud Misc. 429.
The drypoint annotations recorded on folio 60r, in the image below, are inconsistent with the majority of others from this manuscript. These have been added between passages of text rather than confined to the margins. In this example, relatively deep incisions have been made, marking the position of punctuation. Far less obvious and perhaps only recognisable from the 3D render is a small, marginal illustration showing two hands, tied together with a bow.
A digital annotation from folio 60r, showing numerous drypoint additions. MS. Laud Misc. 429.
In order to determine whether or how this annotation might relate to the text, the image above was shared with Jo Story, Professor of Early Medieval History, Leicester University. Her interpretation reveals a clear link between annotation and text. The text from this homily describes the stoning of Stephen. The translation of folio 60r begins ‘when Stephen was dying for his faith, Saul kept the clothes of the stoners. Therefore, he himself stoned them all with his own hands, who returned all the works to the stoners.’ The connection between inscription and text is most evident from the passage at the end of the fourth line ‘Duo ergo sunt que’ –‘because many are called but few are chosen’ – Chapter 22:14 from the Gospel of Matthew. This passage immediately follows the verse ‘Then said the king to the servants, Bind him hand and foot, and take him away, and cast him into outer darkness, there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’
Dozens of similar recordings of unlinked manuscript annotations have now been captured using ARCHiOx technology. The discovery of the name ‘Eadburg’ from another of the Bodleian’s early medieval manuscripts by PhD candidate Jessica Hodgkinson (University of Leicester) is described in a previous Conveyor post. Recordings from these two manuscripts have demonstrated that photometric stereo recording is extremely effective and is likely to hold the key to documenting incised markings from similar volumes. Revealing these markings which have remained undetected for centuries is an incredibly exciting application of this new technology.
“The new photometric stereo recording methods that are being pioneered by John and the ARCHiOX team are transformative. The method allows us to see the surface of the pages in much greater detail than ever before and will give us insights into the preparation of the membrane and the methods used to make the quires, as well as acts of reading and engagement with the book after it was completed. New, and almost invisible, marks are now easily seen – revealing huge amounts of new information about medieval book culture – and the people who made and read them. This changes what we can do, the questions we can ask, and the answers that are revealed.” Jo Story, Professor of Early Medieval History, Leicester University.
A series of exciting inscriptions, almost invisible to the naked eye, have been discovered in the margins of an important eighth-century manuscript in the Bodleian Library, MS Selden Supra 30. Revealed through state-of-the-art 3D recording technology by the ARCHiOx project, these marginal annotations provide tantalising new insights into this manuscript’s history and its links to women, in particular, to a woman called Eadburg.
Introducing Bodleian Library, MS Selden Supra 30
Bodleian Library, MS. Selden Supra 30 is a copy of the Acts of the Apostles, a book of the New Testament, written in Latin. It is a small volume, measuring only 229 x 176 mm (only slightly bigger than an A5 piece of paper).
Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 30 open at pp. 18-19
Like most surviving manuscripts from this period, MS. Selden Supra 30 does not contain a formal colophon or scribal note recording when, where, and by whom it was made.
However, certain features of this manuscript, including the style of uncial script used to copy the text, demonstrate that it was produced in England, most likely somewhere in the kingdom of Kent, probably in the first half of the eighth century (i.e., between c. 700 and c. 750 AD).
MS. Selden Supra 30 was certainly in Kent by the fourteenth century when a shelf mark was added to p. 1 showing that it was then in the library of the monastery of St Augustine’s in Canterbury.
The opening page of MS. Selden Supra 30 (p. 1) which has suffered damage and is now significantly discoloured. The shelf mark from St Augustine’s, Canterbury (Di. I. G. III) is visible in the upper margin.
Prayers added to p. 70, which was originally left blank, suggest, however, that very early in its history MS. Selden Supra 30 was owned and used by a woman.
These prayers were copied in the same type of script as the rest of the manuscript but by a different scribe to the two responsible for copying its main text.
The first prayer is a petition to God made by an anonymous woman, described as God’s “unworthy servant” (indignam famulam).
This strongly suggests that, at the time the prayer was added, MS. Selden Supra 30 was being used by a woman, or a group of women. The prayer may have been copied into the manuscript by a female scribe.
The formula of this prayer is unique and does not survive in any other manuscript. It could have been composed by the petitioner herself.
In 1935, in the first edition of Vol. 2 of Codices Latini Antiquiores, Elias Avery Lowe, then a Reader in Palaeography at the University of Oxford, suggested that another addition made to MS. Selden Supra 30 could provide further evidence of its links to women.
Lowe recorded, for the first time in print, that the letters EADB and +E+ had been incised into the lower margin of p. 47. He noticed that the letters had been cut into the parchment with force, apparently using a knife, slicing through the upper surface of the membrane.
ARCHiOx recordings of the letters inscribed at the bottom of p. 47.
Lowe suggested that these letters were abbreviated forms of the female name Eadburh/Eadburg.
Discovering Eadburg
Studying MS. Selden Supra 30 in the Weston Library’s Rare Books and Manuscripts Reading Room in 2022, Jessica Hodgkinson, a PhD student at the University of Leicester, funded by the AHRC Midlands4Cities consortium, spotted another inscription in the lower margin of p. 18. This inscription had never been noticed before. It was very small and almost invisible to the naked eye but appeared to contain Eadburg’s name written in full.
