15 DECEMBER 1998
LONDON, GREAT BRITAIN
Orientalist Library Resources
The 1998 Conference of the National Council on Orientalist Library Resources was held at the British Library, on 15th December 1998. The title of the Conference was 'Orienteering in the Euston Road' to reflect the occasion of the first meeting of the group to be held in the new British Library premises; it was attended by 38 members of the NCOLR.By C.A. ANSORGE
Following the opening remarks and welcome by the Chairman, Lesley Forbes, the participants were given a guided tour of the new British Library premises. The first of the Conference talks was given by Beth McKillop, the Curator for Korean and Exhibitions Officer at the British Library, and concerned the organization and setting up of the new exhibition area in the British Library. The new Library had been provided with a specially designed exhibition area open to the public, situated in the area to the left of the main entrance and with special facilities for school children to be given talks and to work on school projects. Mrs McKillop described the thought which had gone into the development of the design of the exhibition area. She also described the special lighting which is provided by fibre-optic lights round the perimeters of the showcases whilst the lighting level in the galleries themselves is kept fairly low. She also described the development of the method of displaying items in the wall cases from which the shelves have been removed to avoid casting shadows over other exhibits. She took the opportunity to outline the programme of exhibitions planned for the future.
Mrs McKillop's talk was followed by a tour of the exhibition area to view the facilities and study the exhibits, which she had been describing in her talk. At the lower level is situated 'The Pearson Gallery of Living Words' which shows the range and diversity of the BL's collections, with sections on children's books, the history of writing, and printing methods. At the upper level the 'John Ritblat Gallery' had on display many fascinating items of a historical, literary, and religious nature from European cultures and also many very fine exhibits of manuscripts and rare books from the Oriental world. The items on display had been chosen from every area of interest from Hebrew, Arabic, and Persian items, to exhibits from the Indian Subcontinent, and from Thailand, China, Japan, and Korea.
A special exhibition room off the main area contained the 'Turning the Page' exhibition. This new development displays four examples of manuscripts in digitized form which can be manipulated from a touch-sensitive computer screen and which are accompanied by a soundtrack. One of the items displayed by this technology was the scroll of the 'Diamond Sutra'.
Amalgamation
The first afternoon sessions was a talk by Dr Vrej Nersessian, Head of the Hebrew and Christian Orient Section of the Oriental and India Office Collections, on the background to the exhibition 'Treasures from the Ark' which is planned to take place in 2001. The exhibition will explore aspects of Armenian Christianity drawing on exhibits from the British Library collections and from the artefacts in the British Museum. Dr Nersessian's presentation was illustrated by slides. Some demonstrated the Byzantine and Islamic influences on Armenian culture and art, but also showed the distinctive characteristics of the Armenian landscape and cultural objects produced there. In his talk Dr Nersessian emphasized the lack of recognition paid to the Armenian culture as distinct from those of other surrounding peoples and how the planned exhibition would help to increase public awareness about Armenia and the various aspects of its unique culture.
The final talk of the day was given by Mr Graham Shaw, Deputy Director of Special Collections at the British Library, and in charge of the OIOC collections. Taking the opportunity to mark the reunification of the Oriental collections in one place after many years in separate storage in Store Street and later in Orbit House, he gave a comprehensive and detailed account of the distribution of Oriental-related material in the British Library collections.
He also explained the historical growth of the Oriental collections and recounted the addition of a number of large and valuable collections in the past. The largest single collection to be added to the BL Oriental collections was that of the Oriental and India Office, which was amalgamated with the British Library in 1982. This very significant collection of historical records and books was, in general terms, less well conserved and catalogued than the rest of the British Library collections and a considerable amount of work had since been carried out to improve its accessibility.
The largest collection to be brought together by the amalgamation of the British Library and OIOC in terms of conservation had been the Aurel Stein collection on Central Asia on which conservation work is still being carried out. He emphasized the large amount of material relating to Asia, which can be found among the Western language collections of the British Library. These items complement the specialist Oriental collections in a significant way.
Mr Shaw also pointed out the large and important collections relating to Asian Studies which could be found in the European manuscripts collections, referring especially to the papers of Warren Hastings. Large collections of Oriental material could also be found in the prints and drawings collections, some housed separately in the British Museum, and in the map collection of the British Library.
The present financial position of the oriental collections is, however, far from encouraging. There is, for example, no longer any special funding available for the purchase of more manuscripts for the Oriental section. The talk formed an interesting and concise resume of the situation of the Oriental resources of the British Library in the context of their new setting. *
C.A. Ansorge is librarian.
She can be reached at:
UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE
Faculty of Oriental Studies Library
Sidgwick Avenue
Cambridge CB3 9DA
United Kingdom
E-mail: caal@cus.cam.ac.uk