In this ‘Behind the Scenes’ blog post we take a look at one of the volunteer projects that has been ongoing in the Special Collections Division of the University Library. There are several volunteering projects that…
We hope you have enjoyed our 2019 advent calendar! Here are all of the fantastic beasts for you to enjoy.
The composite Persian volume known as the Book of Wonders, deals with natural history and geography. It is made up of the ‘Seven Seas’ section of ‘Aja’ib al-makhluqat wa-ghara’ib al-mawjudat (Marvels of Things Created…
Today, rather than featuring a specific fantastic beast, we are highlighting the gradual. The gradual or graduale was a music book used in liturgy for the choral parts of the mass. Its huge size was to allow up to 4…
Last week we featured a small dragon which comes from our 15th century Rouen Book of Hours (ms38938). This devotional text includes 13 large full-page illuminated miniatures. The margins of these miniatures include…
Though perhaps not strictly a fantastic beast, we had to include the unusual blemmye in this calendar. The blemmye or mythical headless man has been known by various names and is said to inhabit the remotest parts of…
From our wonderful manuscripts, we have four depictions of dragons to share with you. A dragon in our 17th-18th century manuscript copy of “The Book of Wonders of the Age” (ms32(o)). The dragon in our 1605 copy of…
The griffin, griffen or gryphon has the body, legs and tail of a lion and the head and wings of an eagle. As the lion is the king of the beasts and the eagle the king of the birds, griffins were considered powerful…
Mermaids and mermen are mythological sea creatures, usually with bodies that are half human and half fish. Often sighted by sailors, the mythology of mermaids is common to many cultures. The most famous story is…
Following on from last year’s project with Alice and Indre, interns from the School of Mathematics, this year we had two more interns working with us, again under the supervision of Dr Isobel Falconer, Reader in the…