Some of the most detailed and alarming military maps of Scotland were made by external aggressors, planning attack or invasion. Here we look at maps made by four of these countries: French charts, 1800s In the early 18th century, when Napoleonic France made preparations for an invasion of Great Britain, the best available charts of […]
Category: Illustrations and photographs
Fashion Collections at the NLS
Vogue The Covers HB6.218.6.89, 100 Years of Fashion PB6.212.838/10, Behind The Runway HB6.217.2.36 The General Collections available at the National Library of Scotland (NLS) cover a diverse range of topics from Mountaineering to Music. You can find help and information to set up a business, indulge a passion, learn a new skill or delve into […]
Skills for the Future traineeship placement
Helena Robson began a two week placement in the Library’s Conservation Unit on 16 April. Helena had worked with the conservators as a volunteer in 2015, and she is about to complete her Skills for the Future traineeship on collections digitisation, as part of the programme run jointly by the National Galleries of Scotland and […]
Nothing says ‘Christmas’ like a gun-toting duck …
For the Library’s shopping day this year (Thursday, 14th December) we will have on display a very varied selection of Christmas cards, some widely commercially available at the time, and others designed by respected artists, sometimes for their own use. One such was Jessie M. (Marion) King (1875–1949). She was a celebrated illustrator and designer who […]
One year in the photo-wilds of the National Library of Scotland
The Exploration of a Mountain of Photographic Material by an Icon Intern American pioneering mountaineer and explorer Fanny Bullock Workman’s book Two Summers in the Ice-wilds of Eastern Karakoram: The Exploration of Nineteen Hundred Square Miles of Mountain and Glacier was the inspiration for the title of this piece as I feel it accurately summarises […]
Tracing your family history through football
Did your grandfather referee the Junior Cup final? Did your father play inside left for Third Lanark? If so you may just be able to further your family history research using the newspaper resources that we offer at the National Library of Scotland. The National Library of Scotland has a large collection of microfilms, a […]
A closer look – using the new stereomicroscope to examine and characterise the Photographic Collections of the National Library of Scotland
The National Library of Scotland has in its holdings an amazing collection of photographs and photographic albums. The collections tell the story of the medium before its official announcement in 1839, its first use to illustrate books, and its rapid development throughout the 20th century. The preservation of photographs requires specialized knowledge in order to […]
‘Paint with light’ : Photography and the Moving Image Archive
According to the enthusiastic narration on ‘Amateur Cinematography’ held by the Moving Image Archive, photography serves two distinct purposes; ‘first as a form of record and second as a form of art’. This fascinating 3 minute film, shot in 1948, was made as a trailer for the 10th Amateur film festival held at the Cosmo Cinema, now known […]
Astronomicum Caesareum
Peter Apian’s Astronomicum Caesareum (Ingolstadt, 1540) is one of the finest printed books in the National Library of Scotland, hand coloured throughout and featuring ingenious and beautiful volvelles. Apian, humanist mathematician and astronomer and born Bienewitz in Leisnig, Saxony (Biene is German for bee, hence the Latinizing of his name to Apian), was the son […]
January Map of the Month: Sea creatures
Aurora Borealis – By Marco Ottobelli – Own work, [CC BY-SA 4.0] What does “Iceland” mean to you? To me the name conjures up the distinctive Icelandic style of knitting very cosy jumpers, Magnus and Sally Magnusson, long dark nights with the Northern Lights putting on a show, and nervously watching the latest up-dates on […]