Bibliographical and Typographical Collections

  • This material is held at
  • Reference
      GB 133 Eng MS 73
  • Dates of Creation
      19th Century
  • Language of Material
      English Greek French  and Latin
  • Physical Description
      vols 1-3: c 350 x 220 mm; vol. 4: 308 x 257 mm; vol. 5: 265 x 210 mm; vol. 6: 245 x 192 mm.  6 volumes (106 folios, 121 folios, 129 folios, 101 folios, 163 folios, 174 folios); Binding: uniformly half-bound in aubergine morocco, marbled paper-covered boards, by C. Murton.

Scope and Content

A collection of manuscript drafts, notes and transcribed extracts from various works, including dictionaries, chronicles, moral and religious treatises and sermons, together with notes on collegiate libraries in Oxford and Cambridge and several private libraries, bound together into six volumes. Within the volumes are also various newspaper clippings and inserted extracts from printed publications. The notes and transcriptions focus on works of the 16th and 17th centuries, though some earlier and later sources are used.

Volume 5 contains a letter from Rev. Thomas Curteis, at Maidstone, to Thomas Frognall Dibdin, dated 20 September 1822; also corrected proof copies of [Sir Egerton Brydges'] Censura literaria, no. 15, and History of Great Britain, pp. 145-60.

Volume 6 contains 3 letters from George John, 2nd Earl Spencer, to Dibdin, dated 17 November 1822, 7 November 1824, and undated (the paper is watermarked 1818); also 3 letters from J.D. Churchill [Rev. Joseph Dixie Churchill (1761-1836)] at Blickling parsonage to [Dibdin], dated 15 October 1821, 10 December 1821, and 29 July 1823.

Custodial History

Previous owners: William Barclay David Donald Turnbull (1811-1863), archivist and antiquary: volumes 1-4 are annotated 'Turnbull MSS' in pencil on the front flyleaves; Sir Thomas Phillipps (1792-1872): Phillipps number 18526, on printed spine labels and pencilled annotations inside front covers; thence to his grandson, Thomas Fitzroy Fenwick: inscriptions 'T.F.F. ex[amine]d. 1893' inside lower covers.