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December 16, 2025
Manchester Contributes to the Friedberg Genizah Project
A growing resource for Jewish / Ancient World Studies – I see that as well as the digitized images of Genizah collections at Cambridge and Birmingham there are links to related open access journals and pdfs of all the 8 volumes of “Ginzei Kedem” – a Journal devoted to Genizah research and published by the Ben-Zvi Institute.
New College Library’s earliest Bible
Novum Testamentum Graece, Strassburg 1524. New College Library B.r.316.
This Greek New Testament Novum Testamentum Graece, is the earliest Bible held at New College Library.
It was printed in Strassburg in 1524, and in his preface the printer speaks of this edition as the first fruits of his Strassburg press. Combined with the same printer’s Greek Old Testament of 1526 it forms a complete Bible, but this New Testament appears to have been first issued separately.
This New Testament was published in Strassburg during the period that Protestant reformer Martin Bucer was active there. Bucer was part of a significant group of reformers including Matthew Zell and Wolfgang Capito, and he corresponded with the theologians Martin Luther and Huldrych Zwingli. During his time in Strassburg he is known to have taught classes on books of the Bible so may have used a Greek Testament like this one.
This copy has a number of manuscript inscriptions testifying to its former ownership and a printed book plate from James Walker, Christ Church. It is likely to have been donated to New College Library in the early years of its foundation. Part of the Early Bibles Collection, it was catalogued as part of the Funk Cataloguing Projects here at New College Library.
With thanks to our Rare Books cataloguer Finlay West for supplying details of this item.
Top ten tips for finding theses
Postgraduate students often ask me about how to find theses. Unfortunately there’s no single source for information on all theses worldwide.
However here are a few tips that might help …
1. All Divinity theses and post 1984 other University of Edinburgh theses are now catalogued onto the online catalogue. See my earlier blog post for tips on searching for New College theses …
2. Older University of Edinburgh theses are listed in sheaf-binder indexes, which are held in the CRC Research Suite – see the useful CRC Guide to Theses
3. Remember that most University of Edinburgh printed theses are kept as archival copies and can only be read in the Library.
4. The Edinburgh Research Archive (ERA) has full text online versions of all Edinburgh University theses submitted from 2005.
5. Go to the Theses subject guide on the University of Edinburgh Library website to find a gateway to information sources from universities worldwide – such as …
6. [University of Edinburgh restricted] … The Index to Theses database finds details of UK & Ireland theses from 1715- present (no full text)
7. [University of Edinburgh restricted] The Dissertations and Theses database from ProQuest finds details of primarily US & Canada theses. Currently the University of Edinburgh has not subscribed to the full text option, but if you want the full text you could apply for an inter-library loan.
8. New to me is the Networked Library of Theses and Digital Dissertations – SCIRUS Search. This freely available search of public domain theses will include subscribed content from University of Edinburgh subscriptions if you’re on a University network machine, or going through MyEd or VPN at home (No need to alter settings as you would for Google scholar). There’s more full text here than I’d expected.
9. The DART Europe E-Theses portal – at the time of writing, this is offering access to 362030 open access research theses from 523 Universities in 27 European countries.
10. For theses from further afield, you could try the Center for Research Libraries Global Resources Network.
Keeping the faith in wartime
A short New College Act of Remembrance will take place on Friday 9th November at 1pm at the War Memorial in the corridor leading to the Assembly Hall.
Church of Scotland – Committee on Aids to Devotion. Special Services issued during the Great War 1914-1919. New College Library Pamphlets Collection X.X.h.1.1-14
This item from New College Library’s Pamphlets Collections was recently catalogued as part of the Funk Cataloguing Projects. It is a collection of Church orders of services and guides for public prayer in a family or school setting. All the pamphlets date from the First World War Period, ending with a form of Divine service for Remembrance Day on the eleventh of November.The pamphlets and their binding are flimsy and utilitarian but their content bears witness to the cost of war for those at home as well as those out on the front.
Pamphlet X.X.h. 1/2 Form of prayer for schools in time of war, includes the text:
“Throw the shield of Thy protection over all who have gone forth to fight our battles by land or sea or air. We especially remember those near and dear to ourselves.”
The Bible on Film – Film Industry magazines on trial now
On trial now for University of Edinburgh users is the Entertainment Industry Magazine Archive from ProQuest. This archival research resource contains the core US and UK trade magazines covering film, music, broadcasting and theatre, together with film fan magazines and music press titles. Magazines have been scanned cover-to-cover with indexing of all articles, covers, ads and reviews.
This article by Whitney Williams from Variety Magazine Wednesday October 1, 1952, features the plans by Hollywood director Cecil B. de Mille to make another ‘King of Kings’ epic, and William Dieterle is reported as planning to make ‘King Saul’.