State-of-the-art technology has now not only confirmed this new inscription, but revealed several other instances of Eadburg’s name, alongside many more early marginal additions, incised into the parchment of MS Selden Supra 30. These discoveries provide new and exciting insights into the use of this book by a woman called Eadburg in eighth-century England.
Recording the inscriptions by John Barrett
Scratched markings on the surface of a page are usually photographed using a single light positioned at a low angle. This simple principle is termed raking light. However, through recordings made for ARCHiOx, it has been demonstrated that scratched markings may be far more effectively recorded using a technique called photometric stereo.
The photometric stereo workflow adopted for ARCHiOx uses 2D images to record and store 3D information. These images map the direction and height of the original’s surface, and are processed into renders showing only the relief of the original with the tone and colour removed.
Renders produced using a photometric stereo workflow are superior to raked light images in three ways:
A 3D render lacks the excessive contrast of a raked light image making markings easier to discern. Through the use of software, it is possible to re-light renders virtually, giving complete control over the intensity of the shadow and highlight over the recorded relief of the original.
The ability to filter for different textural frequencies makes it possible to separate the scratched markings from the texture of material on which the markings have been made.
Renders can be re-lit virtually from any direction or height making it possible to reveal markings made along any angle.
In addition, the depth of a marking can be measured by examining a cross-section through it. The profile may also provide clues regarding the mark-making tool, in this case a drypoint stylus.
A cross-section through the lower horizontal line of the letter ‘E’. The depth of the drypoint inscription through this line measures around 18 microns (0.018mm).
A photometric stereo recording of the near-invisible inscription on p. 18 was captured in May 2022.
The Selene, a prototype imaging system designed and built by the Factum Foundation, project partner for ARCHiOx, was used for the recording.
Multiple images were captured from the inscription before being processed, filtered, and enhanced. The resulting high-resolution shaded render shows only the three-dimensional surface of the page. Through this new image, the drypoint inscription has been recorded successfully for the first time.
Top to bottom: An unedited render of the 3D surface of the bottom of page 18 with the inscription now visible. An enhanced version made through tonal remapping. A digitally annotated version. The digital annotation with the render removed.
Subsequent analysis and processing, overseen by Jorge Cano, designer of the Selene, led to a new set of renders which enhance the markings further. These new images were created by compiling renders, re-lit virtually from multiple directions, and using a process called principal component analysis, or PCA.
The clearest recording of the drypoint inscription to date. The inscription has been enhanced using techniques including virtual relighting, image stacking and principal component analysis.
The lines which form this inscription are incredibly shallow. Even the most prominent are only 15-20 microns in depth, perhaps equivalent to less than a fifth of the width of a human hair. It is, therefore, unsurprising that the inscription is simply absent from a conventionally-lit colour image of this page.
Top: The drypoint inscription is absent from this capture recorded using conventional lighting. Bottom: The digital annotation is applied at the exact position where it was recorded using photometric stereo technology.
Processing the data using computational methods has revealed an astonishing amount but analogue (i.e., human) intervention has still been required to digitally annotate the image to clarify the reading. Despite attempts to filter specifically for the inscription, shading from the texture of the parchment and its many tiny creases have proved almost impossible to remove. This makes it difficult in some areas, to rule-in or rule-out the presence of lines. An objective and cautious approach has been taken with the digital annotation. This has involved multiple imaging colleagues working independently to contribute to a set of annotations which could then be compared. Finally, the renders and digitally annotated images were shared with the researchers, allowing them to make their own observations and annotations with the benefit of context.
Subsequent recordings made for ARCHiOx have revealed that Eadburg’s name is spelled out in full five times on five different pages of MS. Selden Supra 30 (pp. 1, 2, 3, 12, and 18). On some of these pages, and elsewhere in the book, other abbreviated forms of this name, including E, EAD, or EADB, are also present.
Reading the inscriptions
The discovery of Eadburg’s full name etched several times into the manuscript’s margins definitively confirms Lowe’s theory that the letters previously identified on p. 47 are, indeed, abbreviations of the same name.
Eadburg’s name was copied out using letterforms common to all the newly identified inscriptions. The form of the A (an oblique line with an oval bow on the left) and the angular U and G are distinctive. This suggests that the same scribe may have made all of these additions. If so, it is at least possible that the scribe was Eadburg herself.
Readers and owners of early medieval manuscripts, both men and women, sometimes added their names to books, usually in ink, but occasionally, as here, in drypoint. Another early eighth-century example is the ink inscription that records, in Old English, that Abbess Cuthswitha owned a copy of Jerome’s commentary on the Old Testament Book of Ecclesiastes (now Würzburg, Universitätsbibliothek, M. p. th. q. 2, fol. 1r).
Eadburg’s name could also be a mark of ownership or evidence of reading. Although small in scale, and faint, someone, perhaps Eadburg herself, was evidently keen to preserve her name in the pages of this book to be seen by subsequent readers. What is unusual about Eadburg’s name, however, is that it appears here, in full or in abbreviated forms, 15 times.
Eadburg’s name is written on the opening page of the manuscript (p. 1). It overlaps part of the top of the enlarged decorated initial P which begins the text. Here, her name is preceded by a cross (+).
A series of ARCHiOx recordings of p. 1 of MS. Selden Supra 30:
Capture using conventional lighting (Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 30, p.1)Detail of the unedited 3D render of the inscription (Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 30, p.1)Digital annotation of the inscription (Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 30, p.1)Image showing the digital annotation applied at the exact position where it was recorded using photometric stereo technology (Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 30, p.1)
The decision to etch the name over the top of the first letter of the text must have been deliberate. It establishes Eadburg’s presence in the book from the outset and connects her name intimately with the biblical text it contains.
