Temple of tomes is no tomb – with aim to keep texts open for viewing

Published on Tuesday 15 December 2009 20:21

"BURN but his books," warns Caliban in Shakespeare's The Tempest as he plots to seize power from the conjurer Prospero.

The monster, born of a witch and acknowledged by his magical master as a thing of darkness, tells his fellow conspirators: "Remember first to possess his books; for without them he's but a sot, as I am."

It is a maxim that could be burned into the hearts of librarians and bibliophiles everywhere. Books mean power. It is a belief that underpins the foundation stones of Edinburgh University's library, and even of the university itself. As Dr John Scally, director of the university collections, points out, there is at the very heart of the university's coat of arms an image of an open book.

The importance of the written word cannot be over-estimated. Edinburgh began its collection of books before it officially became a university. Clement Little, a 16th-century advocate, was a keen supporter of an educational establishment for Scotland's capital to rival the already existing Glasgow, St Andrews and Aberdeen universities. He donated his book collection in 1580, two years before Edinburgh was inaugurated as a university.

Both dates are etched in windows overlooking the city, from the library's top floors, where a very special place exists. Here, the lawyer's books still reside in the library's valuable collection, alongside the economist Adam Smith's library, donated by his family after his death. Indeed, much of the university's collection of 300,000 rare and valuable texts came via alumni. All were created before 1850 and take up 30km of shelf space.

They consume the top two floors of the recently refurbished 1960s Basil Spence-designed building, which alone accounted for 15 million of the total 60m refit. The building, in total, houses about 2.8 million books, but it is at the top of the building where the real treasures are kept. Although these literary crown jewels are made of ink and paper rather than diamonds and rubies, they are far more valuable as they have more than financial merit to boast of.

Dr Scally cannot, or will not, put a value on many of the texts he is responsible for in these high-rise vaults. Some of them are unique, in the genuine sense of the word, and literally have no comparison.

An 11th-century collection of psalms is considered the oldest book in Scotland. The pocket-sized psalter is so well crafted, most likely by monks on Iona, that it is believed it could have been made for Queen Margaret, monarch of Scotland at the time. Its only comparator is Ireland's Book of Kells, 300 years older. It is currently on public display for the first time in four decades in a specially designed exhibition room on the George Square library's ground floor, with state-of-the-art security and air-controlled environments in display cases shipped over from experts in Italy.

It is joined by other treasures from Edinburgh's sky-vaults, including a copy of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet printed in the bard's lifetime. Dr Scally's enthusiasm for these rarest of texts is palpable. "It is very, very rare. This may be the only Romeo and Juliet from 1599 in quarto in such good condition."

Scottish poet William Drummond bought the 1599 copy of the play and donated it to the university library in 1626, ten years after Shakespeare's death. It has been owned by the university ever since.

"Just two careful owners," smiles Dr Scally, who points out that Drummond wrote Shakespeare's name on the title page – "in case we wouldn't know who wrote it", he chuckles.

Of course, it is not just literature that is housed here. There are also scientific and medical texts, and religious tomes from the psalter to some of the earliest Islamic manuscripts still in existence, among the 175,000 carefully stored items in 11 windowless strong-rooms with controlled environments at just the perfect temperature.

Dr Scally says: "These books go into the best conditions that exist for these kind of materials. The temperature is perfect so they will be inert – they won't decay."

It is the quality with which they were made that secures their survival, he says. Modern books are made of acid-and-woodpulp, which eventually crumbles, but older books are made of rag paper distilled down and handcrafted.

An air system filters and removes dust, there are no sprinklers and there is what Dr Scally calls a "secure envelope" of space above, below and all around these vaults – with sprinklers – to ensure fire is extinguished before it reaches these spaces. He says emphatically: "No fire will happen in here", in an anti-echo of Caliban's fearful instruction.

Key to these two special floors, which were opened in September 2008 and are known as the Centre for Research Collections, is providing facilities for students and academics and even members of the public to view their contents safely.

"How do we make this stuff available to people?" Dr Scally asks: "It's important for Scotland and the university that we do."

In an inner windowless sanctum, Dr Scally takes me to the room he has nicknamed the Treasure Room, where a selection of immeasurably valuable texts have been laid out on cushions for a private donor at the university who came for a viewing the day before. Among them is a Gaelic tome of Highland medicine beautifully written by hand and bound in black with carved metal hinges, donated by the 16th-century Macbeth medical family. On another cushion lies a copy of Robert Burns's letters, revealing the poet's beautiful handwriting.

Nearby is a 15th-century scroll, in minute but perfectly crafted calligraphy. Written in Middle Scots, it is a charter of land ownership, interestingly in the name of a Katherine Paxton, in an age when women had few rights to property.

A Euclid's geometry uses beautifully handpainted watercolours of a castle to outline angles using a practical everyday example – very Curriculum for Excellence. In a corner of the room quietly sits enlightenment historian Adam Ferguson's writing desk.

"People have looked at these books and handled them for 300 or 400 years," says Dr Scally. What we don't want is for this material to always be in a teaching environment away from the students."

Although his aim is to protect the books, he understands it is pivotal that their knowledge and power are not hidden.

Prospero may have abjured his rough magic and drowned his book "deeper than did ever plummet sound".

But there is no need to fear that the precious words at Edinburgh's university library will drown – and not just because of the lack of sprinklers.