Lasting Impressions: Understanding the significance of the Great Seal of England

Ana Jacobsen viewing the Great Seal of England in the Reading Room
Ana Jacobsen viewing the Great Seal of England in the Reading Room

Symbols and reminders of the British Commonwealth in modern day Australia appear not only in the form of images but also in the language we adopt. The terminology we use to define the status of our laws, what we choose to call the day this continent was colonised and the figures we decide to honour in the naming of our streets, suburbs and cities are all linguistic reflections of our nation’s apparent values.

Understanding the history of certain monarchical practices in England can help us to understand the origin of colonial perspectives that not only go unquestioned but still get largely celebrated in contemporary culture and society.

The University of Melbourne’s Rare Books collection houses many items that can assist in this kind of research that involves developing an understanding of the significance of a residual British colonial presence in Australia.

One such item is the Great Seal of England – also known as the Great Seal of the Realm – which has been used since the 11th century to signify the approval and authentication of state documents by the monarch. Originally made by pressing an engraved matrix into a wax and resin mixture, the Great Seal served as an accessible means of pictorial expression to show that an official document had been approved by the sovereign during a time when much of the population of England could not read or write.

The Great Seal of England, 1338, Rare Books, University of Melbourne
The Great Seal of England, 1338, Rare Books, University of Melbourne

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Engaging Digital Learning Tools: a virtual tour of Horizon lines

Horizon lines exhibition

There is only one month left to experience the Noel Shaw Gallery’s current exhibition, Horizon lines: the ambitions of a print collection. Showcasing works from renowned European print makers such as Albrecht Dürer, Adriaen van Ostade and Rembrandt, the exhibition celebrates some of the significant pieces within the Baillieu Library Print Collection and helps students connect to the cultural history of their institution.

A virtual tour is now accessible through the University of Melbourne’s Library website that identifies objects or motifs within selected prints and links them to architecture, sculptures or other fascinating items within the Special Collections that can be found on the Parkville campus. Discover how the Tudor-style windows of the Old Quadrangle Building relate to van Ostade’s The Painter and learn where to find an armillary sphere like the one that can be seen in Jacopo Caraglio’s School of an Ancient Philosopher. This virtual tour was created by Mary Henkel, one of this year’s research assistant interns for the Special Collections at the University of Melbourne.

 

Ana Jacobsen

Special Collections and Grainger Museum Blogger

Ana is currently studying a Master of Creative Writing, Editing and Publishing.

Fritz Loewe and polar exploration

Figure 1: Fritz Loewe

The University of Melbourne Archives is thrilled to announce that the papers of meteorologist and glaciologist Fritz Loewe, first acquired by the University of Melbourne Archives in 1988, have been arranged and described in detail in online finding aids, which are now accessible from our online catalogue.

After a long search for funding and a German speaking archivist, researchers can search across three series for key events, important correspondents and research expeditions as well as being able to view file titles in both German and English.

Correspondence in the 2019.0020 series between Loewe and various University of Melbourne professors offers insight into migration out of Germany from Nazi persecution and the role that institutions such as The University of Melbourne played in assisting Jewish people escape Europe.

Researchers can find data gathered at the beginning of the 20th Century from the ice caps of Greenland and Antarctica in the 2019.0021 series, particularly Loewe’s research on Greenland (including his experiences on the Wegener Expedition in 1929-1930) and Antarctica (including the Wyatt Earp Expedition in 1947 and the French Scientific Expedition in 1950-1951). These are important records that may hold valuable evidence of climatic changes and patterns in polar activity.

Loewe collected and curated travel guides, hiking and topographical maps, including maps of the German Reich, as well as keeping journals, newsletters and magazines from various associations and societies. These publications have been collated in the 2019.0022 series.

Many photographs taken by Loewe and his fellow expedition members are discoverable through UMA’s Digitised Items Catalogue, available on the UMA homepage.

Fritz Loewe’s papers are a significant part of UMA’s holdings of collections relating to polar exploration. His research in Antarctica follows the work of earlier explorers, such as geologist and the University’s first Vice-chancellor Sir Raymond Priestley. Part of Ernest Shackleton’s (1907-1909) and Robert Falcon Scott’s disastrous (1910-1913) expeditions, his collection of 1,300 glass lantern slides are digitised and available on the Digitised Items catalogue.

The University’s involvement in Antarctic research is illustrated in material found in the University Registrar’s Correspondence series, from its earliest beginnings through to the 1980s. Researchers can also use the Registrar’s Correspondence series to follow the University’s efforts to bring Loewe to Melbourne, and head Australia’s first university Department of Meteorology.

For further information about UMA collection material relating to Antarctica see the Polar Exploration subject guide.

Figure 2: Sir Ernest Shackleton’s Antarctic Expedition

Figure 1: Loewe looking through an instrument, undated, Fritz Leowe Collection,1988.0160.00097

Figure 2: Sir Ernest Shackleton’s Antarctic Expedition, January 1908. Sir Raymond Priestley Collection, 2017.0071.00685

Discovering global connections of a drawing from the University of Melbourne collection

There is more to the drawing which is described as ‘Adoration’, in the University of Melbourne’s print collection, than first meets the eye. This monochrome drawing on blue paper depicts a common theme in medieval and Renaissance art: Mary and infant Jesus. On the mat of the work, an artist’s name and date is neatly written, as well as the name of the collection that the drawing comes from (The John Lane Collection). I thought that my research would be simple because of the common iconography and as the name of the artist and collection appeared to be known but, I was pleasantly surprised. I will explain my reasoning for thinking that this work may fit into a rich collection of drawings all done by the same artist as preparation for a large oil painting.

Attributed to Pietro de Pietri, Adoration, pen and sepia ink with white bodycolor on prepared blue paper
Attributed to Pietro de Pietri, Adoration, pen and sepia ink with white bodycolor on prepared blue paper

My initial research goal was to figure out whether the name written in pen on the mat and on the drawing is the correct attribution. The name written, Pietro de Pietri (1633-1716), is a baroque artist whose work appears in museums all over the world. Looking at his other works, I not only found drawings that were similar to the University of Melbourne’s in style but also in iconography and composition.

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Australian Comics: Reflecting on our National Identity through Object-Based Learning

The University of Melbourne’s Special Collections – which comprises Rare Books, Rare Prints and Rare Music Collections – houses approximately 272,000 items, with the Rare Books Collection contributing to 250,000 of those materials.This abundance of primary resources may be utilised for innovative research, especially when considered as an inexhaustible source for Object-Based Learning (or OBL). OBL is a relatively new approach to understanding objects in an academic context, using the kinaesthetic, immersive experience of being in the presence of or handling archival material in order to understand and learn about it more effectively. As an educational methodology, it correlates with the principle concepts of New Materialism theory and its consideration of matter as inherently dynamic and susceptible to taking on new meaning from both human and non-human perspectives.

When recording, documenting or archiving history, there are always going to be infinite variations of ‘the story of an object’ at play. It’s important that we consistently revisit and reassess how an object has been understood up until this time so as to maintain a critical dialogue surrounding its ontology. This helps us to form a deeper understanding not just of our own personal histories and identities but also of those on a national and international scale.

Within the Rare Books, the comprehensive McLaren Collection contains many early colonial Australian texts including the first official Australian comic magazine, Vumps (1908), Middy Malone’s Magazine (1947) – plus two different issues of Ginger Meggs from the 1920s.

Continue reading “Australian Comics: Reflecting on our National Identity through Object-Based Learning” →

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