'All my books in foreign tongues’

Kasper van Ommen is curator of early printed and rare books and coordinator of the Scaliger Institute, a special collections research centre, at Leiden University Libraries. In 2020 he defended his doctoral thesis on Scaliger’s oriental bequest in Leiden University Library.

Acknowledgments

Translator's Note

List of Figures and Tables





The Oriental Bequest of Joseph Scaliger and the University Library of Leiden

Introduction

 1 New Research on Scaliger’s Bequest

 2 The Importance of Oriental Books in Early Modern Europe

 3 The First Contemporary Description of the Bequest

 4 The Project



1 A Life in Two Parts: Scaliger and His Collection before and after 1593

 1 Scaliger’s Move to Leiden

 2 Push and Pull Factors

 3 Leiden University and the Study of Hebrew

 4 Correspondence and the Republic of Letters

 5 The Printing House of Plantin and Raphelengius in Leiden

 6 The Importance of Good Books and Good Libraries



2 Scaliger as Scholar and Collector in France, 1552–1593

 1 Scaliger the Philologist: Learning Greek and Oriental Languages

 2 Postel’s Influence on Scaliger

 3 Paris: Scaliger’s First Hebrew Books

 4 The Production and Sale of Oriental Books

 5 Scaliger’s Journey to Italy with Chasteigner de la Roche-Posay

 6 The Influence of Cujas on Scaliger

 7 Refuge in Geneva

 8 Touraine: Exile without a Library

 9 A Fragmented Library

 10 Mastering Arabic

 11 Multilingual Ambitions



3 Supplying Scaliger with Books

 1 The Context of Scaliger’s French Network

 2 De Thou and the Bibliothèque Royale

 3 Claude Dupuy as Supplier of Oriental Books

 4 Dupuy and Pinelli

 5 A Fellow Protestant in Paris: Pierre Pithou

 6 Guy Lefèvre de la Boderie and Other Suppliers of Books

 7 Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc and the Samaritan Language

 8 Scaliger and Mitalerius

 9 Books from Jean Hurault de Boistaillé’s Library in Scaliger’s Bequest



4 Scaliger in Leiden, 1593–1609

 1 Transporting Scaliger’s Books to Leiden

 2 Scaliger’s ‘Oriental Catalogue’ of ca. 1600

 3 Books Left Behind in France

 4 Scaliger’s Network in Leiden

 5 New Contacts in the Leiden Network: Casaubon, Bongars and Commelin

 6 The Operation of a Trade Network in Practice

 7 Scaliger and Daniël van der Meulen

 8 Supplying Arabic Books: Chasteigner in Rome and the Tipographia Medicea Orientale

 9 Gifts from around Europe

 10 The Brothers Labbaeus, Fellow Bibliophiles

 11 Scaliger’s Books in Rare Exotic Languages, from Slavic to Chinese




5 Expanding the University Library: a Will, a Bequest and an Auction Catalogue

 1 The University Library of Leiden before Scaliger’s Arrival

 2 The Oriental Books of the Court of Holland

 3 Scaliger’s Death

 4 Scaliger’s Will

 5 The Auction Catalogue of 1609

 6 Scaliger’s Oriental Bequest

 7 Heinsius and the Arca Scaligerana

 8 The Placement of the Arca Scaligerana in Leiden University Library

 9 The Legacy of Scaliger’s Bequest



6 Scaliger’s Bequest in the Leiden University Library Catalogues

 1 The Catalogue of Vulcanius

 2 Library Catalogues before 1612

 3 Cataloguing Scaliger’s Bequest: the Printed Library Catalogue of 1612

 4 The Catalogue of 1623

 5 The Catalogue of 1640

 6 The Catalogue of 1674

 7 The Catalogue of 1716

 8 Conclusion



7 Oriental Collecting in Context

 1 Private Collecting in the Early Dutch Republic and Its Neighbours

 2 Oriental Books in Sixteenth-Century Scholarly Libraries

 3 Oriental Collections outside the Dutch Republic

 4 Burnett’s Canon

 5 The Auction Catalogue of Johannes Drusius Senior (1616)

 6 The Auction Catalogue of Franciscus (I) Raphelengius (1626)

 7 Isaac Casaubon’s Oriental Books

 8 Portaleone’s Library

 9 Thomas Bodley’s Oriental Collection

 10 Conclusion




Conclusion

 1 A Properly Functioning Network

 2 From France to Leiden

 3 Comparison with Other Collections

 4 The Fate of the Bequest and the Arca Scaligerana

 5 The Reconstruction of Scaliger’s Bequest



Appendix 1: List of Books in Scaliger’s Library, 1600 or later

Appendix 2: List Compiled by Janus Dousa in August 1594 Containing the Libri Haebraici, Chaldaici et Arabici from the Library of the Court
of Holland

Appendix 3: The list of Oriental Books and Manuscripts from Scaliger’s library Compiled by Bonaventura Vulcanius

Appendix 4: Section of Scaliger’s bequest in Daniel Heinsius, Catalogus librorum Bibliothecæ Lugdunensis (Leiden: s.n., 1612), with the current shelf marks of the printed books and manuscripts in Leiden University Libraries

Appendix 5: List of Arabic sources in Scaliger’s library in 1608

Bibliography

Index