Collection highlights, news about acquisitions, events and exhibits, and behind-the-scenes looks at the work and services of Rare Books & Special Collections (RBSC) at Notre Dame.
Throughout the 15th century, outbreaks of the bubonic plague frequently occurred in the city of Florence. The most severe of these epidemics, or plagues, struck in 1430, 1437-38, 1449-50, and 1478-80.
Engraving of Marsilio Ficino from Jean Jacques Boissard’s Bibliotheca chalcographica.
Following the last of these devastating outbreaks, the philosopher and physician Marsilio Ficino composed the treatise Consiglio contro la pestilentia (alternatively, Consiglio contro la pestilenza, or Advice against the Plague), a text that would remain influential for nearly three centuries. Intended to be of practical use, the treatise was initially published in Italian in 1481, and subsequently published in Latin in 1518. Rare Books & Special Collections owns a copy printed in 1556 by the heirs of Lucantonio Giunti, part of the famous Giunti (or Giunta) family of printers. This 1556 reprint attests to the longstanding popularity and continued relevance of the vernacular text.
Consiglio contro la pestilentia opens with initial chapters concerning the origins of the disease and recognizing its signs, with the remaining text then devoted to preventative measures and cures. Some portions of the treatise, including the advice to avoid contaminated spaces and seek out fresh air, are still relevant to us today. Other recommendations, such as the guidance to consume crushed emeralds as apotropaic medicine (or, if unaffordable, horseradish), we might best avoid. Also mentioned is the idea that the plague wanes within forty days, or quaranta giorni, the etymological root of the English word quarantine.
Introductory text on the origins of the plague and the resulting poisoning of the air.
A complete copy of this text from the same edition as that owned by Notre Dame has been digitized by the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Roma and is available online via Google Books. This particular edition is a reprint of that published in Florence in 1522, to which are appended tavole or indexes by topic; an espositione d’alcuni vocaboli toschani, or explanation of Tuscan vocabulary as found in the text; and a brief section titled Segreto & rimedio contro la peste, or Secrets and Remedies against the Plague. It also includes the treatise Consiglio di M. Thomaso del Garbo Fiorentino contro la pestilentia, which initially circulated in the mid to late 14th century. These additions would have helped contemporary readers understand and give context to Ficino’s text.
In celebration of the 50th anniversary of Earth Day—April 22, 2020—Rare Books and Special Collections offers an online exhibition, Describing, Conserving, and Celebrating the Earth: Primary Sources from Hesburgh Libraries. It displays sources about the earth in science, culture, public policy, and politics, from the 1750s to 2004. In keeping with the American origins of Earth Day in 1970 and the EPA, these sources are primarily from an American context.
Each section holds a primary source or group of sources that reflect different periods, kinds of materials (books, illustrations, posters, reports, etc.), and approaches to studying, appreciating, and preserving the earth. The library’s Rare Books and Special Collections resources are where some of these items come from; others are government documents that are available in the open stacks of Hesburgh Library (when the library’s print collection reopens).
We hope that this online resource will help faculty and students to Take 10 for the Planet this week.
A mid-eighteenth-century British naturalist’s illustrated description of wildlife and plant life in the American colonies.
The first issue of the Sierra Club Bulletin, a nature enthusiast’s magazine focused on the western United States.
A late nineteenth-century botanist’s findings, published in an early scientific journal.
A World War II poster by the United States Forest Service, urging people to preserve forests.
A mid-century warning about human damage to wildlife in the United States.
Examples of federal conservation before the advent of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA): a conference report on pollution in the Lake Michigan watershed, and an international commission’s findings about pollution levels in boundary waters between Canada and the US.
A compilation of environment-inspired poems, published a few years after the first Earth Day.
An Earth Day-inspired speech by actor and environmentalist Eddie Albert.
Two EPA publications: an early catalog of agency-sponsored training programs for professionals responsible for pollution control, and a 2004 brochure about the conservation of the Chesapeake Bay.
In 1911, a new group of artists who called themselves Der Blaue Reiter organized its own exhibition and published an almanac also named Der Blaue Reiter. Edited by Wassily Kandinsky and Franz Marc and published by Reinhard Piper in Munich, this volume contains a wide range of contributions including theoretical treatises on artistic form, vocal scores, children’s drawings, and illustrations of sculpture.
The formation of this group stemmed from an event involving Kandinsky. Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944), the Moscow native who was among the pioneers of abstract art, composed ten works between 1910 and 1939 that he considered to be his most important paintings. These ten paintings constitute his Compositions of which seven survive; the first three were destroyed during the Second World War. The artist’s guiding principle for each of these works was what he called the “expression of feeling” or “inner necessity,” a combination of “perceptions that arise from the artist’s inner world [and] . . . the impressions the artist receives from external appearances.” (1) In these paintings, Kandinsky explored the manipulation of color and form, emphasizing the artist’s process of creation and “pure” painting.
During the process of creating Compositions, Kandinsky submitted Composition V (1911) to the Neue Künstlervereinigung (NKV) to be considered for inclusion in the NKV’s third exhibition in 1911. The NKV jury rejected his work on the grounds that it was too large though the rejection probably represented the opinions of a faction within this group who opposed Kandinsky’s experimentation to represent spiritual values in a new way. (2) Upon his work being rejected, Kandinsky along with Franz Marc and Gabriele Münter left the NKV. Joined by others including Paul Klee, August Macke, and Marianne von Werefkin who also rejected the NKV’s traditionalism, these artists founded Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider).
