BRITISH LIBRARY TREASURES GALLERY - LONDON
Rare Books and Manuscripts at St Pancras-Euston
London is full of exhibitions of remarkable things with pricey admissions or long lines, but some of the best sites are free. The British Library is largest repository of books in the world, with a catalogue of upwards of one-hundred seventy million items, with fourteen million books. If reading and research is your goal, a visitor library card registration opens a world of material. If, on the other hand, you’re just a tourist to London with some time to spend before catching a train from St Pancras-Kings Cross or Euston Station, or you have a fascination with historical books and illustrated manuscripts from centuries of the written word, the Treasures Gallery at the British Library is an exhibit well worth exploring, and a free thing to do while in London.
The core of the library’s historical holdings were gathered in the 18th Century from private and royal collections to form a national library, with the King’s Library of George III, the old library of George II, Sir Robert Cotton, Sir Hans Slaone and Robert Harley. The current main modern building of the British Library was opened in 1997 next to the St Pancras Rail station, now the international terminus of the Eurostar. As part of the space, British land developer, Sir John Riblat, endowed the library with an exhibition gallery to house the rare books and original manuscripts of the library’s collections, which until then could only be viewed in limited rounds, with only parts on display at a time. Now, in the Treasures Gallery, a stunning display of the great works that form the culture we know can be seen together.
Just a few of the rare examples of ancient printing and hand copies on display include the earliest known printed book, the Codex Sinaiticus, a Gutenberg Bible dating from 1455, the First Folio of William Shakespeare, a notebook of Leonardo da Vinci, a hand written copy of Handel’s Messiah, Beowolf, the oldest complete copy of the New Testament bible, with stunning illustrated manuscripts of the Lindisfarne Gospels. Favorites of English literature include Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales and Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur, as well as original copies of the works of Jane Austen, Rudyard Kipling, Charles Dickens, Charlotte Bronte and Lewis Carrol. One of the few remaining copies of the Magna Carta has its own exhibit room. There are also examples from Asia including a number of Qu’rans.
Along with the permanent exhibits, the British Library Treasures Gallery presents a rotation of themed exhibitions, like the recent 800th Anniversary of Magna Carta requiring a ticket admission, and beside the books collection is the library’s Philatelic Exhibition with one of the world’s most comprehensive collection of stamps.
Visiting the British Library Sir John Riblat Treasures Gallery
The Treasures Gallery is free and open every day. Open hours are 9:30am to 6pm Monday and Friday, 9:30am to 8 pm Tuesday to Thursday, 9:30am to 5pm Saturday and 11am to 5pm Sundays and Public Holidays. To get there take any underground line to Kings Cross or Euston. Look for the bulbous statue representing Isaac Newton measuring the world, inspired by William Blake, you can’t miss it. © Bargain
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