![]() ![]() A poor soul who was unclaimed at the end of her earthly life, neither receiving a proper burial or respect. From the little information we have, most would assume she was a woman who had lived a difficult and sad life. What I ask, who was the women bound forever in the book at Harvard? We don’t know what her dreams and desires were, did she have lovers and children and meaningful passions before she was locked away from society? Only a line or two we know about the person who became a binder for a book. A wonderful church going and God fearing man he was, who unfortunately fell out of a tree to his death spying on his neighbor’s wife. Imagine binding the old pervert uncle Don over a big and thick smut novel. Even families would honor their deceased with an endearing book binder that could be passed down to generations of kin to enjoy. There are many reports of this practice being used, starting in the 16th Century. Note, the practice of binding books with human skin is called anthropodermic bibliopegy. Well well, you the reader decide, a madman or not? “A book about the human soul deserved to have a human covering: I had kept this piece of human skin taken from the back of a woman.” By looking carefully you easily distinguish the pores of the skin,” he wrote. “This book is bound in human skin parchment on which no ornament has been stamped to preserve its elegance. Inside the book is a note written in French where Bouland explains his thinking. The story goes that the author of Des destinées de l’âme, Arsène Houssaye, gave a copy of his book to a friend, the renowed French doctor Ludovic Bouland, who bound the book with human skin from an unclaimed body of a female mental patience who had died from a cardiovascular issue. The book was not the handiwork of a madman like Buffalo Bill from the novel and film The Silence of the Lambs, (maybe) but a donation to Harvard in the 1930’s. The data revealed - with 99 percent certainty - that the binding was made out of human skin, according to Senior Rare Book Conservator Alan Puglia.In the Houghton Library at the great learning institute of Harvard, you will find a book called Des destinées de l’âme ( Destinies of the Soul in English) that is bound in human skin. The skin was further analysed using a technique called liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry, which determines the order of amino acids and reveals differences between species. This process made it clear that the parchment did not come from other common sources such as cows, sheep or goats and showed that it was consistent with human skin, but could also belong to other primates such as gibbons or gorillas. In order to verify whether or not it was indeed human skin, tiny samples were taken from the binding and these were analysed using a technique called peptide mass fingerprinting, an analytical approach that identifies the provenance of proteins. On other occasions, copies of judicial proceedings were bound in the skin of the convicted murderers detailed within them.ĭespite the inscription claiming that Houssaye's book was bound in this way, Harvard librarians haven't conducted thorough tests on the skin until now. A famous example of this is James Allen's book The Highwayman: Narrative of the Life of James Allen alias George Walton - Allen requested that the book be bound in his own skin. Binding books in human skin is a practice called "anthropodermic bibliopegy" and it was carried out since the 17th century, often at the request of the skin's "owner". ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |