Links & Reviews

- I had the great pleasure of attending the Authenticity of Print Materials symposium at the Library of Congress this week, and I've posted a brief(ish) report on the symposium over at the Fine Books Blog. It was a thoroughly remarkable day, and it was a real delight to be able to catch up with so many friends and to hear an excellent series of talks on the symposium's theme.

- One of the key elements of the LC symposium was a presentation by Nick Wilding and Paul Needham on the Martayan Lan Sidereus Nuncius, now known to be a forgery. There was quite a good NYTimes article on this last week, and a piece by Nicholas Schmidle on the same topic will be in this week's New Yorker.

- Mitch Fraas reports at the Fine Books Blog about the dispersal of the John Gilson Howell collection of printed and manuscript bibles, long owned by the Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley, CA.

- Nick Basbanes has an op/ed in this weekend's LATimes, "A paperless society? Not so fast."

- Heather Wolfe has posted on the news that the Folger has received a three-year IMLS grant to fund the creation of EMMO (Early Modern Manuscripts Online), a searchable online database of Folger manuscript transcriptions from 1500-1700.

- From Literary Tourist, an audio interview with Alberto Manguel about his favorite libraries and bookstores.

- As previously reported, the Bay Psalm Book sold at Sotheby's on 26 November for a total of $14.2 million. Some coverage on the sale from NPR, The Telegraph, LATimes, BBC, Boston Globe.

- Over at the ARCA blog, excerpts from WGBH Boston interviews with Gardner Museum Director Anne Hawley and FBI special agent Jeff Kelley. Kelley told reporter Emily Rooney that they essentially know who carried out the theft, and that he believes that the artworks are all still in existence. The FBI and the Gardner have launched a new public effort to recover the art. Hawley told Rooney that immediately following the 1990 theft there were a series of additional threats and extortion attempts against the Museum.

- A major collaborative digitization project between the Bodleian Libraries and the Vatican Library which now live. The project was funded by a $3.2 million grant from the Polonsky Foundation. Coverage from the NYTimes, NPR.

- Travis McDade covers the trend of book and manuscript thieves defending themselves by maintaining that they found the material in the trash.

- Early and un-reprinted works by P.G. Wodehouse have been identified in the archive of Leeds newspaper The Globe and Traveller.

- Seems like we get one of these articles every six months or so, but here's another: author Patricia Cornwell claims to have uncovered new evidence that Jack the Ripper was artist Walter Sickert.

- Over at The Junto this week, a roundtable on the legacy of historian Pauline Maier.

- Booktryst highlighted a copy of the true first edition of Jefferson's Notes which sold for a healthy $269,000 at Christie's this week.

- That Christie's sale brought in a whopping total of $6,743,750, a good chunk of which came from a lavish presentation copy of Newton's Principia to James II, which made $2,517,000 (over estimates of $400,000-600,000). William Morris' Albion Press sold for $233,000. More on the press in the NYTimes.

- Jill Lepore spoke with Joy Horowitz at the LA Review of Books about her new book The Book of Ages.

- The Boston Public Library's Johnson Building will receive a $16 million renovation, the Boston Globe reported this week.

- Former Apple exec Glen Miranker, a fanatic collector of Holmesiana, is profiled in Forbes.

- While in DC this week I also had the tremendous pleasure of enjoying a behind-the-scenes tour at the Folger Shakespeare Library, which is just as exciting as you might think it would be. Among the paintings we saw was "The Infant Shakespeare Attended by Nature and the Passions," or "The Baby Jesus Shakespeare," which Erin Blake blogged about this week at The Collation.

- From Antipodean Footnotes, a profile of a very neat book now in the University of Melbourne Special Collections: a copy of Malcolm Flemyng's An Introduction to Physiology which traveled around the world with Captain Cook on his 1768-71 voyage.

- Jennifer Howard reported for The Chronicle this week that academics who have posted their articles on the social site academia.edu began receiving takedown notices from Elsevir.

- One of the "my year in books" lists that I look most forward to every year is that of Miriam Burstein at The Little Professor. She's posted it here.

- Historian Michael Kammen has died. Read the obituary in the New York Times.

- Rebecca Rego Barry has posted a year-end bookish roundup too, which probably includes a few good additions to your holiday shopping lists.

Reviews

- Alison Weir's Elizabeth of York; review by Roger Boylan in the NYTimes.

- Umberto Eco's The Book of Legendary Lands; review by Robert Douglas-Fairhurst in The Telegraph.

- Simon Garfield's To the Letter; review by Carmela Ciuraru in the NYTimes.

- Leo Damrosch's Swift; review by Jeffrey Collins in the WSJ.

- Yuval Levin's The Great Debate; review by Jack Rakove in the Washington Post.

- Nick Basbanes' On Paper; review by Philip Marchand in the National Post.

- Graham Robb's The Discovery of Middle Earth; review by Wendy Smith in the LATimes.

- Ronald Frame's Havisham; review by Jane Smiley in the NYTimes.

- David Igler's The Great Ocean and Gregory T. Cushman's Guano and the Opening of the Pacific World; review by David Armitage in the TLS.

Bay Psalm Book Sells, Hammer Price $12.5 Million

The Bay Psalm Book has just sold at Sotheby's New York for a hammer price of $12.5 million, a new record price for a printed book but well below the estimate of $15-30 million.

Total price, including buyer's premium, will be $14,165,000. Sotheby's tweeted soon after the sale: "The Bay Psalm Book was purchased by philanthropist David Rubenstein + is destined for exhibitions at libraries across the US".

Previous Bay Psalm Book-related posts.

Boston Recap, and Links & Reviews

This year's Boston Book Fair certainly appeared to be a resounding success, and it was a real pleasure to have the chance to see so many friends and readers of the blog while enjoying the great variety of books on offer at the Fair. It was, of course, also a treat for me to be back in Boston and visit old stomping grounds (including the Brattle and Raven for books).

- It was on the train up to Boston that I learned that the Google Books decision had finally been handed down, and was basically a complete victory for Google on fair use grounds. Read Judge Denny Chin's decision, or read a rundown at Techdirt. Jessamyn West rounded up some excellent links on the decision as well, and there's yet another link collection here. Nathan Raab wrote for Forbes about the impact this decision, suggesting that it will further drive down the prices of used books (I'm not sure I entirely agree).

