The Public Domain Review

“A Further Account of What Was Contain’d in the Chinese Cabinet”, by Hans Sloane, M. D. from Philosophical Transactions, January 1753; London. An account by Sir Hans Sloane detailing the contents of a Chinese cabinet (which includes a “Sea Horse Tooth”) procured by a Mr Buckley during travels in China. A physician by trade Sloane was also an avid collector of natural curiosities and upon his death, bequeathed the entirety of his collection to the nation and, together with George II’s royal library, it was opened to the public as the British Museum in 1759. A note at the end of this account, which appears in the January 1753 accounts of the Royal Society (the same month that Sloane would pass away), praises the collecting of Mr Buckley: It were to be wished other travellers into Foreign parts would make such enquiries (as Mr Buckly [sic] who sent these to the Royal Society has done) into the Instruments and Materials made use of in the places where they come, that are any manner of way for the Benefit or innocent delight of Mankind, that we may content our selves with our own Inventions, where we go beyond them, and imitate […]

Selections from “Album 11″, a sketchbook belonging to the French neoclassical painter and revolutionary Jacques-Louis David. The sketches are from his student years in Rome in the 1770s, a time in which he became obsessed with the ancient and Renaissance art to be found in the city. During this period he made well over 1000 “Roman sketches” and relied on them as a visual resource throughout his career. Once returned to Paris, David dismantled his sketchbooks and reorganised the leaves into albums according to type, numbering 12 in total. This 11th album – held by the Getty Research Institute and included in The Getty’s Open Content program – is mainly concerned with studies of the bas-reliefs and sculptures from prominent Italian collections, including the ancient Roman paintings unearthed in Pompeii and Herculaneum. David was arguably the most influential European artist of the late 18th century, his thoughtful style of “history painting” marking a change in the moral climate at a crucial time in European history: the end of the Ancien Regime and birth of the French Revolution. David, a close friend of the revolutionary leader Maximilien Robespierre, was an active supporter of the French Revolution (he voted for the execution […]

Matthew Goodman explores the life and writings of Elizabeth Bisland, an American journalist propelled into the limelight when she set out in 1889 – head-to-head with fellow journalist Nellie Bly – on a journey to beat Phileas Fogg’s fictitious 80-day circumnavigation of the globe.

Volume 1 of the 6th edition of Samuel Johnson’s epic achievement A Dictionary of the English Language, published a year after his death in 1785.

“When I said I wanted a crowbar…” AND THE WINNER IS… FIRST PLACE “When I said I wanted a crowbar…” (submitted by Ollie Mustill, from London, UK) SECOND PLACE “When you can snatch a bird out of the sky by skewering it with a blunt pole, your training will be complete, Fido-san.” (submitted by John Durvin, from Atlanta, U.S.A) THIRD PLACE “These new magic sticks are rubbish – all mine does is attract crows. How's yours worked out?” (submitted by Cambridge Caption, @camcaption) Many congratulations to Ollie Mustill from London, UK, for providing the winning caption and being the well deserved recipient of a Public Domain Review tote bag! Didn’t win this time? Worry not, try your hand again, in the Caption Competition #3 to be launched next week! Learn more about The Public Domain Review Caption Competition by visiting the main competition page HERE. HELP TO KEEP US AFLOAT The Public Domain Review is a not-for-profit project and we rely on support from our readers to stay afloat. If you like what we do then please do consider making a donation. We welcome all contributions, big or small - everything helps! Become a Patron Small angel : £3.00 GBP […]

“Ah! fors’è lui” and “Sempre libera” from Act I of Giuseppe Verdi’s La Traviata performed by the Spanish singer Lucrezia Bori in August 1910 for Edison Records. Verdi’s opera in 3 acts has a libretto penned by Francesco Maria Piave and is based on La Dame aux Camélias (1852), a play adapted from the novel by Alexandre Dumas. Housed at: Internet Archive Underlying Work: PD 70 & PD 50 Years | Digital Copy: No Additional Rights Download: VBR MP3 HELP TO KEEP US AFLOAT The Public Domain Review is a not-for-profit project and we rely on support from our readers to stay afloat. If you like what we do then please do consider making a donation. We welcome all contributions, big or small - everything helps! Become a Patron Small angel : £3.00 GBP - monthly Medium sized hero : £5.00 GBP - monthly Large emperor : £10.00 GBP - monthly Vast deity : £20.00 GBP - monthly Make a one off Donation SIGN UP TO THE NEWSLETTER Sign up to get our free fortnightly newsletter which shall deliver direct to your inbox the latest brand new article and a digest of the most recent collection items. Simply add your […]

A small pamphlet (in the series "Little journeys to the homes of great musicians") on the life of the Italian composer Guiseppe Verdi, beginning with a fictionalised account of his childhood meeting with his early patron Signior Barezzi and his eldest daughter Margherita, with whom Verdi ended up falling in love.

A selection of pages from a remarkable book produced sometime in the 1890s, an album of full-page colour illustrations (what look to be chromolithographs) of landmark sites in the “Holy Land”, opposite to which are mounted arrangements of dried flowers picked from the location shown. The album is bound in boards of olive wood with inlaid border and leather spine. It was produced and sold by the publisher Boulos Meo at his antique shop at the Jaffa Gate in Jerusalem. See more over at The Getty Research Institute. The Getty Research Institute Underlying Work: PD Worldwide | Digital Copy: No Additional Rights Download: Right click on image or see source for higher res versions HELP TO KEEP US AFLOAT The Public Domain Review is a not-for-profit project and we rely on support from our readers to stay afloat. If you like what we do then please do consider making a donation. We welcome all contributions, big or small - everything helps! Become a Patron Small angel : £3.00 GBP - monthly Medium sized hero : £5.00 GBP - monthly Large emperor : £10.00 GBP - monthly Vast deity : £20.00 GBP - monthly Make a one off Donation SIGN UP […]

Four photographs depicting dramatic scenes from an "auto polo" match, a version of polo played using cars rather than horses. The sport - thought to have been invented as a publicity stunt by a Ford automobile dealer from Topeka to sell Model Ts - was popular at fairs, exhibitions and sports venues across the United States and several areas in Europe from 1911 until the late 1920s.

This October marks 300 years since the birth of French Enlightenment thinker Denis Diderot. Although perhaps best known for co-founding the Encylopédie, Philipp Blom argues for the importance of Diderot's philosophical writings and how they offer a pertinent alternative to the Enlightenment cult of reason spearheaded by his better remembered contemporaries Voltaire and Rousseau.