During the pandemic, I dabbled in birding, and ever since, I’ve noticed more and more references to birds across cultural media—from literature to music. With the holiday season fully in swing, I’ve heard “The Twelve Days of Christmas” echoing through stores bedecked with evergreen garlands and festooned with sparkling ornaments. Until this year, though, I …
In 1540, humanist polymath, mathematician, astronomer, and cartographer, professor, and printer, Peter Apian (1495-1552) published one of the most lavishly illustrated scientific books ever printed. Dedicated to German Emperor Charles V and Ferdinand I, King of Bohemia, the Astronomicum Caesareum (Imperial Astronomy) contains 21 volvelles and 58 hand-colored woodcuts that involve some of the most spectacular dragons in the Rare Book and Special Collections Division.
A tiny masterpiece of Flemish illumination, the Warburg Book of Hours in the Rare Book and Special Collections Division recently received a new binding that allows readers to better view some of most beautiful paintings and trompe-l'œil manuscript borders in the Library’s collection.
At the end of the fifteenth century, simplified versions of medical charts featuring an image of the "Zodiac Man" began to appear in Books of Hours. The Lessing J. Rosenwald Collection in the Rare Book and Special Collections Division contains many examples of these printed editions, one of which uses a skeleton in place of the Zodiac Man.
Printed in Basel in 1543, Andreas Vesalius' De Humani Corporis Fabrica is considered to be the first "modern" medical book that emphasizes clinical observation over a dependence on ancient texts. The Library of Congress has recently digitized its copy of De Fabrica, which was part of the generous gift of Lessing J. Rosenwald to the nation.
Rachel Louise Carson (1907-1964), pioneer in environmental awareness and protection, authored her landmark work, Silent Spring, in 1962. This Earth Day post remembers her legacy as an author who wrote to inspire wonder in her readers.
Humans have always been fascinated by eclipses and other astronomical phenomenon. In anticipation of the April 8, 2024 total solar eclipse that will cross the United States, the Rare Book and Special Collections Division presents one small treasure from the collections: a miniature book of 19th-century eclipse photography!
No vegetable splits opinion quite like the Brussels sprout, which caused a disagreement between President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lady Clementine Churchill in the summer of 1944.
The Library of Congress has several important works by the printmaker, painter, and art theorist, Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528), including his famous engraving, Melencolia I (1514), and his Treatise on Measurement (1525).