- Sotheby's will sell the Bay Psalm Book on Tuesday at 7 p.m. EST in New York. See the catalog for a full account of the sale (you'll also be able to watch the sale via that link). Jill Lepore has an op/ed in the NYTimes about the sale today. Harvard has had their copy out for display through 14 December. Richard Davies attended one of the displays of the book in Seattle, and wrote about the experience. Earlier this month James Barron previewed the sale for the NYTimes, with comments from (now former) Old South Church historian Jeff Makholm. Over at Rare Books Digest, speculation on who might buy the Bay Psalm book this week (they suggest it may well be billionaire collector Steve Green).

- In Standpoint, H.R. Woudhuysen writes about the Senate House "Folio Fiasco" and the lessons it offers for librarians. It's an excellent piece; read the whole thing.

- Barry Landau's accomplice Jason Savedoff was released from prison earlier this month, after serving a year of his sentence.

- Over at Plougshares, an interview with Leah Price in their "People of the Book" series.

- In honor of the three-hundredth anniversary of Laurence Sterne's birthday, Karen Harvey posts on the OUP blog about the manuscript history of Tristram Shandy.

- Whitney Trettien discusses her work on a prototype of a digital facsimile "edition" of a Little Gidding Harmony.

- Columbia University has acquired the archive of Granary Books.

- An 18th-century Haggadah up for auction next week could fetch up to £500,000.

- The Seth MacFarlane Collection of the Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan Archive was officially opened at the Library of Congress on 12 November.

- Harvard's Colonial North America project involves digitizing a great deal of manuscript material from across the Harvard library system, reports the Harvard Gazette.

- Making the rounds this weekend, a horrifying post at Tech Technologies documenting the 2010 sale and subsequent dispersal of a Book of Hours by an eBay seller who's been taking the manuscript apart and selling it piecemeal. Scott Gwara passed along a link to Erik Drigsdahl's running list of dismembered manuscripts seen on eBay in recent years.

- The NYPL has acquired Tom Wolfe's papers for $2.15 million.

- Charles Dornan Davis, best known for his role as a major forger of Texas documents, died on 30 September, Everett Wilkie reported on Ex-Libris. See Tom Taylor's book Texfake for a full account of these forgeries; there's also a 1989 New York Times Magazine piece on the events.

- Jenny Lowe posted some updates to the Girolamini theft scandal this week: the Italian culture ministry has brought the church and library complex under the regional network of cultural institutions. The ministry has also pledged €10 to restore the site. Herbert Schauer, of the Munich auction house Zisska & Schauer, was extradited to Italy earlier this month. Trials for the conspirators have been postponed yet again. And ALAI president Fabrizio Govi has called on the Italian government to release a list of the stolen books (which may not be possible given that such a list doesn't seem to exist). Govi adds: "apparently the Italian authorities are not concerned with the production of the forgeries that De Caro has disseminated throughout the antiquarian book marketplace, especially in the United States. Our worry is that, if nobody will investigate further in this field, we will never know who physically produced those forged books, how many are still circulating, and, last but not least, how they were manufactured, in order that we might be better able to recognize them in the future. The apparent disinterest in investigating this process brings up the frightening prospect that these forgeries might continue to proliferate and appear on the market long after the authorities are no longer interested in the stolen books themselves."

- To mark the publication of the three-volume History of Oxford University Press, there were a series of interesting posts by Ian Gadd on the OUP blog: "Before Caxton? Claiming Oxford as England's first printing city", "When did Oxford University Press begin?" They also posted a slideshow of OUP-related images.

- Over at Booktryst, a profile of British type-cutter Richard Austin.

- Just over a year ago I linked to a report that scholars had identified the authors of marginalia in a 1635 Mercator Atlas at the JCB as John and Virginia Ferrar. Now Ferrar Papers editor David Ransome weighs in, suggesting that the writing is not that of Virginia at all, but merely several varieties of John's own handwriting.

- The National Book Awards for 2013 were announced this week.

- Eleanor Catton talked with the NYTimes about her Booker Prize-winning novel The Luminaries.

- New from the Department of Labor: Books that Shaped Work in America.

- Mary Norris blogged about a round of literary "Jeopardy!" at the launch of Tom Nissley's endlessly interested new book A Reader's Book of Days.

Reviews

- Doris Kearns Goodwin's The Bully Pulpit; review by Michiko Kakutani in the NYTimes.

- Arlette Farge's The Allure of the Archives; review by Michael Moore in the LA Review of Books.

- Richard Holmes' Falling Upwards; review by Paul Elie in the NYTimes.

- Nicholas Basbanes' On Paper; review by Peter Lewis at Barnes & Noble Review.

- Denise Spellberg's Thomas Jefferson's Qu'ran; review by Kirk Davis Swinehart in the NYTimes.

- Graham Robb's Discovery of Middle Earth; reviews by Ian Morris in the NYTimes and Wendy Smith in the LATimes.

- Owen Matthews' Glorious Misadventures; review by William Grimes in the NYTimes.

Links & Reviews

- Over at Slate, you an watch an 18-minute silent movie from 1925 about the making of the OED.

- The Internet Archive's San Francisco scanning center was badly damaged by a fire; there were no injuries or loss of material being scanned, though much equipment was destroyed. They're asking for donations to help them recover.

- Amazon brought belly laughs to indie booksellers all over the country this week when they announced that they planned to allow indies to sell Kindles. Melville House collected some of the best responses.

- Eric Kwakkel asks "Where are the scriptoria?" in medieval images.

- The Appendix has launched a new blog series called Magic Lantern, in which they will spotlight a particularly singular image. The inaugural example is an 1870s Japanese woodblock print of Audubon opening a box of his watercolors which had been eaten to pieces by rats.

- From Notabilia, a nice example of a paper ream wrapper being used as a component of pasteboard.

- Anna Baddeley profiled The Public Domain Review in The Guardian this week.

- The November AEMonthly is out; it includes a short piece on the resignation of the Senate House librarian over that attempted sale of Shakespeare Folios.

- Scott Brown of Eureka Books announced his purchase of the remaining stock of Serendipity Books in Berkeley, amounting to some 100,000 items. Much of this will be sold off at bargain sales over the next few weeks.

