In 1605, two years after James VI of Scotland’s accession to the English throne as James I, Francis Bacon published The Advancement of Learning, in which he presented to the king his proposals for a reformation of knowledge and the establishment of new methods of scientific progress. He sent a copy of The Advancement of Learning to Thomas Bodley, ‘in regard of your great and rare desert of learning. For books are the shrines where the Saint is, or is believed to be: and you having built an Ark to save learning from deluge’. Bacon later sent the Library this copy of Novum organum. Its velvet binding has an old-fashioned version of the University’s arms on its upper cover, and on its lower cover the author’s own crest of a wild boar.

Arch. A c.5