Treasured manuscript back in city
Oct 25 2008 by Dan Warburton, The Journal
A PRECIOUS Shakespeare first folio arrived in Durham yesterday. Thieves stole a 17th Century manuscript by The Bard from the city’s university library a decade ago.
And the arrival of the 1623 first folio in Durham yesterday marked the latest stage of a police investigation sparked in Washington DC in July.
Experts will now examine the work at first hand after flying it across the Atlantic. Two Durham Police detectives and the university’s librarian, Dr John Hall, accompanied the £15m manuscript, landing at 10.30am. The return of the 900-page folio is thought to represent a major development in the lengthy police investigation.
But it is still unclear when – or if – the work will go on display at Durham University library on Palace Green – the scene of the theft nearly 10 years ago.
A police spokesman said: “The book will now be held in secure and controlled conditions while our inquiries into this matter continue.”
The investigation began in July when book dealer Raymond Scott, 51, entered the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington and asked experts to verify the folio as genuine.
Experts at the centre said they thought the book was that taken from Durham University in 1998.
Mr Scott was arrested during a raid at his home in Widgeon Close, Ayton Village, Washington, following a tip-off by the British Embassy in the USA.
But the 51-year-old – who lives with his 80-year-old mother – maintains the book he took for verification in America is not the Durham folio.
He is due to answer his bail next month and has called for the police to return the book so he can auction it and donate some of the proceeds to charity.
Prof Chris Higgins, Vice-Chancellor of Durham University, said: “We are pleased the Shakespeare First Folio is back in Durham and we await the outcome of the police investigation.”
Several other rare literary treasures were stolen in the raid on the Palace Green Library.
Two hand-written manuscripts from the late 14th or early 15th Century were taken, one bearing an English translation of the New Testament and the other containing a fragment of a poem by Chaucer.
Books stolen included a first edition of Beowulf and two editions by the 10th Century scholar Aelfric, one printed in 1566 and the other in 1709.
They were among more than 50 works on public display in two rooms of the library charting the progress of English literature from the Middle Ages to the 20th Century.
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