- ARCA CEO Lynda Albertson has a very thorough essay on the many questions raised by the discovery of a "lost horde" of Nazi-confiscated art.

- The McGregor Fund has pledged $245,000 to allow select materials from the Tracy W. McGregor Library for digitization and online presentation. The grant will also allow for metadata enhancements and other improvements.

- Jordan Goffin, Special Collections Librarian at Providence Public Library, is highlighted in the Bright Young Librarians series over at FB&C.

- Millions of documents from Bletchley Park are to be digitized and made available online.

- As we wait for the Bay Psalm Book sale later this month, the BL's Head of Hispanic Studies points out that there was a press at Mexico City nearly a century earlier and highlights some of the earliest printing in the Americas. And over on the Sotheby's blog, a very worthwhile post on "Printing the Bay Psalm Book."

- The NYTimes published a roundup of authors' views on how the internet has changed storytelling.

- Raymond Scott confessed to the theft of the Durham University First Folio shortly before he was acquitted of the charge, according to a report in the Sunday Sun tabloid. The confession is to be detailed in a book by Mike Kelly, Shakespeare & Love, scheduled for publication later this month (and, it should be noted, Scott told Kelly in a subsequent text message that he was just joking).

- The record for the longest book domino chain was recently broken at the Antwerp Book Fair. Video here.

- The library school program at Southern Connecticut State University has lost its ALA accreditation.

- Nick Basbanes talked to Jackie Atkins about On Paper for The Philadelphia Junto.

Reviews

- Simon Winchester's The Men Who United The States; review by Stephen Mihm in the NYTimes.

- Jill Lepore's Book of Ages; review by Joanna Scutts in the WaPo.

- Keith Houston's Shady Characters; review by Jon Day in the Telegraph.

- Doris Kearns Goodwin's The Bully Pulpit; review by Heather Cox Richardson in the WaPo.

- Tom Standage's Writing on the Wall; review by Frank Rose in the NYTimes.

Links & Reviews

One of these days I will catch up and get back to a regular schedule ...

- There was an appeal hearing this week in the Authors Guild v. HathiTrust case; Kenneth Crews of Columbia attended and has posted his notes.

- From the BBC, a "Living Online" report from the Folger Shakespeare Library on its digitization plans and strategies.

- Our friend George Psalmanazar is profiled by Benjamin Breen in The Appendix (drawn from his JEMH article here).

- There's a new CLIR report, Born Digital: Guidance for Donors, Dealers, and Archival Repositories. Naturally the report is web-only, but it's available for free download here.

- The Albion iron hand press used by William Morris to print the Kelmscott Chaucer will be sold at Christie's New York on 6 December, with an estimate of $100,000-150,000.

- Dan De Simone has been announced as the next Eric Weinmann Librarian at the Folger Shakespeare Library.

- Newly digitized at Penn, a 1785 mss. inventory of Nicola Rossi's collection of early printed books and manuscripts. See also the later printed version [via Mitch Fraas].

- At the Centre for Material Texts blog, Jason Scott-Warren writes about his hunt for the 850 books of Elizabethan reader William Neile.

- Paul Collins' next book will be Blood & Ivy: The True Story of Money, Murder & the Trial That Shocked Harvard, about the Parkman-Webster murder. It'll be published by Norton and out in 2016.

- The DPLA has announced a million-dollar grant program from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to train public librarians in digitization, metadata creation, and digital technologies.

- Joseph Thomas recently wrote a fascinating piece for Slate on why his biography of Shel Silverstein may never see print.

- At Forbes, Tim Worstall on how Barnes & Noble is suddenly Amazon's biggest roadblock when it comes to getting the books they're publishing in front of readers.

- Nick Basbanes talked about his new book On Paper with Britannica editor Gregory McNamee, with Publishers Weekly's Michael M. Jones (here), and on the Diane Rehm Show (here).

- Nigel Beale has posted an interview with Bill Reese on collecting and selling books.

- In The New Yorker, Annette Gordon-Reed discusses the new "12 Years a Slave" movie and slave narratives as historical evidence.

- A Chicago man who discovered papers related to Richard T. Greener (the first black graduate of Harvard) told a Chicago newspaper that he would "roast and burn" the papers if Harvard didn't offer more money for them.

- The Getty Research Institute has released another 5,400 artwork images into its Open Content Program (bringing the total up to 10,000+).

- The Guardian is running a series of essays on "The 100 Best Novels," which so far have been very much worth reading.

- SHARP seeks editors for Book History.

- Peter Kirwan, an editor for a new volume titled Collaborative Plays by William Shakespeare & Others, writes very cogently about what the volume is designed to do and present.

- Houghton Library curator John Overholt recently appeared on the "You're the Expert" podcast, which makes for highly entertaining listening.

- Robert Darnton discussed "the future of books" with Memphis Flyer reporter Leonard Gill.

- New at Houghton, Kepler's Ad Rerum Coelestium Amatores Universos, the rarest of Kepler's works (just four copies are known).

- APHA has launched a blog on its new homepage. Recommended (even if it does not, at the moment, appear to be RSS-able, which is a bummer, and on which I will be happy to be corrected if someone can send me the feed URL Update: feed is at http://printinghistory.org/feed/).

- There's a new (and quite nice) version of the USTC site. More from Jim Hinck here.

- From Mitch Fraas at Mapping Books, an early look at mapping library markings from looted books.

- Denise Spellberg talked to NPR recently about her book Thomas Jefferson's Qu'ran.

- Keith Houston, whose book Shady Characters I enjoyed very much this fall, has announced that he's now at work on The Book: A Cover to Cover Exploration of the Most Powerful Object of Our Time (to be published by Norton in 2015).

- At Medieval Fragments, a few treasure bindings to feast your eyes upon.

- The University of Melbourne has purchased the literary archives of Germaine Greer for ~$3 million, with proceeds going to rainforest restoration efforts.

- New at AAS, the only(?) issue of The Franklin, an early Washington periodical flop.

- From Jordan Goffin at Notes for Bibliophiles, an excellent reminder that, as he writes, "rare materials require the use of all five senses."

- Rebecca Rego Barry highlights the publication of An Inspiration to All Who Enter: Fifty Works from Yale University's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library (Yale University Press).

- The University of Illinois has acquired the literary archives of Gwendolyn Brooks.

