British Library - Highlights of The Collections

Highlights of The Collections

Highlights selected by the British Library include:

• The Diamond Sutra, the world's earliest dated printed book printed in 868 during the Tang Dynasty
• The Codex Sinaiticus, the major portion of the world's second-oldest manuscript of the Bible in koine Greek (4th century) and a priceless treasure.
• The Codex Alexandrinus, an early manuscript of the Bible in koine Greek
• The Lindisfarne Gospels, an illuminated Latin Gospel book from Anglo-Saxon Northumbria
• The St Cuthbert Gospel, a Northumbrian gospel book with the oldest Western binding, currently on long-term loan and in 2011 the subject of an appeal to purchase
• Two Gutenberg Bibles, two copies of a Latin Bible printed at Mainz, Germany (1450s)
• Two 1215 copies of Magna Carta
• The sole surviving manuscript copy of the poem Beowulf
• The Codex Arundel, one of Leonardo da Vinci's notebooks.
• William Tyndale's 1534 English translation New Testament, the personal copy of Anne Boleyn.
• Manuscript of Alice's Adventures Under Ground by Lewis Carroll (given to the British Library by a consortium of American bibliophiles "in recognition of Britain's courage in facing Hitler before America came into the war")