Manuscript Digest – January 2018– This complimentary e-digest, launched in 2012, covers significant acquisitions and sales, manuscripts lost and found, rare books and ephemera, document conservation, and more.

In the News

Sade-istic Treasure
The Guardian, December 18, 2017
Feared lost in the storming of the Bastille. Once banned in Britain. On the block in the Aristophil auction. Now the Marquis de Sade’s (in)famous scroll is saved for France.
• Top sellers of the French collection

Believe It or Not
Daily Mail, December 17, 2017
Alchemist George Ripley wrote a formula for eternal life. Also for turning lead into gold. Did the formulas work? Not so much. But his scroll turned out to be a goldmine at auction.

Signed by Moonlight
Atlas Obscura, December 22, 2017
Remember Moonlight Graham in Field of Dreams? He played one game in the majors and went into medicine. So where would a baseball autograph collector look for his signature?
• Score! Dream team of 1890s Players League signatures
• Home at last: Long-lost baseball autograph collection

Lone Star
The Telegraph, December 4, 2017
“I want to be alone.” That famous line from Grand Hotel came to define film star Greta Garbo. A cache of letters shows that even stars should be careful what they wish for.

Of Monks and Manuscripts
CBS News | 60 Minutes Overtime, December 24, 2017
Some say the monks of the Dark Ages saved Western civilization. They’re still at it. How a band of brothers is delivering manuscripts from the perils of war, weather, and more.

Greek Is the Word
Smithsonian Magazine, December 11, 2017
The famed Sinai Palimpsests hold layers of secrets, and they keep peeling like an onion. An Italian PhD student has uncovered another lost text — and the name-drops are mic drops.

In the Reads
New York Times, December 19, 2017
If you’ve read Christopher de Hamel’s Meetings With Remarkable Manuscripts, compare notes with the Sunday Book Review. Haven’t read it? Prepare to be illuminated.

Signs of the Times
Hudson Valley One, December 28, 2017
Once upon a time, autograph books were trendy. Say, in the 1500s. Or the Civil War. Or, in some circles, in the 1970s. Why the ups and downs? And what’s taking their place?

Making Their Mark
Washington Post, December 15, 2017
In Star Wars fandom, love is a battlefield. At least it is if you want to score a prized autograph at Comic Con. The Princess Leia effect, and which brand of marker marks the pros.

The End
Otago Daily Times, December 20, 2017
Branwell Brontë left his manuscript of Angria and the Angrians unfinished. Or did he? A scholar has found the end of the tale … and found it at the end of the earth.

Under Cover
Inside Bodleian Libraries’ exhibition “Designing English: Graphics on the Medieval Page”
> Take a peek

Political Cartoons: Documents to Collect?
Why would an art collector be a member — and past president — of the Manuscript Society? Anthony J. Mourek calls political cartoons his passion. He also calls them “historical documents at the intersection of politics, history and art.” Learn more, and download a free chapter of his new book on legendary cartoonist Art Young.