- At Manuscript Road Trip, a consideration of Otto Ege and his biblioclasm.

- Irene O'Daly writes on images of medieval scribes at work over at Medieval Fragments.

- From the Bright Young Librarians series, Meghan Constantinou of the Grolier Club and Jordan Goffin of the Providence Public Library.

- Over at Typefoundry, James Mosley explores the history of @.

- New at Exeter Working Papers in Book History, a series of posts outlining the library contents of Sabine Baring-Gould.

- Jennifer Schuessler covered the launch of the Emily Dickinson Archive, including a look at the continuing tensions between Amherst and Harvard over the Dickinson materials in their collections. More on that from Sarah Schweitzer in the Boston Globe.

- McGill University has launched an exhibit to display select items from the J. Patrick Lee Collection of Voltaire, newly acquired by the university library.

- At Booktryst, a look at the manuscript of George Washington's Thanksgiving Proclamation, going on the block at Christie's on 14 November.

- In The New Yorker, Paul Collins examines what may be some early Poe works through the lens of computer-based textual analysis.

- Reading Copy asked booksellers Bill Reese and Allen Stypeck for their predictions about the Bay Psalm Book sale on 26 November. In a later post, Richard Davies asks "Who Will Buy the Bay Psalm Book?"

- The Letterform Archive is fundraising (via Kickstarter) for what looks like a very cool 2014 calendar.

- Ron Charles highlights the launch of the new Shelley-Godwin Archive. More here from the NYTimes.

Reviews

- Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries; review by Janet Maslin in the NYTimes.

- Alan Jacobs' The Book of Common Prayer; review by Adam Shields at Bookwi.se.

- A. Scott Berg's Wilson; review by Hector Tobar in the LATimes.

- Miles Hollingworth's St. Augustine of Hippo; review by Cole Moreton in the Telegraph.

- James WP Campbell's The Library: A World History; review by Clive Aslet in the Telegraph.

- Jeff Greenfield's If Kennedy Lived; reviews by H.W. Brands in the WaPo and John Timpane in the Philly Inquirer.

- Nick Basbanes' On Paper; review by Helen Gallagher in the New York Journal of Books.

- Jill Lepore's Book of Ages; review by Mary Beth Norton in the NYTimes.

- Richard A. Serrano's Last of the Blue and Gray; review by Scott Martelle in the LATimes.

Bay Psalm Book Sale Date Set

Sotheby's announced this morning that they will sell the Old South Church Bay Psalm Book on 26 November in New York. They've placed an estimate of $15-30 million on the volume.

The Bay Psalm Book will be displayed at Sotheby's New York from 12-14 April before being exhibited around the country in the coming months. From 18 November through the sale it will again be on display in New York. The press release indicates that a schedule will soon be posted at http://www.sothebys.com/baypsalmbook.

The church membership voted in December to sell the book, one of two copies still in its possession (of an original five which came to the church through the bequest of Rev. Thomas Prince).

For more on the extant Bay Psalm Book copies, see my November post: The Bay Psalm Book of 1640: Where Are They Now?

Links & Reviews

Happening recently:

- Matthew Haley has been appointed head of Books, Maps, and Manuscripts for the UK wing of Bonhams, after four years in New York as a specialist in fine books for the auction house (during which time he also launched the annual Space History Sale for Bonhams). Congratulations to Matthew on this appointment!

- Bookseller Ken Karmiole has established a $100,000 endowment at UCLA to fund archival studies and lectures in the field.

- From the Rare Book Cataloging at Penn, blog, a student worker's perspective on jumping into the world of cataloging.

- The AE Monthly for January is up: it includes Michael Stillman's annual look at the top 500 auction items for 2012, a discussion of the recent Graham Arader sale and a piece on the Old South Bay Psalm Book decision by Bruce McKinney, among other articles.

- Reporting for the WSJ this week, Barry Newman explores the market for authors' archives, highlighting bookseller Ken Lopez and the recent acquisition by Yale of the papers of N. Scott Momaday.

- The British tabloid The Sunday Sun reports that authorities will hold an inquest into the apparent suicide of book thief Raymond Scott.

Reviews

- G. Thomas Tanselle's Book-Jackets: Their History, Form, and Use; review by Robin at Bookride.

- John Glassie's A Man of Misconceptions; review by Jad Abumrad in the NYTimes. Reviewed jointly with Lawrence M. Principe's The Secrets of Alchemy and John Freely's Before Galileo by Laura J. Snyder in the WSJ.

- Bernard Bailyn's The Barbarous Years; review by Charles C. Mann in the NYTimes.

- Simon Garfield's On the Map; review by Simon Winchester in the WaPo.

- Stephane Gerson's Nostradamus; review by Joshua Blu Buhs in the WaPo.

More on the Bay Psalm Book Sale

A couple additional items of interest relating to the now-probable sale of one of two remaining copies of the 1640 Bay Psalm Book belonging to Boston's Old South Church.

On 25 December the New York Times ran a report by Jess Bidgood on the decision to sell one of the Old South copies; the article features comments by Rare Book School director Michael Suarez.

And from the "oldie but goodie" department, there's a 22 November 1954 LIFE article on the removal of the other three copies from the Prince Library, headlined "A Very Proper Swindle."

Old South Church to Sell Bay Psalm Book

The members of Boston's Old South Church have voted 271-34 to sell one of the two copies of the 1640 Bay Psalm Book belonging to the church (on deposit at the Boston Public Library since 1866). The congregation also voted 252-69 to sell the church's collection of colonial silver (currently at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston).

This will be the first time since 1947 that a 1640 Bay Psalm book is sold, and the first time since 1966 that a copy changes hands.

More from WBUR.

For more on the known copies of the Bay Psalm Book, see my post from Friday.

[Update: The Boston Globe has more on today's meeting which resulted in the vote to sell the Psalm Book: they report that the meeting lasted for almost two hours of discussion, and that amendments to the sale proposals limit the window for selling the book and silver to ten years.]

The Bay Psalm Book of 1640: Where Are They Now?

With the reports today (WBUR, Boston Globe) that the leadership of Boston's Old South Church is considering the sale of one of its two copies of the 1640 Bay Psalm Book, I thought it was worth taking a look at the eleven known copies. If one of the Old South/BPL copies is sold, it will be the first time since 1947 that a first edition has come to auction, and would be the first time a copy could potentially return to private hands.