On p. 2, her name is framed by a cartouche.
Detail of the recording of the lower margin of p. 2 showing the name Eadburg surrounded by a rectangular border. (Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 30, p.2)
On p. 18, Eadburg’s name forms part of a multi-word inscription added to the lower margin. Here also, her name is preceded by a cross. Some of the following letters are easy to see, whilst others, especially those towards the end of the inscription, are difficult to make out, even with the benefit of the new visualisation techniques.
The most recent and clearest recording taken of the inscription, enhanced through virtual relighting, image stacking, and principal component analysis, appears to show, however, that, among the visible letters, there is a wynn (Ƿ), the Old English letter for W. This letter can be distinguished from the Rs in the inscription, including in the name Eadburg, by the form of the bow which is pointed and extends further down the vertical line of the letter than on R. The presence of a wynn shows that the inscription was written, not in Latin, but in the Old English vernacular language.
This inscription probably comprises three words. The name Eadburg is the subject of the statement, so we might reasonably expect the other letters to include a verb followed by the object.
A preliminary reading of the inscription is:
+ EaDBURG BIREð CǷ….N
+ Eadburg bears [cw….n]
Most of the letters in what appears to be the third and final word are unclear, with only CW– at the beginning and -N at the end remaining legible.
One Old English noun that could fill this position is cwærtern, meaning ‘prison’. Interestingly, the inscription is positioned beneath the beginning of the text of Acts 5:18 which describes the imprisonment of the Apostles by the high priest of the Temple and his followers because they had continued to preach the Gospel (…et injecerunt manus in Apostolos et posuerunt eos in custodia publica). If cwærtern is the third word in the inscription on p. 18, perhaps Eadburg sought to mirror the text, associating herself with the Apostles in their imprisonment.
Deciphering the drawings
Alongside Eadburg’s name, several intriguing drypoint drawings have also been discovered. Some are clearly human figures, though further investigation is needed to establish exactly who or what they depict. All the figures are very small. Several seem to have been made by incising a line around a thumb or finger to form the outline of the figure.
ARCHiOx recording of the lower margin of Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 30, p. 9. Digital annotation applied in lower image showing two figures. The figure in the background has outstretched arms, and is reaching towards the figure at the front who appears to be holding up a hand to signal them to stop.
The scene added to the lower margin of p. 11, which features at least three figures, may also include two E‘s. There appears to be an E, preceded by a cross, to the left of the first figure, and a second E, followed by a wynn (Ƿ) between the second and third figures. Could Eadburg have drawn this scene in drypoint and signed her work with her initial, as found elsewhere in the manuscript?
Recording of the dry-point addition in the lower margin of Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 30, p. 11.
Identifying Eadburg?
Eadburg’s name or initials are etched into several pages, sometimes next to contemporaneous dry-point drawings. But who was she? More work on the newly discovered additions may bring us closer to answering this question.
We know of nine women called Eadburg living in England at some point between the seventh and tenth centuries (for details see the online Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England). Other sources provide some tantalising clues that might help identify the Eadburg of MS. Selden Supra 30.
Charter evidence suggests that a woman called Eadburg was abbess of a female religious community at Minster-in-Thanet, in Kent from at least 733 until her death sometime between 748 and 761. As Lowe suggested in 1935, her dates and location correspond with the palaeographic assessment of the script of MS Selden Supra 30.
Abbess Eadburg of Minster-in-Thanet may also be the woman of the same name who corresponded with Boniface, the West Saxon missionary bishop and Church reformer. He became archbishop of Mainz in 732 and was martyred by pagans in Frisia in 754. Surviving letters show that Boniface held Eadburg in high esteem and that she sent books to him in Francia. He commissioned from her a deluxe copy of St Peter’s Epistles to be written in gold.
Boniface’s friend clearly had access to manuscripts and the means to make them. As such she is an especially strong candidate for the woman whose name was etched into the margins of MS. Selden Supra 30.
John Barrett is Bodleian Library’s Senior Photographer and ARCHiOx Technical Lead for the Bodleian.
Jessica Hodgkinson is a PhD candidate at the University of Leicester funded by the Midlands4Cities doctoral training partnership. Her research explores the participation of women in early medieval book culture in Western Europe through the analysis of surviving manuscripts commissioned, copied, owned and/or used by them.
With special thanks to Jorge Cano, designer and engineer for Factum Arte and the Factum Foundation, for his work on enhancing the recording of p. 18, to Dr Philip A. Shaw, Teaching Fellow in the Department of English Studies at Durham University, for helping to decipher the Old English of this inscription, and to Professor Jo Story and Dr Erin T Dailey at the University of Leicester for their guidance and suggestions.
Chiara Betti, DPhil student on the Collaborative Doctoral Partnership scheme
Most of us imagine libraries as repositories of books, manuscripts, and paper things. However, library collections are much more diverse than this. For example, the Bodleian Library not only preserves precious manuscripts and printed books but holds prints, paintings, printing plates and blocks, and even embroidery samples. And until the beginning of the twentieth century, you could also find marble sculptures and wax seals in the Bodleian collections.* However, libraries have sometimes struggled with the practicalities and the purpose of preserving objects such as printing surfaces, which are after all the tools used to make books, rather than books themselves. Why should libraries preserve printing plates? How can they be understood and integrated with the rest of the collections?
