The ledger entry’s main characterization, “Oriental,” is a category from the long-19th century with a very broad meaning, essentially including any part of Asia and North Africa. I wanted to find out what happened to its “Oriental manuscript on vellum.” A metal (brass?) case binding depicting the Ascension on the front cover and Crucifixion on the back a hinged spine and cover with clasp for the fore-edge. The only problem was that this case did not hold a book, as it apparently did when it arrived in 1924. Going through them all, I found one that matched the unusual description of “Back jointed.” This case (Grolier Club BnS-21) has a hinge in the middle of the spine, as well as a brass color (whether it’s actually brass, I’ll leave to expert eyes). But in the silver bindings collection, we have plenty of metal bindings with crucifixion and ascension scenes on the covers. In our small manuscript collection, we certainly did not have a metal binding matching this description. Without a title or date, I didn’t have much to go on. “ … Brass … Crucifixion & ascension on covers. I could not match one entry to its object, 16056: In preparation for the show, I wanted to match each binding with its accession number, especially looking for any useful information for the exhibit. ![]() At the time when this bequest came in, each binding was entered into an acquisitions ledger and given an accession number. It acted as a ‘past members collect’ compliment to the annual New Members Collect show, with most of the silver bindings coming from Beverly Chew’s bequest in September 1924. This past summer, I curated a display of silver bindings in the second floor gallery. By Scott Ellwood, Bruce and Mary Crawford Assistant Librarian Part of the silver binding display in the Grolier Club’s 2nd floor gallery, summer 2022, with the binding discussed in this post seen in the upper right corner.
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