Darwin Online has virtually reassembled the naturalist’s personal library
Famed naturalist
Charles Darwin amassed an impressive personal library over the course of his life, much of which was preserved and cataloged upon his death in 1882. But many other items were lost, including more ephemeral items like unbound volumes, pamphlets, journals, clippings, and so forth, often only vaguely referenced in Darwin's own records.
Oil painting by Victor Eustaphieff of Charles Darwin in his study at Down House. One of the many bookcases that made up his extensive personal library is reflected in the mirror
For the last 18 years, the
Darwin Online project has painstakingly scoured all manner of archival records to
reassemble a complete catalog of Darwin's personal library virtually. The project released its complete 300-page online catalog—consisting of 7,400 titles across 13,000 volumes, with links to electronic copies of the works—to mark Darwin's 215th birthday on February 12.
Darwin was a notoriously voracious reader, and Down House was packed with books, scientific journals pamphlets, and magazine clippings that caught his interest. He primarily kept his personal library in his study: an "Old Study" and, after an 1877 addition to the west end of the house, a "New Study." A former governess named Louise Buob described how Darwin's books and papers inevitably spilled "into the hall and corridors, whose walls are covered with books."
The French literary critic Francisque Sarcey remarked in 1880 that the walls of the New Study were concealed "top to bottom" with books, as well as two bookcases in the middle of the study—one filled with books, the other with scientific instruments. This was very much a working library, with well-worn and often tattered books, as opposed to fine leather-bound volumes designed for display. After Darwin died, an appraiser valued the scientific library at just £30 (about £2,000 today) and the entire collection of books at a mere £66 (about £4,400 today).
The two main collections of Darwin's books—amounting to some 1,480 titles—are housed at the University of Cambridge and Down House, respectively, but that number does not include the more ephemeral items referred to in Darwin's own records. According to the folks at Darwin Online, tracking down every single obscure reference to a publication was a case study in diligent detective work.
One of the project's major sources was a handwritten 426-page compilation from 1875, whose abbreviated entries eventually yielded 440 previously unknown titles originally in Darwin's library. They also scoured Darwin's reading notebooks, Emma Darwin's diaries, a 1908 catalog of books donated to Cambridge, and the
Darwin Correspondence (30 volumes in all), as well as historic auction and rare book catalogs.
https://arstechnica.com/science/202...les-darwins-complete-personal-library-online/
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