A census and account of copies is given in Wilberforce Eames' introduction to The Bay Psalm Book: Being a facsimile Reprint of the First Edition, Printed by Stephen Daye At Cambridge, in New England in 1640. New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1903. Another census appears in Nathaniel B Shurtleff and Bradford F. Swan, "Some Thoughts on the Bay Psalm Book of 1640: with a Census of Copies." Yale University Library Gazette 22:3 (January 1948), 51-76. Since they provide good historical background, Eames' comments on each copy are given below, and I have added updates (both from Shurtleff and Swan and other sources) as needed. Additions/corrections are welcome! [Update: Note that the Sotheby's catalog for the 26 November 2013 sale also contains a detailed census]

1. John Carter Brown Library - Of this copy Eames writes "Perfect, but with a small portion of the blank margin of the title-page and the lower blank margin of the leaf of errata cut out; in the original old calf binding, rebacked. Size of leaf, six inches and seven-eighths by four inches and one-half. It was first owned by Richard Mather, one of the translators, whose autograph signature is in several places on the fly leaves and covers. From the Mather family it passed to the Rev. Thomas Prince, the bookplate of whose 'New England Library' is pasted on the back of the title. By Prince it was bequeathed to the Old South Church, in his will dated October 2, 1758, 'and from that time till 1860, the book remained in the custody of the deacons and pastors of that church. In that year it was given by the church, through the proper agents, to the late Nathaniel Bradstreet Shurtleff, M.D.' On Dr. Shurtleff's death his library was offered for sale at auction by Leonard & Co., Boston, November 30 to December 2, 1875, but the Psalm Book was withdrawn because the deacons of the Old South Church obtained an injunction to prevent its sale. After a hearing before the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, the injunction was dissolved and the book adjudged to belong to Dr. Shurtleff's estate. It was therefore advertised again, in a four-page circular, to be sold at auction, on October 12, 1876, by Joseph Leonard; and it was sold for $1025, to Mr. Sidney S. Rider of Providence, from whom it was bought by Mr. Caleb Fiske Harris. After the death of Mr. Harris, who was drowned in October, 1881, his collection was placed for sale in Mr. Rider's hands, and he sold the Psalm Books of 1640 and 1647 to the Brown Library, $1500 being given for them together with books worth considerable more. See Catalogue of the Library of Dr. N.B. Shurtleff (1875), no. 1356; Catalogue of Books relating to North and South America in the Library of the late John Carter Brown, part 2 (1882), pp. 201-202; Victor H. Paltsits in the Library Collector, December 1901, p. 70."

Shurtleff obtained his copy of the Bay Psalm Book via Old South deacon Loring Lothrop. On 30 December 1859 Shurtleff wrote to Lothrop: "My Dear Sir: I am very desirous of obtaining one of the duplicate copies of the old Bay Psalm Book belonging to the Old South Church Library, having a strong veneration for the old volume. I think I have books in my library, such as would be not only appropriate for the Library of the Old South Church but also valuable for reference and for the use of those who may rely upon the library for works suitable to be consulted. Among the books which I happen to think of are the original edition of Winthrop's New England and Belknap's New England Biography ... which I would gladly give in exchange [for] one of the duplicates ... " The books are inscribed "Given to the Prince Library of the 'Old South Society' of Boston, Mass., by Nathaniel B. Shurtleff, M.D., in exchange for the 'Bay State Psalms.' Boston, Jan. 11, 1860."

In the 1950s, BPL librarian Zoltán Harastzi explored whether this copy might be returned, telling LIFE in 1954 that he had asked to examine the files from the 1875 court case. "After a considerable search, the clerk located the old file and handed it to me. It contained about a dozen documents, summonses, briefs, affidavits—and that amazing letter of Shurtleff's to Lothrop. I don't believe anyone else has looked at the file since it was put away 79 years ago. Of course I should have known how the case turned out even before I looked at it. The deacons were too late—the statute of limitations had run."

Some additional notes on this copy: the blank leaf preceding the title page includes various Richard Mather signatures and other ink notations, possibly in several hands, on the recto. The verso includes additional ownership inscriptions by Mather, as well as a shelfmark [presumably Prince's]: "10.4.9." Below this, in ink: "Oct. 10. 1848. Examind this book by the catch word of every leaf and believe it to be complete. S.T.A." STA was Samuel T. Armstrong, a deacon of Old South Church. On verso of title page is the bookplate of the New England Library, with printed text "This Book belongs to The New-England-Library, Begun to be collected by Thomas Prince, upon his entring Harvard-College, July 6. 1703 ; and was given by said Prince, to remain therein for ever."

On leaf B1v the first line of Psalm 9:1, "the" in the text is lined through and "thee" written in the left margin. On leaf C4v at the first line of Psalm 15:31 is a smudged correction in ink, the only readable text being "(3)". On leaf D2r at Psalm 19:13, "let thou kept back" in the text is lined through, corrected to "kept back out" in ink. On leaf D3v at Psalm 21:8, "The Lord" in the text is lined through, corrected to "Thy hand" in ink. On leaf E1r at Psalm 22:23, "prayse yee," in the text is lined through, corrected to "do yee" in ink. On leaf L3v at line four of Psalm 50:7, "I" in the text is lined through, corrected to "God" in ink.  On leaf S2v at line three of Psalm 76:10, "earth" in the text is lined through, corrected to "wrath" in ink. On leaf Dd3v at line two of Psalm 113:5, "earth" in the text is lined through, corrected to "high" in ink. On leaf Kk2v at Psalm 143:6, "I even" in the text is lined through, corrected to "Moreover" in ink.

As noted, the lower half of the errata leaf is wanting. On the recto of the blank leaf following the errata leaf, of which a portion is also missing, is a notation in ink: "Aristotle sayd yt man was the [?], the [?] of [?] Image of Inconstancy the tryall of Envy & misery ; And all the rest of man flem & coeler". Various pen tests and other marks on the verso of the same leaf.

Chain of Provenance: Richard Mather - Mather family (likely Samuel, Increase, Cotton) - Thomas Prince - Old South Church - Nathaniel Bradstreet Shurtleff - Sidney S. Rider - Caleb Fiske Harris - Sidney S. Rider - John Carter Brown - John Carter Brown Library.