My doctorate focuses on the unique collection of printing plates amassed by the British antiquary Richard Rawlinson (1690–1755). The antiquary’s life mission was to preserve artefacts, manuscripts, books, and curiosities of historical relevance in the hope that future generations might learn from those objects. Thanks to contemporary accounts, we know that his London house was so crammed with objects of any sorts that he resorted to living in the attic, with the result that he could not even hear visitors knocking at his door!
Rawlinson was an extremely generous collector and often lent items from his collections. Shipping printed reproductions of those items was much more straightforward. While still an undergraduate at St John’s College, Oxford, Rawlinson commissioned his first engraved copper plate from Michael Burghers (c.1647/8–1727), an engraver for the Oxford University Press, in 1710. Rawlinson could reach a much wider audience with impressions from a single copper plate, with fewer risks of never seeing his possessions returned.
In many aspects, Rawlinson’s commitment to reproducing and documenting valuable artworks and manuscripts can be seen as an antecedent of modern digitisation campaigns of museum and library collections. Echoing his mission to “collect and preserve”, the Bodleian Library has embarked on a crucial project that will produce many dozens of super-high-resolution images of some of the library’s treasures. ARCHiOx –Analysis and Recording of Cultural Heritage in Oxford – is a collaborative project that originated from the partnership of the Bodleian Libraries and the Madrid-based Factum Foundation. Since February 2022, the Bodleian’s Imaging Studio has been photographing items selected by the Bodleian curators and staff, starting with the Rawlinson copper plates. For a detailed description of the digitisation process, the reader is invited to refer to John Barrett’s recent blog about ARCHiOx. In brief, John and his team are creating 3D recordings that allow us to study in detail and measure the objects photographed. This imaging technique, which can capture textural details, represents a significant step forward in the study of printing plates and, in general, of the materiality of objects.
Why should we preserve and study printing equipment? Copper printing plates (and woodblocks and lithograph stones) are a repository of information about the manual processes of creation and revision, often not acquirable from the impressions. Three examples here, images of copper plates obtained with the help of John Barrett in the Bodleian Imaging Studio, will elucidate how they help us to learn more about our print collections.
The Invidia plates: two sides to a story
Views of Rome on three small copper plates. From left to right: Anonymous, Tempio Fortuna Verile, 18th century. Engraved copper plate. Rawl.Copperplates g.17; Anonymous, Cerchio di Antonino Callo, 18th century. Engraved copper plate. Rawl.Copperplates g.21; Anonymous, Trofei di Mario, 18th century. Engraved copper plate. Rawl.Copperplates g.19.
The above three small plates giving views of Rome are from a series of twelve copper plates copied after much larger Italian engravings depicting the same subjects. However, these three plates have more in common than one might expect. Their reverse is etched with an old design, indicating that they were formerly part of the same larger copper plate that was then re-used and cut up to make new engravings. The other side of these plates shows a naked female figure with Medusa-like hair, a man dressed in Elizabethan fashion, and another man with a hat standing in front of a building. If we place the three plates next to one another as in a jigsaw, a new image appears. In this case, technology provides a more efficient alternative to manually aligning the plates.
A digital restoration of an etching of Invidia (Envy) from the reverses of Rawl.Copperplates g.17, g.19 and g.21. No extant print made using this side of the plate has yet been identified. The etched lines are extremely shallow, measuring 0.029mm in depth.
The image above was obtained by stitching together the images of the three reverses, and the results are impressive. This image can be used to run online searches to try to identify other impressions of this plate or designs from which it was copied. So far, even with these methods, I have not found any impressions, but my research continues with the hope of solving the mystery of this “puzzle plate”. The absence of impressions might even suggest that the plate was made for decorative purposes rather than printing. It is hoped that further research will shed light on the route of this copper plate from the ‘Invidia’ design to the small views of Roman sites shown above. These tools for printmaking had an industrial history, linking one engraver and publisher to another through the re-use of materials.
The De Passe family: portraying royalty
The Rawlinson collection of plates features many famous engravers from the 17th and 18th centuries, including members of the famous Dutch family De Passe.
Willem De Passe, Portrait of King James I and Henry Prince of Wales, 1621. Engraved copper plate. Rawl.Copperplates c.34.
Copper plates like the portrait of King James I and Henry Prince of Wales have an enormous historical value as not many 17th-century printing plates survive today. The engraved portraits are representations of monarchy attempting to assert its importance. The printing plates let us look behind the techniques and materials that were used to achieve this.
Digitising these objects ensures their preservation while making them accessible to a broader audience. In fact, while studying the objects in the flesh is irreplaceable and essential for the researcher, the reality is that accessing printing plates is not always straightforward. On average, printing plates are much heavier than books, and, unlike most books, their handling requires gloves (to prevent oils from our skin corroding the metal) and much care. High-resolution images enhance the possibilities for the study of these objects.
Studying mezzotint plates: seeing through time
William Faithorne the younger after John Closterman, Portrait of Madame Plowden, 1690–1725. Mezzotint on copper. Rawl.Copperplates c.43.
