Ian R. M. Mowat, Librarian to the University
Edinburgh University Library is one of the largest and most important academic libraries in the world. While it cannot compete in size of collections with the very largest - Harvard or Cambridge, for example - it has a host of treasures which bring scholars from all over the world to conduct research. Perhaps the finest of all these treasures, visually, is the Rashid al Din illuminated manuscript, History of the World. We were honoured to show this recently to the Crown Prince of Jordan when he visited, as well as Koran which has belonged Tippoo Sahib, the 18th century ruler of Mysore, from whom the East India Company seized the ms in the 18th century. The Crown Prince's wife is descended from Tippoo Sahib but, fortunately, he not only forbore from claiming it back but added to our collection with a gift of more modern material.
Less obviously connected with British imperial history, but of great importance in the history of religious tolerance (or intolerance) is the Bohemian nobles' protest to the Pope against the burning of Jan Hus in 1415. Close to home the Library houses books and papers of great Scottish figures - William Drummond of Hawthornden, who gifted his books to the University, Sir Walter Scott and Hugh McDiarmid. It is a joy to work in a Library whose collections reflect the diversity and richness of the British experience.
From 1827 until 1967, the Library was housed in purpose built premises in Old College - a location, which, in its new guise as a function suite for open lectures and other public occasions, remains perhaps the finest interior in Edinburgh and one of the finest in Britain. Since 1967, the headquarters of the Library has been located in what was, at the time of construction (and may still be) the largest academic library building in Europe. In addition, numerous branch libraries have sprung up to service the needs of the various parts of the campus. The Divinity Library, in New College, this year celebrates the 300th anniversary of the foundation of our oldest class library - the Theology Library - and we were able to show our Chancellor, Price Phillip, the Duke of Edinburgh, some of the early borrowing ledgers when he visited us in July (1998).
Because the twenty one different branches of the Library reach right into the heart of each part of the University, the Library as a whole remains one of the heaviest used in any British University. Although it remains committed to collecting traditional print on paper so long as this is required by a significant element of the user community, the emphasis of current activity is moving ever faster towards an electronic environment. The Library, with the University, participates in co-operative schemes, locally, nationally and internationally, to ensure that an increasing number of journals in electronic format (currently numbered in there hundreds but confidently expected to exceed 1,000 before long) are available to students and researchers at their desks.
In similar vein, the Library has participated in other schemes to make available both catalogue data and the full text of some of its more important materials to users internationally across the network. In this manner, the tradition of the Library in reaching out as closely as possible to it users will be maintained into the future.
Number of visits
since 4 Mar 99
Last updated on
4 Mar 99