This copy was recently featured in Slate, and a full scan is available here.

2. Yale University Library - Eames knew this as the Vanderbilt copy, and describes it this way: "Perfect. It is one of the five copies bequeathed by Thomas Prince in 1758 to the Old South Church, from whose collection is passed by exchange, between the years 1850 and 1860, to Edward A. Crowninshield ... . In the catalogue of Mr. Crowninshield's library, announced to be sold at auction by Leonard & Co., Boston, in November, 1859, the book is described as 'in the original old vellum binding.' The whole library, however, was withdrawn, and sold at private sale for $10,000 to Mr. Henry Stevens, who took it to London, where the Psalm Book was offered to the British Museum for £150. Its purchase not being approved, the book was withdrawn by Mr. Stevens, and after being rebound by F[rancis]. Bedford in 'dark brown crushed levant morocco,' was sold in 1868 to Mr. George Brinley of Hartford, for 150 guineas. At the Brinley sale in March, 1879, it was bought for the late Mr. Cornelius Vanderbilt for $1200. The statements in the Memorial History of Boston, vol. I (1880) and in the Catalogue of the John Carter Brown Library, part 2 (1882), that this copy was destroyed in a warehouse fire in New York, not long after its purchase by Mr. Vanderbilt, are both incorrect. Mrs. Vanderbilt writes that the book now belongs to her, and that it has never been injured in any fire. See Catalogue of the Valuable Private Library of the late Edward A. Crowninshield (1859), no. 878; Brinley Catalogue, part I (1878, sold 1879), no. 847; Stevens, Recollections of Mr. James Lenox (1886), pp. 61-63."

Shurtleff and Swan report that the book probably was exchanged with Crowinshield prior to 1850. It remained in the Vanderbilt family until its sale at Parke-Bernet Galleries on 28 January 1947 for $151,000 to the Rosenbach Company. The copy was purchased for Yale University by a "group of alumni and friends," as announced in September 1947. They note that there have been minor repairs at the outer margins of signatures Kk and Ll. An account of the 1947 sale of this copy (and of the transfer of the other Old South copies) is included in the 22 November 1954 issue of LIFE, under the headline "A Very Proper Swindle".

The Sotheby's census notes that this copy was acquired by Old South Church before 1750, and does not attribute ownership to Thomas Prince.

Yale Catalog Record.

Chain of Provenance: Old South Church - Edward A. Crowninshield - Henry Stevens - George Brinley - Cornelius Vanderbilt - Alice Gywnne Vanderbilt - Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney & her estate trust - Rosenbach Company - Yale University.

3. Boston Public Library Copy 1 - From the Catalogue of the Prince Library: "Has the book-plate of the 'New England Library' ... a small part of [leaf] Ee supplied in manuscript, and is otherwise complete." "Old South Church Library" stamped in gold on front board. "Thomas Prince Library In the Custody of the Boston Public Library" bookplate on front pastedown, with shelfmark H.21.14. Shelfmark written in blue pencil on verso of added front flyleaf. On recto of the blank leaf preceding the title page, a shelfmark [presumably Prince's] near the top in ink: "10.4.8" and below this "O.S. 132." In ink lower on the page is a citation from Cotton Mather's Magnalia Christi Americana: "'About the year 1639, the New English Reformers ... resolving upon a New Translation [of the Psalms], the chief Divines in the country took each of them a portion to be translated: among whom were Mr Weld & Mr Eliot of Roxbury & Mr Mather of Dorchester. ... The Psalms thus turn'd into Metre were printed at Cambridge in the year 1640.' Magnalia, III.100." On verso of title page, Prince's ownership inscription: "T. Prince. Milton. Apr. 9 & 10. 1728" [astronomical notations appear above the dates]. Below this is the bookplate of the New England Library, with printed text "This Book belongs to The New-England-Library, Begun to be collected by Thomas Prince, upon his entring Harvard-College, July 6. 1703 ; and was given by" with addition in manuscript "said Prince in his last will Oct. 2. 1758 to remain in said Library forever." See an image of Prince's inscription and bookplate from this leaf here.

On leaf **2r, in the preface, the following section of the text is underlined in ink: "it hath beene one part of our religious care and faithfull indeavour, to keepe close to the originall text." A marginal bracket in ink has been added to the text from the final, partial paragraph on leaf **2r through the end of the first full paragraph on leaf **3r. The phrase "a paraphrase" is underlined in ink on leaf **2v. On leaf A1r several notations to later changes are indicated in ink: the second line of Psalm 1:5, "rise to stand in the doome," in the text, is glossed "stand upright in ye Doom. 1647". Below the text, in ink: "All the Rest of this Psalm as in 1647. But the next edition ^after 1647^ greatly amended." On leaf A2r, at the end of Psalm 2 is added in ink "[all ye same in 1647.]" The second line of Psalm 3:6, "ten thousand" in the text, is glossed "ten thousands in 1647." On leaf A2v, at the end of Psalm 4, "all the same in 1647." Foliation notation on leaf Aa4v, in pencil at the top corner, "fo. 100." The missing portion of leaf Ee, noted in the Prince Catalogue as being supplied in manuscript, no longer has the manuscript portion present (a portion of the text from the lower half of the leaf is missing). On the verso of a later rear endleaf, in pencil: "Ee defective; otherwise perfect."

This is Shurtleff and Swan's BPL Copy A; they note that its condition "entitles this copy to a much higher ranking than is ordinarily given to the volume, which has all too often been passed over with the simple notation that it is 'slightly imperfect.' A full scan of this copy is available here.

Chain of Provenance: Thomas Prince - Old South Church - Boston Public Library.

4. Boston Public Library Copy 2 - From the Catalogue of the Prince Library: "[C]omplete, with the exception of a slight mutilation of the 'Finis' leaf, and the absence of the following leaf, which contains on the recto a list of 'Faults escaped in printing.'" These are Ll3 and Ll4. Contains the following inscription on the flyleaf: "This book was bound at the cost of Mr. Ed. Crowninshield and given in exchange for No. 259 in the catalog. Jan. 1850. STA." See entry 1 for another Armstrong note. No. 259 in the catalog of the Prince collection is the notation for the copy of the Bay Psalm Book Crowninshield received [entry 2]. This copy is Shurtleff and Swan's BPL Copy B, and they note that its "defects, especially the [missing leaf] are serious, but the copy is still worthy of a higher rating for condition than is commonly given it." The noted errata, with one exception, have been corrected in manuscript, and the first verse of Psalm 100 (Z4v) has a contemporary manuscript edit. The reiteration of sheet D is noted by the addition in manuscript of "miss 2 leaves" at the foot of D1r and D4r, and "Turn back a leafe" on D3r and D2r. This is item 112 in the 1847 Prince Library catalog, and bears the shelfmark 10.4.11 in ink on the title page.

