You can always count on Fawkes to make an entrance. Our Harry Potter: A History of Magic exhibition opens in 50 days! #BLHarryPotter
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Not that we have favourites or anything, but we really couldn't agree more with Miss Granger. #HappyBirthdayHermione! #BLHarryPotter
Happy birthday, Severus Snape! On loan from and drawn by the amazing Jim Kay, this portrait of the professor is on display in #BLHarryPotter. Can you guess what the lilies by his hands might represent?
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On loan from , Nicolas Flamel's tombstone was reputedly found being used as a cutting board in a Parisian grocery! #BLHarryPotter
Happy birthday Leonardo da Vinci, born #onthisday in 1452. Painter, sculptor, architect, engineer and owner of the most impeccable handwriting.
Explore da Vinci's notebook, showing his 'mirror writing' moving from right to left, with #BLTreasures: bit.ly/2uPEXZM
#HarryPotterBookNight ⚡is here! While we can't say if this is Fawkes, here's a 13th-century phoenix rising from the ashes #CloseEnough
Here the ‘fenix’ is described as a native of Arabia and can live for up to 500 years. It is creating its own funeral pyre. #BLHarryPotter
Harry Potter: A History of Magic, our ★★★★★ exhibition, has been open for one month! Have you visited yet? bit.ly/2hxKmLH #BLHarryPotter
Happy birthday Arthur Conan Doyle, born #otd 1859. His manuscript for #SherlockHolmesDay bit.ly/1sFoq4Q
Journey to where magic and myth began. #BLHarryPotter tickets go on sale at 12 noon, Monday 3 April. Don't miss out! bit.ly/2oFU3Ji
Ever wanted to delve into Divination or ponder the peculiarities of Potions? Now you can! #BLHarryPotter on sale now bit.ly/2nNSfPe
'Love demands expression. It will not stay still, stay silent, be good, be modest, be seen and not heard, no. It will break out in tongues of praise, the high note that smashes the glass and spills the liquid...'
— Written on the Body, Jeanette Winterson
Wishing all a happy and… Show more
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Witches with a cauldron: this image shows two women placing a snake and a cockerel into a flaming pot to create a hailstorm #BLHarryPotter
The Ripley Scroll is an alchemical manuscript that describes how to make the Philosopher’s Stone. It is nearly 6 metres long! #BLHarryPotter
How it started How it's going
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A moment to reflect on the achievements of a great human mind: Leonardo da Vinci was born #onthisday in 1452. From Leonardo's Codex Arundel, this thought experiment explores how a perpetual motion wheel might work, but in reality the wheel would always come to a stop.
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As part of #BLHarryPotter our friends will be taking over our Instagram account tomorrow to explore the science and history of magic. Don't miss it!
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Before the internet, there were... libraries
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YOU HAVE NO AUTHORITY HERE JACKIE WEAVER.
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Our hearts go out to the staff and users of of Brazil. A reminder of the fragility and preciousness of our shared global heritage #MuseuNacional
Happy #WorldBookDay! Instead of a #selfie, why not take a #shelfie today? Here's ours to get you started. We'd love to see yours!
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We’ve been having a hoot with the items on display in #BLHarryPotter – opening this month! Have you got your ticket? bit.ly/2ycO1sw
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The most famous star in the constellation of Canis Major & also the brightest star in the night sky, is Sirius. Happy birthday Sirius Black!
Special delivery! Coming to #BLHarryPotter tomorrow? Here's some handy info you'll need to know before you visit bit.ly/2zlYoGS
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Please take your seats: our Hogwarts Curriculum Lectures start on 29 Oct with Maggie Aderin-Pocock on Astronomy bit.ly/2eYegHL
Happy birthday Leonardo da Vinci, born #onthisday in 1452! From Leonardo's Codex Arundel, this thought experiment explores how a perpetual motion wheel might work, but in reality the wheel would always come to a stop... #AMindinMotion
Your amazing comments and pictures on our #BLHarryPotter feedback wall have made us feel very warm and fuzzy inside.
