Chocolate and Bibles: How Victorian Collectors Spent their Evenings and Shaped Scholarship

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• Dr Harry Spillane, Munby Fellow in Bibliography, University Library and Research Fellow, Darwin College
• Tuesday 04 February 2025, 13:10-14:00
• Richard King room, Darwin College.

If you have a question about this talk, please contact Dr Amelia Hassoun.

One of the most prolific chocolate makers of the Victorian period, Francis Fry, was also one of the most prolific collectors of bibles. Though chocolate and bibles are at the heart of this talk, bigger questions about authority and who decides what is and what is not authentic and true arise. Through Fry’s activities important and interdisciplinary questions are raised about how status and control of source material exert influence over scholarly study. Fry’s enormous collection of many thousands of religious texts allowed him to write several books of his own. In turn, these allowed readers who owned copies of the English Bible from the 1500s and 1600s to identify what edition they had, how complete it was and thus its value. Fry’s methods were unusual and he openly revealed that he frequently commissioned modern copies of missing pages for his own books in order to ‘complete them’. Ultimately, a letter of authenticity from Francis Fry became a valuable thing and auction houses across the world used his verdict as a guarantee when pricing copies for sale. Today, Fry’s bibles sit at the heart of the Bible Society Collection within the University Library at Cambridge. His collection has been used to make catalogues that scholars still refer to and it is visited by researchers from across the world who wish to learn more about the history of print and bible production. What shadows has Fry cast over modern scholarship?

This talk is part of the Darwin College Humanities and Social Sciences Seminars series.

This talk is included in these lists:

• AUB_Cambridge Seminars
• All Talks (aka the CURE list)
• Centre for Health Leadership and Enterprise
• Chris Davis' list
• Darwin College Humanities and Social Sciences Seminars
• Darwin College Research Talks
• Darwin Lectures and Seminars
• ESRC DTP
• Neurons, Fake News, DNA and your iPhone: The Mathematics of Information
• Richard King room, Darwin College
• custom

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