Collections : [Rare Book & Manuscript Library]

This collection contains the administrative records of the Rare Book and Manuscript Library, from its days as the Department of Special Collections to the present.

The collection consists of 624 cuneiform tablets (dating from circa 3100-539 BCE), and some ancient clay objects. Accompanying these are some twentieth century casts, and a collection of catalogs of the collection, articles about various parts, especially Plimpton 322, and correspondence about the tablets, including a number of letters, mostly from Edgar J. Banks, to George A. Plimpton, and others about tablets now in the Columbia collection.

This collection consists of the publications of the special collection libraries at Columbia University.

The George A. Plimpton Papers consist largely of personal and professional correspondence, financial and real estate records, personal diaries and albums, writings, and lectures produced by or for George Arthur Plimpton. But the Papers also contains not only the correspondence and records of Plimpton's colleagues at Ginn and Company, the publishing house that Plimpton led for decades, but also correspondence and records relating to the dozens of other institutions and organizations that Plimpton helped lead. In addition to extensive correspondence relating to Plimpton's collecting of rare books, manuscripts, and historical artifacts, the Papers also contain such diverse items as autographs of presidents, handwriting specimens, studies of medieval manuscripts, and documents relating to the American slave trade.