Especially appreciated on #snowdays like today. Thank you!
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Who else is counting down to our #BLHarryPotter exhibition? Before it opens tomorrow, here's a little look inside!
Vworp! Vworp!
Happy #DoctorWhoDay!
#OTD in 1963, the TARDIS landed on our screens in the very first episode of #DoctorWho
We’ve created a special spectrogram of the TARDIS dematerialisation sound to celebrate nearly 60 years of the time-travelling ship.
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Something magical is coming. Our exhibition on the magic of #HarryPotter20 opens Oct 2017 bit.ly/2bdJtDU
ok, wow, unfollowing now. was a big fan of him becoming thane of cawdor. had no idea he was murdering his friends to be king hereafter.
Our #BLHarryPotter curator Alex Lock looks *very* happy to declare the exhibition well and truly open!
First in line.
We hope he has his Reader Pass, Reading Room ticket and face covering. If you have desk space booked, double check what you’ll need for your visit: ow.ly/XRGJ50ADU9E
We can’t wait to see you tomorrow
News just in! We've added 09.30 slots for #BLHarryPotter for Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays. Book now bit.ly/2AJXt3Y
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Here's a little sneak peek into what treasures you might expect to see tomorrow bit.ly/2m7yP7m
'I am the Cat who walks by himself, and all places are alike to me.' An Illustration from Rudyard Kipling's beloved tale. #NationalCatDay
‘In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit’.
#BornOnThisDay in 1892, J R R Tolkien wrote the first line of The Hobbit (1937) on a scrap of paper while he was marking exams. He later reflected, 'I did not and do not know why.' ⬇️
🔗 ow.ly/R5nS50CSf0Y
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Happy #Hanukkah! The Jewish festival of lights starts tonight. A new candle is lit each day, as this image from a 12th-century Italian prayer book shows. Other customs include eating doughnuts, giving gifts and playing a traditional spinning top game.
Harry Potter: A History of Magic opens 20 Oct – a thrilling exhibition of Library treasures & material from ’s own archive #HP20
We’re back. Thank you to all the brilliant researchers who returned today.
The Library really has been nothing without you
#EidMubarak to those celebrating Eid al-Fitr, marking the end of Ramadan. Here is a beautiful Qur'an manuscript copied in Jerusalem in 792 AH (1390 CE). Find out more about our Qur'an manuscripts here ow.ly/wNyE50uw9fX
Today, we're celebrating like it's 11/1/1111
#Twosday
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Harry Potter: A History of Magic, our spellbinding new exhibition, opens one week today! #BLHarryPotter bit.ly/2yhap2U
Happy #BackToHogwarts Day! One of our favourite lessons: Potions Class with Meydenbach's 'Ortus Sanitatis' (1491). Who’s with us?
Happy #Hanukkah! This stunning page decorated with gold is from ‘Decisions of Isaiah of Trani the Younger', a Hebrew manuscript from Italy (1374). It describes the laws associated with the Jewish festival of lights and depicts the lighting of the Hanukiah.
'I'm not over-fond of animals. I am merely astounded by them.'
Happy birthday Sir David Attenborough!
(Photo by Fay Godwin, 1984).
Missed it the first time? Harry Potter: A History of Magic will be shown on again at 10.00 today!
It's like #Christmas has come early. Oh wait... #BLHarryPotter
No matter what book you're reading, where you're reading it, or how you're reading it this #BookLoversDay, enjoy!
(Image from 'Lilliput Lyrics' by William Brighty Rands and Charles Robinson, 1899)
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We are saddened to hear of the death of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.
We wish to offer our most sincere condolences to the Royal Family at this sad time.