A favoured method for making print portraits was the mezzotint process. Mezzotint plates rarely survive because of the limited number of impressions they can yield. The few existing examples in the Rawlinson collection confirm that the plates are too worn out to see the details of the images on them. However, the images produced by ARCHiOx slightly improve our chances of studying the way these plates were made. For instance, the plate with the portrait of Madame Plowden is hardly legible with the naked eye because it is extremely worn out and is covered with a thick layer of dirt and residual ink. Thanks to the advanced imaging provided by ARCHiOx, we can decipher the image and see that many details were etched into the plate to enhance the delicate shading provided by the mezzotint process.
Science and Humanities
Those familiar with copper plates will be aware of how challenging it is to study them, even when you have them in your hands. They are often preserved in a poor state, with residual ink in the engraved lines or evident signs of oxidisation which obscures the image. However, once printing plates have undergone a process of cleaning and conservation, the polished copper is highly reflective, making it almost impossible to photograph it. Advanced imaging techniques such as those developed by ARCHiOx allow us to observe and study printing plates in unprecedented detail. Moreover, the presence of ink in the grooves is no longer an issue – if anything, it is an advantage as a perfectly polished surface would not be suitable for this kind of photography.
Copper plates belong to the category of “difficult objects” preserved by libraries and archives. They are not printed material, nor really 2D artworks, and often fall beyond the expertise of the curators and conservators. As a result, printing technologies are sometimes left out of catalogues and digitisation programmes, making it difficult for a researcher to obtain information through the usual library channels. My research and the valuable work of the Bodleian Imaging Studio and the Digital Bodleian will finally close a gap, starting with the Rawlinson copper plates, just one of the collections of printing surfaces held by the Bodleian Libraries.
The results obtained by ARCHiOx will transform this research. The ARCHiOx imaging not only produces high-resolution images but enables researchers to measure details on the objects’ surfaces. For instance, it is possible to measure the distance between engraved lines as well as their depth. Thanks to the generous support of SHARP (Society for the History of Authorship, Reading and Publishing), which allows me to conduct detailed analyses of some of the Rawlinson copper plates, we have been able to compare the accuracy of the ARCHiOx technology to that of optical 3D microscopes. For example, using the Alicona Infinite Focus 3D Profilometer at LIMA (Engineering Science, Oxford), I measured the distance between parallel lines on copper plates engraved by various artists to establish the differences in techniques and skills. The same measurements were taken on the ARCHiOx, and the results are consistent with those of the 3D profilometer.
3D image of a section of Rawl.Copperplates e.65 obtained with the Alicona Infinite Focus 3D Profilometer. The scale on the right shows the depth of the engraved lines.Depth profile of the same section of Rawl.Copperplates e.65 showing the varying depth of the engraved lines.
The results so far obtained with ARCHiOx and the Engineering Department are promising. They will reshape our understanding and appreciation of print technologies as tools for researching book and art history, the history of collecting and heritage science.
With thanks for his assistance in writing this article:
John Barrett, Bodleian Library’s Senior Photographer and ARCHiOx Technical Lead for the Bodleian.
* Transfer of the seals and seal matrices to the Ashmolean: Bodleian Library, ‘Index to Rawlinson [Monastic] Matrices, [C18]’. Library Records e. 382; Bodleian Library, ‘Transfers to the Ashmolean and Other Institutions (1863)’. Library Records d. 1180. Marbles: https://collections.ashmolean.org/collection/search/per_page/25/offset/25/sort_by/relevance/object/45098 Also see Jeremy Coote, ‘An ‘Unimportant’ Inscription: The Antiquarian and Institutional History of a ‘Muscovite’ Cup in the Rawlinson Bequest of 1755’, The Bodleian Library Record, 30 (nos 1-2 April to October), (2017), pp. 16-40
This blog was prompted by Chiara Betti’s doctoral research on the Rawlinson copper plates. Readers with an interest in Chiara’s research are encouraged to contact her at chiara.betti@postgrad.sas.ac.uk. The research is funded by the AHRC through the Collaborative Doctoral Partnership. See: https://www.glam.ox.ac.uk/early-modern-copper-plates-bodleian-libraries
by Elena Trowsdale, an English Literature and Language Finalist at Brasenose College on placement in Special Collections. Elena has been identifying some examples of ‘nature prints’ in Bodleian collections.
Fig 1: From Constantin von Ettingshausen’s ‘Über die Nervation der Blatter Bei der Gattung Quercus’ from volume two of Denkschriften der Mathematisch-naturwissenschaftlichen classe der Kaiserlichen akademie der wissenschaften..
Beginning 25th July 2021, the Oxford Botanic Garden has been celebrating its 400th anniversary. The Bodleian Libraries have been collaborating with the Garden to identify historical books containing depictions of scientific specimens. Recently I spent a week in the Weston Library for Special Collections, investigating books which feature specimens depicted using a technique called ‘nature printing’. Related to this topic, there will be an event during summer 2022 entitled ‘Capturing Nature’, created by designer and printmaker Pia Östlund.
Nature printing, otherwise known as Naturselbstdruck [Nature’s self-printing], is an intriguing form of printing which is often breathtakingly lifelike. Using this method, prints are taken directly from the natural object itself such as a leaf, flower or even occasionally a bat. Alois Auer’s specific technique of nature printing, depicted in The Discovery of the Natural Printing Process: an Invention … (1853), involves impressing the natural object into a lead plate. Making a printable surface was done by electroplating the impression to create a copper plate, which was used to create the print on paper. This is an intaglio technique, where the ink rests in the shallow grooves of the lead plate rather than on the higher surfaces. However, in my investigations I have chosen to also study nature prints which fit the definition more loosely. Out of the examples I have found, some are taken from directly applying ink to the natural item, some may incorporate photographic printing techniques and others are facsimiles of nature prints, made from woodcuts which used the original nature print as their primary reference. Some prints are hand coloured, others use coloured ink, and some are drawn upon after they have been printed.
