We've had lovely British weather today --- a bit cool and rainy --- so I decided to go to the British Library. It's one of the few museums that I haven't been to yet.
There is only one main room of materials in the Library, but it is chock-full of amazing things. There is a special exhibition space, too, but they were showing an exhibit about propaganda and Mom saw it and said it wasn't worth the extra dough.
The main room carries a bunch of sacred texts from various cultures as well as the Gutenberg Bible. There is a special room for the Magna Carta. There were only 7 copies of it made and only 4 are left. The Library holds 2 of the copies.
There are also letters from Isaac Newton and Charles Darwin, Leonardo DaVinci's notebooks, Jane Austen's notebook and writing desk, a letter from Charles Darwin, some works from Shakespeare, and the Beowulf Manuscript (gag --- I hated reading that in high school!).
On the more contemporary side, there is also a bunch of Beatles stuff. The handwritten lyrics for Help, Ticket to Ride, Yesterday, and others. One of them was written on the back of Julian Lennon's birthday card. It was pretty cool to see the evolution of the lyrics.
There was a new exhibition added to the Library recently. The 1863 Minute Book, which contains the 13 original laws of football. And, by football, I mean soccer. It was pulled together by a group of guys (in a pub, of course) to try to regulate things. Up until then, everyone was playing by their own rules.
There is only one main room of materials in the Library, but it is chock-full of amazing things. There is a special exhibition space, too, but they were showing an exhibit about propaganda and Mom saw it and said it wasn't worth the extra dough.
The main room carries a bunch of sacred texts from various cultures as well as the Gutenberg Bible. There is a special room for the Magna Carta. There were only 7 copies of it made and only 4 are left. The Library holds 2 of the copies.
There are also letters from Isaac Newton and Charles Darwin, Leonardo DaVinci's notebooks, Jane Austen's notebook and writing desk, a letter from Charles Darwin, some works from Shakespeare, and the Beowulf Manuscript (gag --- I hated reading that in high school!).
On the more contemporary side, there is also a bunch of Beatles stuff. The handwritten lyrics for Help, Ticket to Ride, Yesterday, and others. One of them was written on the back of Julian Lennon's birthday card. It was pretty cool to see the evolution of the lyrics.
There was a new exhibition added to the Library recently. The 1863 Minute Book, which contains the 13 original laws of football. And, by football, I mean soccer. It was pulled together by a group of guys (in a pub, of course) to try to regulate things. Up until then, everyone was playing by their own rules.
FA Minute Book
The book is valued at £2.5 million, which is kind of impressive because it isn't that big. And, the rules that I saw were kind of lame. It's not like it specified offsides or anything. The entry was about when they would have meetings. I guess they couldn't give us free access to page through the book.
All in all, it was a pretty cool compilation of stuff. Not a bad way to spend a rainy Saturday afternoon.
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