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First up is this manuscript in Elizabeth I’s own hand. It is a draft of a speech given in 1563 to Parliament, responding to their pressure to marry. Elizabeth carefully selected her words as seen in the numerous corrections here. ow.ly/p7rf50kioO3 #NationalHandwritingDay
‘I felt my lungs inflate with the onrush of scenery—air, mountains, trees, people. I thought, ‘This is what it is to be happy’.’
— Sylvia Plath
#EarthDay 🌍
Happy birthday to our favourite Transfiguration Professor! Can anyone else see McGonagall's steely gaze in this 'Historia animalium'?
"This little C14th Book of Hours which we digitised earlier this year is full of topsy-turvy antics in the margins. But I particularly love the series of animal musicians - it looks like they're having a real shindig!" - Eleanor Jackson, Curator of Illuminated Manuscripts
This #StarWarsDay uncover Yoda lookalikes in a galaxy not so far away. More in our blog you will find. bit.ly/2rkr0Ou
#MayThe4thBeWithYou
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We never tire of this sight, no matter how often we look at the King's Library. #BookLoversDay
Send us your best #shelfie! We'd love to see them. 📚
'In ancient times cats were worshipped as gods; they have not forgotten this.' - Terry Pratchett
Presenting our feline overlords from the collection for #InternationalCatDay.
9 Nov: How do you say ‘Snitch’ in Icelandic? A global panel discusses the challenges of translating Harry Potter bit.ly/2eGf6fm
#DidYouKnow it took four years of teams working five days a week to move all of the Library items from the to the site at St Pancras?
#LibraryMemories #ForEveryone
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Delighted to announce that Elizabeth I letters relating to the imprisonment of Mary, Queen of Scots have been donated to the Library bit.ly/2BelMM5
Do you recognise this script? If you think it's traditional Chinese calligraphy, look again.
These are English words with their letters reorganised by artist Xu Bing into forms that look like Chinese characters. See more of his work in our #MakingYourMark exhibition.
Today marks the anniversary of the British Library being created in 1973. This was the outcome of the British Library Act 1972. Before this, we were once part of the British Museum, which supplied the majority of the items we hold in the new library. #OnThisDay
In this letter to Charles Babbage, Ada Lovelace proposes a calculation that may be worked out by an engine rather than a human – it’s the first time the idea of a computer programme had been set out in writing. See it in #BLTreasures bit.ly/2OyDCvT #AdaLovelaceDay
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Cameras come in all sizes! This photograph shows a 36 x 36 inch camera for half tone images. Two assistants stand beside the massive camera in the Photographic Department of the Survey of India. #PhotoFriday
📷 Calcutta, 1911, BL Photo 572/1(132)
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Between 1875 and 1886, the Society for Photographing Relics of Old London produced records of buildings that were about to be demolished, or were under threat of disappearing. The result is a photographic archive of London streets as they were in the late 1800s.
Tab.700.b.3.
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The basilisk! Did you know in ancient times you could kill a basilisk by dropping a weasel down its burrow?! #AskACurator #BLHarryPotter
Discovered on the back of Egyptian farm accounts, Aristotle’s 4th-century BCE ‘Constitution of the Athenians’ was thought to be lost forever bit.ly/2Gmdq6V #ManuscriptMonday
The poem 'Sir Gawain and the Green Knight' begins when a Christmas feast at Camelot is interrupted by a mysterious green knight riding a green horse. This masterpiece of Middle English literature survives solely in this single manuscript ow.ly/WRSs50jr4Gm #BLTreasures
...but only one click to your guide to Harry Potter: A History of Magic (in numbers) bit.ly/2wBc6EK #BLHarryPotter
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Same.
Quote Tweet
leaving the british library for lunch after downloading one pdf and changing the font on an essay
twitter.com/Sebby_Col/stat
Introducing a new Twitter emoji celebrating the 20th anniversary of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone! #HarryPotter20
Swooping in for #NationalBirdDay, here are our two feathery friends from Audubon's beautiful 'Birds of America' bit.ly/2CILdVI
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Fur-get about getting anything done today – it’s #BlackCatDay. We might be scrolling through this hashtag all day. Pro-cat-stination galore!
