Rare Books @ NLS

Here’s a book we bought not so much because of what’s in it, but because of who owned it. It’s an English translation of a theological treatise by a French noblewoman, Louise Francoise de la Baume le Blanc, Duchesse de la Valliere (1644-1710), called The penitent lady (NLS shelfmark  AB.1.211.014).  The book itself does not look terribly exciting –

but its author is certainly an interesting figure! Louise Francoise de la Baume le Blanc made her debut at court in 1661 and soon attracted the attention of  King Louis XIV. She became his mistress and bore him four children. However, by 1670 she had lost her place as Louis’ principal mistress, and, after recovering from a serious illness and suffering a crisis of conscience, she decided to renounce her former sinful existence. One of the results of her change of heart was her turning towards writing. In 1671 she published her Reflexions sur la misericorde de Dieu (Reflections on the mercy of God), of which we have now bought a rare English translation.  In 1674 she entered a Carmelite convent in Paris, where she remained for the rest of her life.

This particular copy has an inscription by a former owner, Maurice Paterson (1836-1917), who was the rector of Moray House in Edinburgh, then a Free Church teacher training college. It reads:

“This book belonged to and was much prized by Mrs. Scott, mother of Sir Walter Scott.

Presented by Isabella Paterson step cousin who resided with Aunt Esther who was companion of Mrs. Scott.

Esther Paterson was my father’s half sister.

M. P.”

So, this book once belonged to Anne Scott, Sir Walter Scott’s mother, and had passed into Maurice Paterson’s hands via a step-cousin!

Esther Paterson had nursed Walter Scott’s older brother John through his final illness and then became his mother’s companion for the final years of her life. Anne Scott died in 1819, and Esther Paterson presumably received this book as a token of gratitude for her work.

Walter Scott was certainly grateful to Esther, describing her as a person of ‘uncommon good sense and civility’, who was of ‘inestimable comfort’ to his dear mother.

Further reading:

Sir Walter Scott in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (accessible through NLS Licensed Digital Collections)

H.J.C. Grierson (ed.). The letters of Sir Walter Scott, London, 1932-37. (NLS shelfmark Lit.S.25) Volumes 6 and 7 are particularly interesting here.

January 30th marks 100 years since the death of John Dowden (1840-1910), Episcopal Bishop of Edinburgh and founder of the collection deposited in the National Library which bears his name. The Dowden Collection contains items from Bishop Dowden’s own library which were bought by St Mary’s Cathedral Library after his death as an apt memorial to the scholarly cleric, whose authoritative works on liturgy and Scottish church history included The Celtic Church in Scotland. It was deposited in NLS in 1954.

Dowden’s books reflect his interests, including liturgies from a variety of Christian traditions, books about Scottish church history in general and Episcopalianism in particular, and pamphlets debating the contemporary church debates of his day. There are five incunables in the collection: Baldovinus Sabaudiensis: Ars memoriae (Paris: [Etienne Jehannot], for Geoffroy de Marnef, [about 1497]) is one of only two known surviving copies (shelfmark Dowd.871(1)).

Armorial binding of Alexander Beaton

Dowden’s copy of Francois Duaren: De sacris ecclesiae ministeriis ac beneficiis libri VIII (Paris, 1557), shelfmark Dowd.167, connects him with a Scottish cleric of a past century. It belonged to Alexander Beaton, 16th-century Archdeacon of East Lothian, who had the vellum binding stamped with his coat of arms, as shown in the image here.

You can find a listing of the Dowden collection by searching for the shelfmark ‘Dowd.’ on our main catalogue.

Further Reading:

• Dowden’s biography in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (accessible through NLS digital collections)

What better way to start our blog than with Scotland’s national poet?

Here at the National Library of Scotland, we try to have a comprehensive collection of material by Robert Burns: we have long held such famous books as the Kilmarnock edition – you can read it online at our Digital Archive – but we’re still acquiring new items for our collections.

One book we recently bought is a copy of the Belfast edition of Burns’ poems of 1803. Belfast and Dublin were the first places outside Scotland to reprint his Poems in 1787, and Burns and his poetry had an immense influence across Ireland, particularly in Ulster. This 1803 edition seems to be extremely rare, and the condition of our copy explains why: this book has been read to death by its early owners, who have attempted some homemade repairs.

We know who these owners were, because they have written their names in the front and back endpapers: John and Elizabeth Russell of Newtownards, a small market town in County Down which had been settled by Scots since the Ulster Plantation.

Which brings me to my poem, which I think is in the same hand as John Russell’s signature. On the front free endpaper he has written the following poetic riddle:

Conjoin with a fish that would make a neat dish
What’s Spotted bay, sorrel or Black
Transpose them my friends the[y] will answer your ends
And what I oft wear on my Back
Take two thirds the same and one fifth of a name
Of Diana who Governs the wood
One third of what’s evil or very uncivil
In short sirs, it near will be goo[d?]
A maid that is fair these parts will declare
Now sing it you Dia[n']s famed bards
She’s fair and she’s tender she’s young and she’s sclender
And lives in our fair Newtownards.

I have no idea what the answer is – any ideas will be gratefully received. But I do like the idea of our Ulster author being inspired by Burns to turn his own hand to poetry.

I see that currently the Linenhall Library in Belfast is holding an exhibition about Burns: I wonder if any of their copies show similar evidence of reading?