Cuneiform tablet

Cuneiform tablet, Southern Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq), c 2050 BCE, Rare Books collection

Cuneiform writing, developed by the ancient culture of Sumer, was one of the world’s first scripts. It was written on clay tablets using a wedged stick (cunea is Latin for ‘wedge’); the tablets were then sun-dried or fired. The earliest tablets (c 3400 BCE) record economic transactions. This tablet records taxes paid in sheep and goats in the tenth month of the 46th year of Shulgi, second king of the Third Dynasty of Ur.

The Torah

Sefer Torah, Eastern Europe, mid-19th century, manuscript on vellum with wooden rollers with silver pointer. Courtesy of the Jewish Museum of Australia, Melbourne

The Torah contains five sacred texts of Judaism, which were subsequently adopted by Christians as part of their Old Testament. As God's covenant with the Jewish people, it is the basis for Jewish religious, political and social life. The Sefer Torah is handwritten on parchment made from the skin of a ritually killed animal, then placed on a scroll for public reading in the synagogue. The reader uses a yad (a rod with a hand and extended forefinger), to avoid touching the text.

Patron saint of librarians

Antiphonary, Paris, c 1350, