The Earliest Books at the University of London (1838): 185 Volumes Presented by Nathaniel Vye, Esq.

The University of London was established by royal charter in November 1836, and its first donations of books are recorded in Senate Minutes of 1838. The list begins, atypically for the years before 1871, with two bulk donations. The first of these summarises: ‘Parliamentary Reports and Papers on Education in England, Scotland and Ireland. Presented by the Chancellor and Mr. Warburton’, and refers to minutes of the Committee of the Faculty of Medicine for a full list. These minutes show the reports to date from 1809 to 1837, and to focus on Ireland; most are on primary or secondary education, and appear unrelated to universities (a local English example is ‘Reports from the Select Committee on the Education of the Lower Orders in the Metropolis’).2 The record of the second bulk donation states briefly: ‘185 volumes. Presented by Nathaniel Vye, Esq.’ Nothing indicates the further identity of the donor or the motivation for the donation, and, unlike the educational reports, no list survives elsewhere. It is this hitherto unidentified group of books which forms the basis for this article.