The Special Books (SB) Collection contains volumes which date between the early-seventeenth century to the mid-nineteenth century. Its content partially reflects the range of studies engaged in by scholars of both Marischal and King’s College during this period. Also contained within the SB Collection are c.2,000 pre-Victorian late eighteenth and early nineteenth-century novels in their original bindings. The KCx sequence is a discrete section of predominantly nineteenth-century books on the medical sciences, and consists of c.4,400 volumes. The University (specifically King's College) had the right of legal deposit from 1710 to 1836, and most of the books claimed under this privilege are housed in the SB or pi Collections.
Keywords: Science; mathematics; economics; philosophy; theology; literature (European).
Strengths: Contains first editions of many important works such as Newton's Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica (London, 1687), and Adam Smith's An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (London, 1776). By virtue of the former status of King's College as a library of legal deposit (1710-1836) and the collecting policies of teaching officials, there is also a significant sequence of some two thousand first editions, in their original bindings, of novels published in England in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
Languages:English, Latin, French, German, Scottish and Irish Gaelic, Welsh
Identifier: SB
Physical characteristics: c. 45,000 volumes and growing
Accumulation date range: 1600-
Contents date range: c. 1600-1840-(1860); and see the chronological relationship of this Collection with the pi Collection.
Accrual Status: Active (retrospective conversion)
Custodial history/provenance: Notable among the benefactors of this period is James Fraser, a graduate of King's College and Secretary to the Chelsea Hospital, who not only rebuilt the library at King's College in the 1720's, but also further enriched its stock with a considerable collection of books. The size and depth of the Collection reflects the fact that King's College had the right to claim legal deposit between 1710-1836.
Access Control: Closed access - please request. Non-borrowable.