
500-year-old library catalogue reveals books lost to time - richardhod
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/apr/10/extraordinary-500-year-old-library-catalogue-reveals-books-lost-to-time-libro-de-los-epitomes
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xefer
As a comment to that article references: it’s certainly a great story, but it
makes it seem that this is _the_ catalogue of the library, when in fact it is
one of 16 volumes, 14 of which are already known.

The referenced page at The Arnamagnæan Institute stays:

“There were 16 volumes of indices in all; 14 of these are in the Biblioteca
Colombina in Seville, where what remains of Colón’s library is kept. The other
two were presumed missing — but now it seems that one of them wound up in the
collection of Árni Magnússon.“ [1]

It’s great that this was found (and one is still missing) but perhaps not
quite as profound as the article would lead one to believe.

[1] [https://manuscript.ku.dk/news/a-new-discovery-in-the-
arnamag...](https://manuscript.ku.dk/news/a-new-discovery-in-the-arnamagnaean-
collection/)

~~~
tmalsburg2
Is there a digital version of these summaries that one could read?

~~~
KuhlMensch
It will be release in 2020 according to the article

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peter_d_sherman
Excerpt:

"After amassing his collection, Colón employed a team of writers to read every
book in the library and distill each into a little summary in Libro de los
Epítomes, ranging from a couple of lines long for very short texts to about 30
pages for the complete works of Plato, which Wilson-Lee dubbed the “miracle of
compression”."

Amazing.

~~~
girzel
I'm a writer, translator, and literary promoter. Sometimes I think I've never
done anything more difficult than reading long works of literature and
summarizing them faithfully in one or two paragraphs. It's absolutely brutal
mental and compositional work.

~~~
Abishek_Muthian
What's your opinion about services which provides summary for the books, such
as blinkist?

Do you think those services are an asset or that it affects the book
negatively? Do you think, if the original author wrote the summary; it would
make a difference?

I have built news aggregators apps which uses summary from original
description of author & also built bots which summarizes content; I'm
conflicted between the value of a summary provided by the author /reader. I
know that a book cannot be compared with a news article.

~~~
arvidkahl
From what I learned from listening to an interview with a Blinkist founder
Holger Seim on the Factory Berlin Facebook page, they employ experts in the
fields that the books are about to summarize them. So while this is not an
author-provided summary, it is (seemingly) closer than a mere reader summary.

~~~
Abishek_Muthian
Yes, they have mentioned that in their FAQ as well. But still, even though
they're professional; they would still be a reader.

Edit:Typo

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joe_the_user
Wilson-Lee: _" It’s a discovery of immense importance, not only because it
contains so much information about how people read 500 years ago, but also,
because it contains summaries of books that no longer exist, lost in every
other form than these summarie"_

It's exciting that we should soon get a window into the very first books that
appeared after the explosion of printed matter that followed the invention of
the Gutenberg press.

~~~
caprese
Watch it be like 2009 Twitter

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drharby
Im currently reading Island at the Center of the World about dutch new york,
new amsterdam. And the source material is basicly one or two books because the
dutch west india company sold their records as scrap paper. Rooms full of
records, granted yhe papet were records over 200 years old. I wondet how much
history we've lost

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skookumchuck
"They are also working to digitise the manuscript, in collaboration with the
Arnamagnæan Institute."

Send it to me. I'll have it digitized in about an hour. Just turn the pages
and click with my phone.

Yes, I know that professional archivists would rather give birth to a goat
than do that, but consider:

1\. It's the text that's important, and a handheld phone camera captures that
just fine. Try it and see.

2\. It's immediate.

3\. It's cheap.

4\. The worry about damaging it irretrievably will be alleviated, as now a
backup exists.

~~~
LeoPanthera
Stop trying to re-solve already-solved problems.

~~~
skookumchuck
Are they solved? The quote indicated it had not been digitized and implied it
would take significant effort. The Vatican library has never been digitized,
and nobody really knows what all is in there. The HP library burned down
before anybody digitized it.

~~~
snvzz
>The Vatican library has never been digitized, and nobody really knows what
all is in there.

Seems like a clear case where public interest should override private
property.

~~~
Freak_NL
I'm sure the citizens of the Vatican City State will rise up and demand public
access any day now.

~~~
jaco8
They even might find books by Otto Corvin ....

