Research Notes

Turnbull Library Record, Volume 16, Issue 2, 1 October 1983, Page 126

Research Notes

The Library has placed a subscription to ‘The Eighteenth Century’, the microfilm edition of a selection of titles listed in the Eighteenth Century Short-Title Catalogue of books published in Britain, its possessions, and the United States from 1701-1800. This will supplement the Turnbull’s holdings of the microfilm editions of titles listed in Pollard and Redgrave, and Wing. All microfilms in the three series are available on library interloan.

The first fascicle of John Abbot’s Insects of Georgia was published by the Endowment Trust on 5 May 1983. This fascicle contains six facsimile colour reproductions from Abbot’s set of 103 watercolours, together with descriptions and an introductory essay by P. G. Parkinson. The paintings were completed in 1818 for a commission by William Swainson, the British naturalist, and brought to New Zealand in 1841. The second fascicle of 10 reproductions is planned for early 1984.

The Turnbull Library Endowment Trust has agreed to publish the second volume of‘First Hand Accounts of Maori Life’, the transcription and translation of the logs of the 1772 expedition of Marion du Fresne in the Mascarin and Marquis de Castries. The first volume, de Surville’s expedition of 1769, was published in March 1983. Oxford University Press will be issuing late in September 1983 In the Light of the Past: Stained Glass Windows in New Zealand Houses, by J. O. C. Phillips and Chris Maclean. Research for the book was assisted by grants from the Turnbull Research Endowment Fund and the Library has purchased the photographic documentation for its collections.

The Government Printer is negotiating with the Library to publish ‘Mrs Hobson’s Album’, a manuscript volume of paintings, drawings, verse, translations from the Maori, and messages of goodwill presented to Mrs Hobson (widow of William Hobson, governor of New Zealand, 1841-1842) by the citizens of New Zealand on her return to England in 1843. The Turnbull Library Endowment Trust has agreed to underwrite the publication of a bibliography of materials relating to women in New Zealand from the 1820 s to the First World War. The bibliography is based on a list prepared by Patricia Sargison for Professor Sandra Myres’s research on pioneer women during her tenure of a Fulbright Research Scholarship in 1982.

The New Zealand Early Modern Studies Association’s Turnbull seminar in August 1983 was held around the theme ‘Society and Culture in Early Modern Europe’. With the assistance of grants from the Turnbull Research Fund two speakers, Peter Burke and Keith Thomas, came from the Humanities Research Centre in Canberra.

The National Register of Archives and Manuscripts (NRAM) has issued the first 1000 entries in microfiche, and in May the first instalment of 250 entries of the B series was published. To date 30 institutions have contributed 1,250 entries. Twelve institutions have reported 10 or more collections and 18 less than 10. The major contributors to date are: Alexander Turnbull Auckland Institute and Library 338 Museum 61 Auckland University 209 Victoria University 44 Canterbury Museum 171 New Plymouth Public Canterbury Public Library 124 Library 33 Taranaki Museum 109 Hocken Library 31 University of Canterbury 105 Gisborne Museum 17

Notes on Contributors Brian hooker, a map collector, has taken a particular interest in the early mapping of New Zealand and has published on this topic in the New Zealand Journal of History. He has also published facsimile maps of New Zealand and the Pacific under the imprint Pan Pacific Fine Art Ltd. sharon dell, ba (hons), dip nzls, is Maori Materials Subject Specialist at the Alexander Turnbull Library.