Miscellaneous: The British Library pop one million pictures on Flickr. As you do.

Date
16 December 2013

Good news this morning for all those who find themselves glancing idly over the text in library books, as they flick through the pages to look at the photographs and illustrations instead. Those jammy folk over at the British Library have got a fair few drawings and illustrations from historical books stashed away in their archive, and the digital world was delighted to find that they had kindly popped one million of them up on Flickr for the rest of the world to share.

One million! The images have been sourced from around 65,000 books dating from the 17th to the 19th century, and they include Arctic hunters, the Pied Piper of Hamelin, drunken sailors, lavish Italian interiors and dreamy landscapes, in one of the most comprehensive snapshots of printed material to date. Anyone else up for starting a campaign to get them on Pinterest too?

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British LIbrary Flickr: Image taken from p. 31 of “[The Light of Asia; or, the Great Renunciation-Mahâbhinishkramana. Being the life and teaching of Gautama … as told in verse by an Indian Buddhist. By E. Arnold, etc.]”

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British Library Flickr: Image taken from page 68 of “Nimrod in the North, or hunting and fishing adventures in the Arctic regions”

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British Library Flickr: Image taken from p. 25 of “The Pied Piper of Hamelin”. Originally published in “Dramatic Lyrics,” no. 3 in the series “Bells and Pomegranates”

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British Library Flickr: Image taken from p. 78 of ‘Songs for Little People’. With illustrations by H. Stratton

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British Library Flickr: Image taken from p. 93 of “On the Domesticated Animals of the British Islands: comprehending the natural and economical history of species and varieties; the description of the properties of external form, and observations on the principles and practice”

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British Library Flickr: Image taken from page 119 of “[Italian Pictures, drawn with pen and pencil. [By S. M.].]”

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Britsh Library Flickr: Image taken from p. 66 of “Songs of the Master’s Love [With illuminated initial letters, etc.]”

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About the Author

Maisie Skidmore

Maisie joined It’s Nice That fresh out of university in the summer of 2013 as an intern before joining full time as an Assistant Editor. Maisie left It’s Nice That in July 2015.

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