Annals of the Bodleian Library, Oxford, A.D. 1598-A.D. 1867 / With a Preliminary Notice of the earlier Library founded in the Fourteenth Century

by William Dunn Macray

A.D. 1764.

The Editio princeps of Homer, Florence, 1488, was bought for £6 6s.

A.D. 1768.

H. Owen, the Librarian, and Principal of Jesus College, died in March of this year, and was buried in his College Chapel. In his room was elected the Rev. John Price, B.D., of Jesus College, 'after a severe contest with Mr. Cleaver, of Brasenose, afterwards head of that College and Bishop of St. Asaph, who used to say that he was indebted to Mr. Price for his mitre, for had he obtained the Bodleian he should have there continued, instead of becoming tutor in a noble family, and so placed in the road to advancement. In this election the votes were equal, and Mr. Price, being senior, was nominated by the Vice-Chancellor[259].' Price appears to have been employed in the Library as early as the year 1760, when a payment of £8 8s. was made to him; in 1766 he signs, together with Owen and Thomas Parker, an account of books received from Stationers' Hall.

[259] Note by Dr. Bliss in the edition of Wood's Life published, in 1848, by the Eccl. Hist. Soc. p. 88.

A.D. 1770.

The Library was largely enriched with books which were then modern, in which it appears to have been very deficient, by the legacy of the library of Rev. Charles Godwyn, M.A., Fellow of Balliol College. The collection, which is still in the main kept undivided (although a few folio and quarto volumes are placed in the general class marked Art.), consists chiefly of works in English and general history, civil and ecclesiastical, published in the eighteenth century, and includes besides the later Benedictine editions of the Fathers. There is also a series of theological and literary pamphlets; to which have been added of late years upwards of 2400 volumes, of all dates and on all subjects, which are now all alike numbered, for convenience sake, in connection with Godwyn's own. The residue of his property, after payment of all claims and bequests, formed a further portion of his legacy; and the interest upon £1050 which accrued from this source, still forms part of the annual income of the Library.

A.D. 1771.

A payment of £2 12s. 6d. was made in this year (or rather, at the close of 1770) to a glass-painter, named Brooks, for one of the coats of arms in the great east window.