What Is The Oldest Book You Own?

[pyan]

A copy of The Old Curiosity Shop bound with Master Humphrey's Clock, by Charles Dickens, dated 1840.

SFF: A 1910 edition of The Marvellous Land of Oz, L.Frank Baum, many illustrations, as they say.

[McMurphy]

Originally Posted by pyan

SFF: A 1910 edition of The Marvellous Land of Oz, L.Frank Baum, many illustrations, as they say.

I am officially jealous!

[AE35Unit]

Erm could be H.G.Wells's The men in the Moon or maybe Olaf Stapledon's First and Last Men which is a very old Penguin Classic,anyone on here read this book,i find it a little daunting!
I also have a Jules Verne paperback somewhere,and it is reckoned he was the first professional SF writer.

[Rosemary]

'Wild Wales' by George Borrow, 1862 is my oldest book and which I still re-read on occasions.

'Familiar Wild Birds' by W. Swaysland is another, this copy was printed in 1901.

My oldest fantasy book would have to be a copy of LOTR, 1954 which I found in a second hand book shop.

[bruno-1012]

Oldest books I have a re a couple of PG Wodehouse 1st editions from 1954 and 57.

Oldest items I have held are an artists impression of Thomas Bouch's suspension bridge design for the Forth Bridge circa 1870 and the as-built drawings for Fowler and Baker's Forth Bridge circa 1890.

[Giovanna Clairval]

A 1721 leather-bound book by an unknown person who wrote about the world, just all of it, in Latin, and the book was published in Pavia (the capital of the Lombard Kingdom until A.D. 753, which has nothing to do with the book, of course.)

[HardScienceFan]

Otto Welten's "Die Pharetronen de Essener Grunsandes",ca 1910
Again, great illo's.
Old books are like fine wines
and the funny thing is:i always start to imagine what the world was like when the books was published.

everything is different in old books,especially the fonts
and that lovely smell........................

[digs]

A tiny version of the "Poetical Works of Longfellow" c. 1902 which my grandma gave to me on my 18th birthday. I'm scared to read any of it in case it falls apart.

Oldest SFF I'm not sure, nothing impressive...I have a lot of creased old second-handers that I love though.

[mosaix]

A gift for my birthday - an 1883 edition of 'A Verbatim Reprint Of the First Edition of Caxton's Game And Playe Of Chesse - Published 1474.'

It's a strange book, not just difficult to read, but it explains the laws of chess as more or less a social dialogue. Each piece has its part to play just as their human counter-parts have an equivalent standing in society.

[j. d. worthington]

Originally Posted by mosaix

A gift for my birthday - an 1883 edition of 'A Verbatim Reprint Of the First Edition of Caxton's Game And Playe Of Chesse - Published 1474.'

It's a strange book, not just difficult to read, but it explains the laws of chess as more or less a social dialogue. Each piece has its part to play just as their human counter-parts have an equivalent standing in society.

Now, that sounds an interesting little volume, frankly.... okay, I know: I'm verrrry strange.....

[HoopyFrood]

No, I agree, that does sound very interesting.

And again, not one I own, but I'm currently perusing a copy of A Midsummer Night's Dream published in 1895.

[Reading_fanatic]

Um my oldest book is The Hobbit by J.R.R.Tolkien printed 1978 as a special edition (So it has a fancy cover)

[Iorek444]

A 4 volume set "Shakespeare's Complete Works". The only date I can find is in an introduction, 1864.

[gully_foyle]

A copy of Madame Bovary from 1890ish (not at home so I can't check).

Joe Strong Boy Fish by Vance Barnum, a rollicking tale of a boy with fishy tendencies. Around 1910 (see disclaimer above)

[Urlik]

the oldest books I have seen and handled are a set of French books about the Napoleonic War. Leather bound with marbling on the inside of the cover and dated in the mid 1800's (I can't remember anything else about them, but my mother has them somewhere)

the oldest I own is probably a pocket reference book on Greek Mythology which was my grandmother's but I seem to have mislaid it so I can't check the publishing date.

I have a lot of Heinlein, Azimov, Clarke and Bradbury that were printed in the 60's