In my investigations, I have found nature printed items dating back to Johann Hieronymus Knipof’s work in 1757. Some are more intricate than others, partially because some have used wet subjects and some dry, dry subjects tending to be easier to print accurately. My personal favourite is the work of Constantin von Ettingshausen. A compilation of his works in three volumes is housed in the Radcliffe Science Library. I ordered this to the Weston Library reading room and examined it closely, finding extremely intricate leaf prints which detailed their structure and veins perfectly.
To compare different ways in which nature printing have been used and adapted, Francis Heath’s Fern Paradise (1875) can be compared with Thomas Moore’s Nature-Printed British Ferns (1859), H.B. Dobbie’s New Zealand Ferns (1930) and Peter Hutchinson’s Ferns of Sidmouth (1862).
Figure 2: Left to Right, plate 6 from Francis George Heath’s Illustrated Edition of The Fern Paradise (1875), print from Thomas Moore’s The Octavo Nature-Printed British Ferns (1859), cover of H.B. Dobbie’s New Zealand Ferns (1930) and first print from Peter Orlando Hutchinson’s The Ferns of Sidmouth (1862).
All of these books depict ferns using different, contrasting techniques- all of which fall under the blanket term of nature print. In his work, Heath discusses how his plates of ferns are originally taken from nature prints made through applying a fern to a plate of ink, which is why they appear like negative images of the blank space the fern creates. Then, Heath sent his nature prints to a printing house where they were turned to woodcuts. Moore’s ferns are seemingly direct nature prints, made using different coloured inks applied to the plate the ferns were imprinted onto, then with some additions such as the yellow seeds. The most intriguing aspect of Dobbie’s fern study is its cover, which has a gold embossed fern pressed into its binding. This fern appears exactly like a nature print, meaning a nature print was probably the reference image used by the embosser. Hutchinson’s fern is less detailed than the others. It was made by lithography and the fern was likely not dried out. Each of these techniques creates a different visual way to understand these objects, useful to scientists at the time as well as being aesthetically and historically meaningful to current researchers.
Fig 3: The final page of Henry Smith’s Specimens of nature printing from unprepared plants (1857).
Then, perhaps the most shocking example of nature printing I have found is Henry Smith’s Specimens of nature printing from unprepared plants (1857). This book’s final page is a nature print of a bat’s wingspan. This bat was obviously compressed it could be printed but remains incredibly detailed. From looking online, I have found that Smith’s other works contain other nature prints of animals, including multiple snakes. I find this way of preserving the likeness of animals to be slightly unsettling, yet extremely beautiful and evocative.
During my time researching nature printing in the Bodleian collections, I was granted the privilege of spending a morning at the Bodleian bibliographic press with Richard Lawrence. We decided to experiment with nature printing techniques and printed a variety of items including a leaf and some insects. We used the classic method of imprinting a natural object onto a piece of soft lead, covering this with ink, wiping away the excess, then printing this lead plate.. The Natural History Museum of Oxford were kind enough to provide me with some waste specimens to be used as printing subjects.
Fig 4: Mine and Richard’s nature print of a leaf. From right to left: subject, lead plate, initial print, final print.
We quickly realised that dried leaves were much easier to print than insects. The printing objects needed to be flat and dry to avoid distortion within the press. However, we did manage to make some semi-successful butterfly prints.
Fig 5: Mine and Richard’s Butterfly plate.
This was an incredible process to have the chance to attempt. I now have a newfound respect for the nature printers of the past as this form of printing requires a huge amount of precision and technical skill. On 18 July 2022 visitors will be able to see this fascinating printing method demonstrated as part of the Oxford Botanic Garden programme.
All of the items I have referenced are accessible to order on SOLO and I will include the links to their web pages below. While I hoped to find more examples of nature printing across the many Bodleian collections, I am satisfied with the dozen or so that I managed to successfully locate. However, it is likely that many more examples exist in the collections but have not yet been located or catalogued. Hopefully, in the future, more of these beautiful items will be accessible for further study.
Fig 6: Page from Henry Smith’s Specimens of nature printing from unprepared plants (1857).
Thanks to Matthew Zucker, for the view of a list of his own collection of nature-printed books, and for advice on the history of nature printing.
Hanquart, Nicole and Régine Fabri, ‘L’impression naturelle : une technique originale au service de l’illustration botanique. L’exemple des Chênes de l’Amérique septentrionale en Belgique du Belge Julien Houba (1843-1926)’, In Monte Artium (Journal of the Royal Library of Belgium), vol. 7 (2014), pp. 57-78. <https://www.brepolsonline.net/doi/10.1484/J.IMA.5.103285>
The Bodleian Libraries hold several collections of copper plates dating from the 17th to 19th centuries, amounting to approximately 2000 individual pieces of copper. A brief overview and the available handlists can be found in the LibGuide to printing surfaces.
The majority of these plates were made for book illustrations connected with published scholarship in the sciences, or antiquarian studies. These include the plates to:
Robert Morison, Plantarum historiae universalis Oxoniensis (1680-1699) Martin Lister, Historiae Conchyliorum (1685-1692) Edward Lhyd, Lithophylacii Britannici (1699) Richard Gough, Sepulchral Monuments (1786)
Plates made for a number of other 17th and 18th-century publications survive in the collection of Richard Rawlinson (d. 1755).
