The Dundee Bibliotheck, 1599-1724 - (Library of the Written Word) by William Poole (Hardcover)

About the Book

This book reintroduces a lost Scottish library, that of the burgh of Dundee, founded in the late sixteenth century, but destroyed by fire in 1841. A contextual and statistical study is given, followed by a catalogue of the library as it stood in 1724.

Book Synopsis

This book reintroduces a lost Scottish library, that of the burgh of Dundee, founded in the late sixteenth century, but destroyed by fire in 1841. Happily, a catalogue of 1724 has survived, and this edited document forms the centre of this study. A handful of books were also rescued from the flames, and they are presented here. Evidence from council minutes, testaments, legal documents, and the books themselves is all drawn together to reconstruct this landmark but lost institution and its donors. This book also offers a comparative study of Scottish libraries in the period.

About the Author

William Poole is Fellow and Tutor in English, Senior Tutor, and Fellow Librarian of New College, Oxford. He is a literary and intellectual historian and bibliographer, and has published many monographs, articles, and translations, including most recently A Dundee Physician in the Republic of Letters: The Life, Letters, and Poems of Peter Goldman (1587/8-1628) (Boydell, 2024).