Associate Professor of the History of Science André-Marie Ampère Recueil d’observations électro-dynamiques Paris, 1822 The Recueil is a landmark book which collects together French physicist André-Marie Ampère’s famous discoveries about the unity of electricity and magnetism. But upon closer inspection it is not quite what it seems. Margins, typeface, and

Francis Lee Higginson Professor of English Literature. Samuel Richardson The Paths of Virtue Delineated London, 1756 This children’s abridgment shrinks all 18 verbose volumes of the novels of the great 18th-century moralist Samuel Richardson into one volume sized for children’s small hands. One of the novels miniaturized here, Pamela, takes

David Woods Kemper ’41 Professor of American History, Harvard College Professor Jared Sparks Notes and memoranda on Benjamin Franklin, 1836-40 In the 1830s, Jared Sparks, the first professor of American history at Harvard, went to see a widow living in Boston, a woman named Jane Mecom Kinsman. She was the

Kuno Francke Professor of German Art & Culture Paradies bei Soest Johannes-Libellus Westphalia, ca. 1380 These leaves are exceptionally rare portions of an illustrated sequence, the rhyming Latin poem which followed the Alleluia at Mass. This particular example alludes to the opening of the Gospel of John. In addition to

Arthur Kingsley Porter Professor of Medieval Latin. Director of the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection Anatole France Le jongleur de Notre-Dame Bâle, 1955 Adaptations of medieval material in modern culture can be fascinating. Le jongleur de Notre-Dame is earliest attested in a beautiful thirteenth-century French poem. First edited in

Donald P. and Katherine B. Loker Professor of English John Leland The laboryouse journey London, 1549 Every scholar will recognize the pathos of this little book: (i) John Leland is writing a grant proposal of sorts, promising his patron Henry VIII that the work is progressing well; (ii) he promises

Gurney Professor of English Literature and Professor of Comparative Literature Charles Eliot Norton Scrapbook and Letters related to the Spanish-American War, 1898 This was the first item I examined in Houghton. It was my freshman year 1969–70; the Vietnam War was raging. In the Freshman Union (itself a tribute to

Alphonse Fletcher, Jr. University Professor Director, Hutchins Center for African & African American Research Phillis Wheatley Poems on various subjects Boston, 1773 Of the 96 slaves shipped from Africa’s Windward Coast to Boston in 1761, 75 survived the Middle Passage. One, a girl named Phillis for the brigantine that had

Ernest Bernbaum Professor of Literature William H. Ireland Miscellaneous papers and legal instruments under the hand and seal of William Shakespeare London, 1796 Samuel Ireland was a minor engraver on the margins of the London art world, an obsessive collector of Shakespeare memorabilia, and, alas, a gullible parent. So thrilled

Adams University Research Professor Emeritus Johann Sebastian Bach Canon for 4 voices Weimer, 1714 This sophisticated riddle canon for four voices (soprano, alto, tenor, and bass) was composed when Bach served from 1708 to 1717 as organist and chamber musician at the ducal court in Weimar. The single leaf on which