Another category of plates are those that were commissioned by Richard Rawlinson (1690-1755) to portray his own collections of other objects, including medieval manuscripts. The Rawlinson collection of copper plates, amounting to some 750 in all and including these commissioned plates, the collected book illustrations and other picture plates, is currently the subject of a doctoral study by Chiara Betti.
Finally, copper plates made for packaging and ephemeral print are held in the John Johnson Collection of Printed Ephemera, under the headings “Copper Plates for Paper Bags” and “Copper Plates for Bookplates”.
The Morison copper plates
Morison Sect. 15 Tab 7, ‘Mosses’
Morison was Professor of Botany at the University of Oxford. The publishing history of his great work has been studied by Scott Mandelbrote. [‘The publication and illustration of Robert Morison’s Plantarum historiae universalis Oxoniensis’, Huntington Library Quarterly, 78 (2015), 349-379.] Over 290 folio-sized plates were preserved for a projected reprint but were then set aside for some centuries before finding use, allegedly, as the counterweight to a lift in the science library.
One of the Morison copper plates with a plant specimen and a proof print.
A project and seminar in 2019 examined the Morison plates by placing these alongside related material surviving in several Oxford institutions, including plant specimens from the Herbarium, proofs of the plates in the Sherardian Library, and prints at the Ashmolean Museum and at the Oxford University Press made by the same engravers, including Michael Burghers, who worked on the plates for the lavishly illustrated, and ruinously expensive, Morison book.
Optical 3D profilometry of an engraved line, by the Laboratory for In-situ Microscopy, University of Oxford
A John Fell grant to the Bodleian Libraries supported Optical 3D profilometry of some sections of the plates, taken by the Laboratory for In-situ Microscopy and Analysis (LIMA), in the Department of Engineering Science. Four days were allocated for the profilometry scanning in January 2019. Examinations were carried out on small portions [c. 4 cm sq, up to 10 cm. sq] of each of the plates. Profilometry enabled close examination of the depth of the engraving marks. Measurements enabled comparison of marks at different parts of the plates. The measurements showed the consistent depth of the lines, the profile of engraved lines (shown in the image) and also demonstrated the raised surface, as expected, of plates from which corrosion had not been cleaned.
The Lister copper plates of shells and molluscs, from drawings by Martin Lister’s daughters, are the subject of a publication by Anna Marie Roos. [Martin Lister and his remarkable daughters: the art of science in the seventeenth century (Oxford, Bodleian Library, 2018)] https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsnr.2011.0053
Many of the illustrations for Lister’s work depict just one specimen. Many plates in the book therefore bear the assembled imprints of several small pieces of copper.
The Rawlinson copper plates
Bodleian Library, Rawlinson Copperplates e.39
During his life, Richard Rawlinson built a collection of 752 printing plates. He commissioned at least one-fourth of them to illustrate his vast collections, while the rest of the plates came from auction sales. The copper plates show a wide range of subjects: portraits, facsimiles of documents, topographical views, coins, medals, and seals.
From the early 1720s, Richard Rawlinson used his engravings as a means to facilitate and spread the knowledge of his collections. Besides commissioning original engravings, the voracious collector attended many auctions of books, art, and copper plates. Thanks to Rawlinson’s meticulously annotated sales catalogues, it has been possible to study the provenance of about 80 of his second-hand copper plates.
The Rawlinson printing plates are now the focus of Chiara Betti’s doctoral project. Her research takes a multidisciplinary approach that brings together book history, printmaking, engineering, and history of collecting. Chiara’s research will shed light on the history and provenance of the Rawlinson plates and their manufacture and use in publications both before and after the antiquary’s death.
The Gough copper plates
Bodleian Library, Gough Copperplates d.102
Among the plates of Richard Gough’s Sepulchral Monuments (1786, 1796) are several images engraved from drawings by the young William Blake. The plates themselves are signed by James Basire but, as argued by Mark Crosby, [‘William Blake in Westminster Abbey, 1774-1777,’ Bodleian Library Record 22:2, October 2009] ‘it was common practice for a master to sign the work of his apprentices,’ and Blake was apprenticed to Basire from 1772.
The John Johnson Collection
As a collection dedicated to printed ephemera and the history of printing, the John Johnson Collection in the Bodleian Library holds a few dozen copper plates which were used to print packaging and for personal printed items such as bookplates and calling-cards. These are probably the most recent in date of the copper plates preserved in Bodleian collections.
John Johnson Collection, Copper plates for paper bags
We are delighted to announce that digital images of over a hundred key manuscripts for the New Testament in Greek at the Bodleian Library are now available through the New Testament Virtual Manuscript Room (NTVMR), hosted by the University of Münster. The research team at the Institute for New Testament Textual Research (INTF) has scanned and transcribed archival microfilms and historic photographs of these collection items.
The NTVMR is an online open collaborative research environment focusing on the textual criticism and research of Greek New Testament manuscripts. The Institute for New Testament Textual Research conceived this platform and continues its development.
There are over 5,600 known Greek New Testament manuscripts. Approximately ninety per cent of these have images available on the NTVMR. The platform was initially designed for editing critical editions of the Greek New Testament, in particular the Editio Critica Maior (ECM). It is open access, which means that anyone with an email address can create an account and begin customizing their own workspace and creating their own projects.