Things we love about books:
The smell on opening
The rustle as you turn a page
Being swept away to far off worlds
Seeing into another’s soul
The feeling you've made a new friend
Losing all sense of time
The fire it ignites within you
Repeating it all over again...
#WorldBookDay
Behold this intricately drawn picture, titled 'Unicorn'. It shows a woman in a flowing blue dress, protecting one of the most beautiful mythical creatures from a hunter. #NationalUnicornDay
Shelfmark: Harley 3448 f. 36v
In the 16th century, it was fashionable for rich women to wear tiny books hanging from their belts or ‘girdles’. This girdle book is bound in gold and black enamel. When opened it reveals a portrait of Henry VIII and is rumoured to have belonged to his second wife, Anne Boleyn 🧵
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Today is the #WinterSolstice, the shortest day of the year. Also known as Midwinter and by several other names across the globe it has been celebrated by people since neolithic times.
Shelfmark 16116.d.1
It's #NationalWritingDay! May the plaintive lion of procrastination be ever thwarted by the massive upright desk of creativity (Harley 2982)
How it started How it's going
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The library is dangerous –
Don’t go in. If you do
You know what will happen.
It’s like a pet store or a bakery –
Every single time you’ll come out of there
Holding something in your arms.
— Don't Go into the Library, Alberto Ríos 📚
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Did you know that Monolopy, the board game synonymous with capitalism (and Friday night family feuds), was actually invented by a feminist who wanted to promote the opposite?
This #WomensHistoryMonth let us introduce you to Lizzie Magie, who created The Landlords Game in 1903 🎲
Harry Potter: A History of Magic closes today! Have you seen it? Let us know what you loved about the exhibition using #BLHarryPotter
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Today marks #100years to the day of Royal Assent of the Act which gave some women the right to vote. Both our St Pancras and Boston Spa sites are flying Suffragette flags to celebrate this momentous occasion. #Suffrage100 #onthisday
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Happy 200th birthday to Emily Brontë! She and her sister Anne, invented their own imaginary world called Gondal and Emily copied out 45 poems relating to Gondal in this notebook which can be seen in our #BLTreasures Gallery bit.ly/2M15Tts #Bronte200 #Emily200
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Season’s Greetings from the British Library ❄️
Wishing you a peaceful and safe Christmas. See you in 2021.
🐦 Sherborne Missal, Illuminated Manuscript, Add MS 74236
Our thoughts are with the staff and users of our esteemed counterpart, the Vernadsky National Library of Ukraine, in Kyiv. The threat you face to life and limb, and to the precious intellectual and cultural heritage in your collections, is an outrage.
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This c.1573-5 watercolour is one of the oldest depictions of Stonehenge, and the first to have been drawn on site. It illustrates Lucas De Heere’s guidebook to Britain, entitled Corte Beschryvinghe van England, Scotland, ende Irland. bit.ly/2FTMDv0 #EnglishTourismWeek
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This tiny magazine fits into the palm of a librarian's hand. It was created in December 1829, when its authors were 12 and 13 years old. Blackwood’s Young Men’s Magazine was designed and written by brother and sister Branwell and Charlotte #Brontë.
#ItemOfTheWeek
📜Ashley MS 157
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Hey, I just met you
And this is crazy
But here's my spindle
So hold it maybe?
🔗 imagesonline.bl.uk/asset/6372
#KittyKnitter ##Caturday #SewHelpful
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#Onthisday over 1300 years ago, the oldest surviving, complete Latin Bible in the world began its journey to Italy. This October, Codex Amiatinus will return to the British Isles for the first time since 716 CE bit.ly/2LXZ0d0
© Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Florence
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The Berlin Wall fell #onthisday 1989. This information map from 1963 illustrates the wall and West Berlin surrounded by barbed wire #BLMaps