This is the copy currently being considered for sale by the Old South Church.

Eames: "Both slightly imperfect, and both in modern binding. These are the two remaining copies of the five originally given by Thomas Prince to the Old South Church in Boston. In 1866 they were deposited with the rest of the collection in the Boston Public Library. For both BPL copies, see Catalogue of the American Portion of the Library of the Rev. Thomas Prince (1868), p. 16; and The Prince Library, A Catalogue of the Collection of Books and Manuscripts (1870), p. 7. Shurtleff and Swan add: "It has been said that the modern bindings were put on these two copies as part of the payment involved in the exchanges by which the other three copies passed to Messrs. Shurtleff, Crowninshield, and Livermore [entries 1, 2, and 10]. If this is the case, it is perhaps more to be deplored than that duplicates were allowed to leave the Prince collection."

Chain of Provenance: Stephen Northup - Old South Church (possibly via Joseph Sewall) - Boston Public Library.

5. Bodleian Library - Eames: "'The copy in the Bodleian is perfect. It formerly belonged to Bishop [Thomas] Tanner.'" — Cotton's Editions of the Bible (1852), p. 177. Bishop Tanner died  December 14, 1735; and by his will, dated November 22, 1733, he bequeathed his manuscripts and books to the Bodleian. 'Unfortuantely, when Tanner was removing his books from Norwich to Oxford, in December, 1731, by some accident in their transit (which was made by river) they fell into the water, and were submerged for twenty hours. The effects of this soaking are only too evident upon many of them. The whole of the printed books were uniformly bound in dark green calf, apparently about fifty years ago; the binder's work was well done, but unhappily all the fly-leaves, many of which would doubtless have afforded something of interest, with regard to the books and their former possessors, were removed.' — Macray's Annals of the Bodleian Library (1868), pp. 155-156. See the Caxton Celebration Catalogue (1877), p. 165; Stevens's Bibles in the Caxton Exhibition (1878), p. 117."

Bodleian Catalog Record.

Chain of Provenance: Thomas Tanner - Bodleian Library.

6. New York Public Library - "Slightly imperfect, the upper corner of leaf G being torn off, taking away portions of three lines on both sides; in modern binding. Size of leaf, seven inches and one-sixteenth by four inches and three-quarters. This copy turned up at the sale of the Fourth and concluding portion of the extensive and valuable collection of books, formed by the late Mr. William Pickering, of Piccadilly, bookseller, at Sotheby & Wilkinson's auction rooms, London, on Jan. 12, 1855, in a lot [with other early psalm books]. The lot was bought by Mr. Henry Stevens for £2 18s. On examining the book, Mr. Stevens, discovered that twelve leaves (sheets W, X, and Y) were lacking, having been left out by the original binder. These twelve leaves were finally obtained from Mr. Livermore's copy [see entry 11 below], and after being mended and re-margined, they were inserted in this copy; the book was rebound in red morocco by F[rancis] Bedford, and was then sold by Mr. Stevens to Mr. Lenox for £80. See Stevens, Recollections of Mr. James Lenox (1886), pp. 57-62, where, besides the error in stating the wrong number of leaves found lacking in this copy, an error is also made in referring to the wrong number in the Pickering sale catalogue... ."

NYPL Catalog Record.

Chain of Provenance: William Pickering - Henry Stevens - James Lenox - Lenox Library - New York Public Library.

7. Henry E. Huntington Library - This was, when Eames wrote, in the possession of Mr. E. Dwight Church of Brooklyn. "In the original old calf binding; lacking the first four and the last three leaves, which were supplied later in facsimile. Size of leaf, seven inches (nearly) by four inches and five-eighths. Accompanying the book is a manuscript note of which the following is an extract: 'It belonged to the Shuttleworth family, & is now handed down to my daughter Sophia S. Simpson, to be used at her own discretion, by her beloved mother. Sarah Shuttleworth, 1844.' About the year 1872 it was bought by the late T. O. H. P. Burnham, of the 'Antique Bookstore' in Boston, not knowing at the time exactly what it was. Years afterwards, on comparison by Mr. R. C. Lichtenstein with the 1640 edition in the Public Library, it was found to be a genuine copy of that edition. In August, 1892, it was sold to the late Bishop John F. Hurst, of Washington, D.C., and in February, 1903, shortly before his death, it was bought by Messrs. Dodd, Mead & Co., from whom it passed to the present owner."

Shurtleff and Swan note that the copy includes signatures of Rev. John Cotton, John Dothirk, and Ann Dowding. The copy was advertised for sale by Dodd, Mead & Co. for $4,000 in April, 1903, when it was purchased by Church. It was used to make the plates for the facsimile edition of 1903 for which Eames wrote the introduction. Henry E. Huntington purchased the book as part of a 2,000-volume portion of the Church collection in 1911, and it remains in the library which bears his name.

The Huntington Library gives John Dethicke (rather than Dothick) as one of the inscribers, and does not mention John Cotton.

Huntington Library Catalog Record.

Chain of Provenance: John Cotton? - John Dothirk or Dethicke? - Ann Dowding? - Shuttleworth family - Sophia S. Simpson - T. O. H. P. Burnham - John F. Hurst - Dodd, Mead & Co. - E. Dwight Church - Henry E. Huntington - Huntington Library.

8. Harvard University Library - Eames: "Imperfect, lacking the first six leaves and the last four leaves; re-bound in October, 1900. The book was given to Harvard College Library in October, 1764, by Middlecott Cooke, of Boston, a graduate of the Class of 1723. See Catalogue of the Library of Harvard University, vol. 2 (1830), p. 679; and information from William C. Lane, the librarian." With a manuscript correction on W4r, changing "this man" to "himselfe". Signature of John Leverett on N1v.