Although the NTVMR hosts high-resolution colour images from many institutions, most of its images are from black and white microfilm resulting from photography expeditions undertaken by INTF staff in the 1960s through 1980s. The new Digital Bodleian image licensing terms waive the former requirement to apply for permission to reproduce Bodleian imagery for non-commercial purposes. This allows the NTVMR to display these images without restrictions under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) licence.
Theodor Mommsen, one of the greatest classicists of the nineteenth century, visited Oxford in March 1889. Legend has it that Mommsen was so keen to work at the Bodleian Library that he stood at the entrance at 7 am, waiting for it to open. He was eager to examine a manuscript of Cassidorus’s Variae (probably MS. Bodl. 96 ) when Edward Nicholson (Bodley’s Librarian 1849-1912) showed him an early composite manuscript that contained Jerome’s translation of Eusebius’s Chronicle, MS. Auct. T. 2. 26. The manuscript had been bought at the Meerman sale in 1824.
(Mommsen made time for modern reading too: he dined with W. Warde Fowler at Lincoln College, who records in an excellent memoir of Mommsen that he had been reading Jane Eyre on his way from Berlin, and spoke of it with enthusiasm. Mommsen was keen to find a copy of Wuthering Heights at an Oxford bookstore.)
Jerome’s translation and expansion of Eusebius’ Chronicle
The composite manuscript proved to be quite extraordinary. Hiding behind a 15th-century addition, it contained an early copy of Jerome’s Latin translation of Eusebius’ Chronicle (Eusebius’ compilation was made in the early 4th century with Jerome’s translation and additions done by c. 380). On fols. 33-145 Mommsen discovered a mid-5th century copy of the text. Without any delay, Mommsen published an article about the discovery of the Oxford manuscript in Hermes 24 (1889) 393-401. Henry Nettleship (Corpus Christi Professor of Latin 1878-1893) had transcribed portions for him.
[click on image to examine] Page from Jerome’s translation of Eusebius’ Chronicle shows the parallel reckoning of various regnal years. Here we can observe that the 6th Olympiad saw Ahaz ruling in Judah, Hoshea over the Israelite Kingdom of Israel, and Alcmaeon and then Charops ruling in Athens. Right at the beginning of the 7th Olympiad we find a note about the foundation of Rome. Bodleian Libraries, MS. Auct. T. 2. 26, fol. 66v (mid-5th century (after 435 or 442), Italian?). Marcellinus Comes, Chronicle
The manuscript yielded also another discovery: on fols. 146-178 there is the earliest known text of the Chronicle of Marcellinus Comes (d. c. 534), copied in the second half of the 6th century. Mommsen went on to edit Marcellinus’ Chronicle in 1894.
[click on image to examine] The beginning of Marcellinus’ Chronicle. Bodleian Libraries, MS. Auct. T. 2. 26, fol. 146r (6th century (after 548), Italian?).The manuscript was correctly dated by the eminent palaeographer and latinist Ludwig Traube, and was reproduced in facsimile by another editor, the distinguished classicist and astronomer John Knight Fotheringham in 1905.
Importance of colour of the text
When Jerome translated Eusebius’s Chronicle into Latin, and brought it up to date, he wrote a preface in which he instructed scribes how to copy the complicated series of parallel columns which enabled readers to date biblical events by reference to events in the history of Egypt, Greece and Rome.
He wrote ‘the history is multiplex, possessing barbarian names, matters unknown to the Latin-speaking peoples, inexplicable numbers, and columns equally interwoven with events and numbers, so that it is almost more difficult to discern the order in which things must be read, than to arrive at an understanding of the meaning.’
‘The variety of colours should also be preserved; lest someone suppose that so great an effort has been attempted for a meaningless pleasure of the eyes, and, when he flees from the tedium of writing, inserts a labyrinth of error. For this has been devised so that the strips of the kingdoms, which had almost been mixed together because of their excessive proximity on the page, might be separated by the distinct indication of bright red, and so that the same hue of colour which earlier parchment pages had used for a kingdom, would also be kept on later ones.’
The work was important not only because of its chronology, enabling readers to date the fall of Troy, the rape of Lucretia, and the birth of Christ, but also because it provided dates for the lives of Greek and Latin authors. The Oxford manuscript is one of the four late antique copies to survive, and though the opening leaves are missing, the other copies are fragments or a palimpsest.* The Oxford manuscript is written in uncial script and has some contemporary slanting marginal annotations.
In 1902, to celebrate the Bodleian tercentenary, Ludwig Traube presented the library with his publication of a facsimile of the fragments of a similar manuscript of the Chronicle which had survived as binding fragments in Leiden, Paris and the Vatican. In his Latin preface he stressed the importance of photography for the study of manuscripts. Traube saw the importance of the age of photography, as he named it, for the study of manuscripts, and hoped for the publication of more full photographic facsimiles of manuscripts. He would have delighted in the number and the quality of digital facsimiles. There is another fairly early copy of Jerome’s translation of Eusebius’s Chronicle in Merton College MS. 315 . This 9th century German manuscript is the oldest book at Merton College and likewise accessible on Digital.Bodleian .
Further reading:
W. Warde Fowler, ‘Theodor Mommsen, His Life and Work,’ History Vol. 2, No. 3 (July-September, 1913), pp. 129-142.
W. Warde Fowler, Reminiscences (1912).
