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The published proceedings of the Institute’s 1998 Conference “Human Pedigree Studies” is, we learn, one of a collection of just 300 books “to be displayed at a PR event showing excellence in UK publications to an exclusive audience of over 1000 VIPs during the opening ceremony of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina” now scheduled to take place on 23rd April 2002.
The new Alexandria library is a rebirth of that famed predecessor of antiquity which was burnt to the ground in 391 AD and which from 295 BC had been the premier research Institute of its time and housed original works by Archimedes, Aristotle, Demosthenes, Livy and Sophocles. Throughout its long life “Graeco-roman culture was linked to the advent of Islam and thereby to the resurgent civilisation of western Europe”. Its destruction, together with its collection of 500,000 manuscripts has been termed the “Greatest crime of the first millennium”.
Its modern successor has taken 7 years to build at a cost of $300 million contributed by Arab and non-Arab governments, UNESCO and UNDP. Its initial stock of 400,000 books will eventually grow to 10 millions. It will also include a cultural complex with a conference centre, planetarium, science museum and lecture halls.
More than 50,000 books are published in the UK each year. The task of selecting the representative 300 for display at the library’s opening ceremony was carried out jointly by the Book Development Council and the British Council having regard to style, design and excellence of production. The Institute is gratified that one of its own publications has been thus chosen especially as economy of production has been the over-riding concern of the editorial committee in its attempt to break even financially on a modestly priced product.