Special Collections’ copy of the 1912 printing of Der Blaue Reiter is one among a few works acquired related to German Expressionism. These acquisitions were made in collaboration with faculty in the German Department to support the undergraduate courses they teach. Notable among these works are:
Gottfried Benn, Söhne: neue Gedichte (Berlin-Wilmersdorf: A.R. Meyer Verlag, 1913). Rare Books Small PT 2603 .E46 S57 1913
Bertolt Brecht, Hauspostille (Berlin: Im Propyläen-Verlag, 1927). Rare Books Medium PT 2603 .R397 H3 1927
(1) Magdalena Dabrowski. Kandinsky Compositions (New York: Museum of Modern Art, 1995), p. 11. Accessed April 12, 2020, https://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015034282809 (\Access provided through HathiTrust Emergency Temporary Access Service).
(2) Shearer West, The Visual Arts in Germany, 1890-1937: Utopia and Despair (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 2001), p. 65.
While the Irish Studies collection in the Hesburgh Libraries has grown considerably in recent decades, one of the enduring treasures, and the collection most often inquired about, is the O’Neill Collection. This is the personal library of Francis O’Neill, the famous collector of Irish music who was once Chicago’s Chief of Police.
Francis O’Neill (1848-1936) left Ireland in his teens, travelled the world as a sailor, settled in America and after first qualifying as a teacher in Missouri, moved to Chicago where he joined the police force in 1873. By all accounts a larger-than-life figure, he was well-known both as a police officer and as one of the major experts on Irish traditional music.
Sometime in the later 1880s… Francis O’Neill began to realize that there was yet much Irish traditional music to be collected and preserved that had escaped earlier collectors. He recruited James O’Neill to the project of collection and started to visit him regularly … so that the tunes remembered from Francis’ childhood in Cork could be noted down from his dictation in a private manuscript collection… [i]
As months and years passed and word of their enterprise spread others contributed tunes to the collection and James O’Neill began visiting musicians in their homes to note their music.
Carolan, 11
Nicholas Carolan goes on to describe how O’Neill’s project developed, his publication of O’Neill’s Music of Ireland (1903) and his other books, and of the enduring legacy of these books.
For generations of musicians who play Irish traditional music, O’Neill’s books are perceived as essential. Carolan aptly named his book ‘A Harvest Saved’ as O’Neill collected at a time and place where people had left the communities in which the music had thrived. The 75,000 Irish immigrants in Chicago carried with them the music of many parts of Ireland, and O’Neill was able to tap into the rich repository of their tunes and record them for posterity.
O’Neill was following in the footsteps of important collectors such as Edward Bunting and George Petrie, many of whose books are in O’Neill’s collection and bear pencilled annotations indicating his careful study of the contents.
From New edition of a general Collection of the ancient Irish music. Rare Books XLarge M 1744 .B868 G4 1796
This book is one of the most important works in the history of Irish music collecting. Edward Bunting began his life-long interest in the collection of Irish harp-music in 1792. He notated the music of performers at the Belfast Harp Festival that year, and this inspired him to continue for many years in his collection and study of Irish harp music.
The O’Neill Collection includes also Bunting’s two later collections, published in 1809 and 1840. O’Neill’s pencilled notes can be seen in the margins of these books.
Page detail from New edition of a general Collection of the ancient Irish music. Rare Books XLarge M 1744 .B868 G4 1796
The O’Neill Collection includes important works from Scotland including Orpheus Caledonius by William Thompson, one of the earliest published collections of Scottish songs. First published in two volumes in 1725, our O’Neill copy is volume I only of the 1733 edition. This copy has pencil annotations either by O’Neill or by an earlier reader. It also includes a subscribers list, which is not included in the facsimile edition published in 1962.
When Chief O’Neill offered his library to the University in 1931, he described it as having a ‘Hiberniana’ collection and a music collection. In each case, his library was exceptional. Our O’Neill Collection includes a valuable selection of books on Irish history and antiquities, and in the music section, a collection of many well-known collections of Irish music, along with lesser-known books of dance music, and books on the music and instruments of Ireland, England and Scotland in particular.
Hoping to bring the O’Neill Collection to enthusiasts who cannot visit the Hesburgh, we selected thirty of the rarest books from the collection for digitization. We plan to share these digital collections in a number of ways — the Internet Archive being one — making it possible to study the books anywhere in the world.
The Irish Song Book, with Original Irish Airs. Edited, with an introduction and notes by Alfred Perceval Graves. 2nd ed. London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1895. Rare Books Small M 1744 .G783 I7 1895
[i] The Hesburgh Library’s O’Neill Collection has only two music manuscripts. It would be wonderful if O’Neill’s own manuscripts were still in existence and could be found.
In 1911, a new group of artists who called themselves Der Blaue Reiter organized its own exhibition and published an almanac also named 
Special Collections’ copy of the 1912 printing of Der Blaue Reiter is one among a few works acquired related to German Expressionism. These acquisitions were made in collaboration with faculty in the German Department to support the undergraduate courses they teach. Notable among these works are:
