'A remarkable time capsule': The enchanting history of Oxford University's 750-year-old medieval library

Predating the Aztec Empire, Merton College Library in Oxford has been used by everyone from celebrated 14th-Century mathematicians to JRR Tolkien. In an exclusive interview with the BBC for its 750th birthday, its librarian describes what makes it so special.

At Merton College in Oxford, there is an antique chest. In the Middle Ages, three key-holders had to be summoned to reveal the riches within. But this treasure wasn't gold or jewels. It was books.

Such strict security may sound overly cautious for mere parchment. But in an era before the printing press, books were a valuable commodity. They could take months to produce, as the entire text had to be painstakingly written out by hand. So, just as universities solicit cash from their alumni today, Merton College insisted its 13th-Century fellows donated books.

The Archbishop of Canterbury issued a decree in 1276 introducing this requirement, which marked the beginning of the library at Merton College. It has been running continuously ever since. To put that length of time in context, Merton's library predates the Aztec Empire. Its unbroken history stretches from before the Black Death to beyond the Covid-19 pandemic. And its users have encompassed everyone from famous 14th-Century mathematicians to Lord of the Rings author JRR Tolkien.

This month marks the library's 750th anniversary. It's a major milestone. But Merton's extraordinary lifespan has been recognised since the Victoria era, when it was routinely described as the oldest library in England.

In the 20th Century, writers like Rudyard Kipling and John Buchan referenced it in works of historical fiction, bolstering its reputation as a particularly venerable library. As the cultural recognition of "the famous Merton Library" grew, claims about its longevity became exaggerated. Some overzealous Oxonians even declared it the oldest library in the world.

The origins of the historic library

Historians today are more careful about making such bold declarations. "It's a complicated question," says Prof Teresa Webber from the University of Cambridge. "There's no single definition of a library. And there were all sorts of stages in the development of what we think of today as a library."

The origins of the library at Merton are certainly different from how we think of such institutions now. There was no librarian and there were no shelves for browsing. "There was a system of loaning and returning books from the chest," Merton's librarian, Dr Julia Walworth tells the BBC. "It would have been a formal thing. Rather than just saying, 'Oh, go rummage and find the books you need,' the whole community would come together to open the chest."

Merton's collection started evolving into a modern library quite quickly. Just a few years after the Archbishop's decree, several books were stored outside the chest for the first time. They were chained to a table in the college, making them available at any time. According to Walworth, this innovation "anticipates the modern distinction between loan and reference library collections".

Merton's book treasury moved closer to becoming a modern library in the 1370s, when a purpose-built room was constructed to house the growing collection. It was here that Merton introduced a vital improvement in book storage. "Horizontal shelves were installed for placing books upright," Walworth says. "Merton is the first recorded use in Britain of this method of storing books."

Curiously, Merton's books were shelved with their spines inwards and their titles inked on the paper facing out. This was due to the continued use of chains, which were clipped on the fore-edge of each book's cover. "The fellows were aware that chained books........

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