University of Edinburgh users can access the trial on the E-resources trials page.
The trial ends on 27 November.
New books at New College Library – November
A new title that has gone straight to the shelves is Religion and the news, edited by Jolyon Mitchell and Owen Gower. Newly published this October, two copies of this book were acquired in support of a number of undergraduate and postgraduate Divinity courses on religion, contemporary culture and the media. One copy can be found in the Reserve Section and one in Standard loan at PN4756 Rel.
New College Library also has a regular display of new books at the far end of the Library Hall, close to the door to the stacks.You can see an regularly updated list of new books for New College Library on the Library Catalogue – choose the New Books Search and limit your search to New College Library. Here’s a quick link to new books arriving in the last few weeks. A word of caution – some of the books listed here may still be in transit between the Main Library (where they are catalogued) and New College Library, so not on the shelf just yet.
The ghosts on the shelves
I
t’s difficult to walk around Stack III, the rare books stack of New College Library, without feeling the weight of history. On these shelves Tyndale rubs shoulders with Calvin, and fifteenth century incunabula are a few steps away from nineteenth century treatises on religion and science. So many of these texts are witnesses of strongly held beliefs, beliefs that changed the religious and the political landscapes of their day. In addition to these historic voices, we can also find the ghosts of former owners and former libraries that have been donated and absorbed into New College Library. Many rare books are inscribed by their owners, and often a succession of owners.
As new books join the ranks on the shelves in New College Library, and are borrowed, read and absorbed into learning, they join in the community of the written word that makes up a library and enter the conversation of scholarship that was begun by the generations before. In the minds of the scholars and students these voices from the past are still watchful, possibly censorious, always listening and still alive.
From Greek to Gaelic
Just over 400 items which together form the Gaelic Collections at New College Library have now been catalogued online and their details can now be browsed online using the shelfmark “Gaelic Coll.” This collection of monographs and pamphlets was put together from various sources, including thirty nine books from the bequest of the Rev. Roderick Macleod.
A contender for the oddest item in New College Library’s Gaelic Collections are a series of works by Thomas Stratton trying to prove the Celtic source of Latin and Greek, including “Proofs of the Celtic origin of a great part of the Greek language”. 1840 ; Gaelic Coll 213 and “Illustrations of the affinity of the Latin language to the Gaelic or Celtic of Scotland”. 1840 Gaelic Coll 213. This copy has a handwritten inscription identifying it as previously belonging to the Library of the Church of Scotland.
With thanks to Patrick Murray, our Gaelic Cataloguer, for supplying details of this item.
Gaelic hymns from the Highlands
Grant, Peter. Dain spioradail. Elgin : Peter Macdonald, bookseller, 1837. New College Library Gaelic Collections 250.
New College Library’s recently catalogued Gaelic Collections contain several editions of “Dain spioradail ” by the celebrated hymn writer Peter Grant.
This edition at Gaelic Coll. 250 is the fifth edition, considerably enlarged and improved from earlier editions. It was published in Elgin, in the highlands of Scotland.
The title page information refers to Grant’s Gaelic name Pàdraig Grannd nan Òran, which means ‘Peter Grant of the songs’. Grant was a Baptist minister, born on 30 January 1783 at Ballintua, Strathspey, Scotland. He was a skilled fiddle player, who was able to set his poems on evangelical themes to well known tunes which were popular into the twentieth century. This work is typical of the works in the Gaelic Collection, which contains many volumes of religious poetry.
With thanks to Patrick Murray, our Gaelic Cataloguer, for supplying details of this item.
Bagpipe music of the Isles
A collection of piobaireachd, or pipe tunes : as verbally taught by the M’Crummen pipers in the Isle of Skye to their apprentices / now published, as taken from John M’Crummen … [by Neil MacLeod, Gesto]. Edinburgh : Printed by Alex. Lawrie & Co., 1828. New College Library Gaelic Collections 137
One particularly interesting and unique item in New College Library’s Gaelic Collections is an instruction book on the bagpipe (in Gaelic Pibroch, or, Ceol mor, or, literally, Big music). Entitled “A collection of piobaireachd, or pipe tunes” it includes ” Canntaireachd notation” which was a way of teaching pibroch using verbal sounds.
At first sight this looks like a collection of texts, but is actually music in the traditional ‘verbal notation’ that pipers used. It was published by Captain Niel MacLeod of Gesto, in Skye and it has a handwritten dedication to Hugh MacQueen, a Writer to the Signet.
With thanks to Patrick Murray, our Gaelic Cataloguer, for supplying details of this item.
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