Shurtleff and Swan note that Cooke's gift was probably to replace an earlier Harvard copy, likely destroyed in the library fire of January, 1764.

The Houghton Library record notes that the missing leaves are supplied in type-facsimile, and that the book is bound in modern black morocco. Haraszti notes that the rebinding occurred in 1900.

Houghton Library Catalog Record.

Chain of Provenance: John Leverett - Middlecott Cooke - Harvard College.

9. American Antiquarian Society - Of this copy, Eames writes: "Imperfect, lacking the title-page and the leaf of errata at the end; in the 'original vellum binding.' 'The upper portion of next to last leaf is torn and a corner from the first page of the Preface.' It was given to the American Antiquarian Society by Isaiah Thomas, whose book-plate is in the volume. On one of the fly leaves Mr. Thomas has written the following note: 'After advertising for another copy of this book, and making enquiry in many places in New England, &c. I was not able to obtain or even to hear of another. This copy is therefore invaluable, and must be preserved with the greatest care. It is in the original binding. I. T. Sept. 28th, 1820." See Catalogue of Books in the Library of the American Antiquarian Society (1837), p. 43 of letter P; and information from Mr. Edmund M. Barton, the librarian."

This is the copy mentioned by Thomas in his 1810 History of Printing in America as being in the collection of Rev. William Bentley of Salem, acquired by Thomas after Benthley's death.

The Sotheby's census notes that this copy is indicated in Bentley's "Book Accounts" as being purchased 15 May 1804 at Peabody's among "A Lot of old Books" for 36 cents, and prints certain correspondence about the volume between Thomas and Bentley.

The AAS catalog notes that the missing leaves are supplied in facsimile.

AAS Catalog Record.

Chain of Provenance: William Bentley - Isaiah Thomas - American Antiquarian Society.

10. Library of Congress - Known to Eames as the Alfred T. White copy. "In the original old calf binding, with remnants of the brass clasps; lacking nineteen leaves, i.e. title, O₂ and O₃, and sheets W, X, Y, and Ll; and showing marks of usage. Size of leaf, six inches and fifteen-sixteenths by four inches and three-sixteenths. This also was one of the five copies bequeathed by Mr. Prince to the Old South Church in Boston, from the custody of which it was obtained about the year 1850, by Mr. George Livermore of Cambridge, whose signature is on the inside of the front cover. In 1855 Mr. Henry Stevens of London made a trade with Mr. Livermore by which he received from him twelve leaves out of this volume (sheets W, X, and Y) to supply an imperfection in the copy which he sold afterwards to Mr. Lenox [copy 6 above]. After Mr. Livermore's death in 1865, some of his books were deposited in the library of Harvard College, but they were subsequently withdrawn, and all were sold at auction by Charles F. Libbie & Co., Boston, November 20-23, 1894, when the Psalm Book was bought for its present owner for $425. See Catalogue of the Valuable Private Library of the Late George Livermore, Esq. (1894), no. 531. See also Stevens's Recollections of Mr. James Lenox (1886), pp. 61-62, where an error is made in stating that only four leaves were taken from this copy to perfect the Lenox copy. The same error is repeated in Mr. Littlefield's Early Boston Booksellers (1900), pp. 18-21... ."

Shurtleff and Swan note that this copy was erroneously reported by Sabin and by T. J. Holmes in The Minor Mathers to have been at the Huntington Library. By 1948 the book was in the possession of White's son-in-law, Adrian Van Sinderen. It was placed with the Library of Congress on 2 May, 1966 by Mrs. Adrian Van Sinderen, when it was the last copy remaining in private hands. At that time the front cover was detached, and the leaves were measured at 7 x 4^1/4, making it one of the taller copies. See The Quarterly Journal of the Library of Congress 24:3 (July, 1967), pp. 204-205.

Additional notes on this copy: Livermore's inked ownership notation on the inner front board reads "George Livermore | Dana Hill | Cambridge." The title page is supplied in pen facsimile. Additional ownership note on title page, "Geo Livemore" (partially warn away). Ink markings, possibly an early ownership notation, on *2r along with a shelfmark [presumably Prince's]: "10.4.10." Lightly inked at the top of leaf F1v, obscuring part of the running title and the first line. Several circles and scribbles in ink at the right and bottom margins of leaves N1v and top and right margin of N2r. Several unreadable words[?] in ink at bottom margin of leaf R3r. Horizontal tear across the center of leaf Ff3. Diagonal tear on the outer edge of leaf Hh, affecting the text slightly on the verso. One side of sheet Ii very lightly inked. Several notations and a square in ink on inner rear board.

The Sotheby's census notes that this copy was acquired by Old South Church before 1750, and does not attribute ownership to Thomas Prince.

A full scan of this copy is available here.

Library of Congress Catalog Record.

Chain of Provenance: Old South Church - George Livermore - Alfred T. White - Mr. & Mrs. Adrian Van Sinderen - Library of Congress.

11. Rosenbach Library & Museum - This copy, the most recently-discovered, was not known to Eames. Shurtleff and Swan describe it as imperfect, citing a 1947 Parke-Bernet catalogue description: "Original calf binding. Lacks D_1-11 [i.e. D-D2] but with original blanks." It was believed to have been discovered in northern Ireland sometime in the early part of the 20th century, and sold to Rosenbach. They note that this copy was exhibited on the Freedom Train in 1947.

In Legacies of Genius, Edwin Wolf 2nd notes that Rosenbach acquired his copy in 1933 from J. Weatherup, "a gentleman from Belfast," for £150. The Rosenbach Museum's A Selection from Our Shelves notes that this volume contains the early 18th-century signature of a William Brown, and that currently "the first four leaves and the four leaves comprising signature D are in facsimile."

The Sotheby's census notes the signatures of James and Thomas Lawrence on H1r and H2r respectively, and prints a June 1933 letter from Weatherup to the Rosenbach Company about this volume. This copy was that briefly absconded with by a UCLA undergraduate during an exhibition, but was recovered.

Chain of Provenance: James Lawrence - Thomas Lawrence - William Brown - James Weatherup - A. S. W. Rosenbach - Rosenbach Library & Museum.

[NB: this post has been updated, latest on 24 November 2013. In several entries references are made to specific leaves within the book: where Eames is quoted directly these have been left as given, with the leaf numbers in subscript.]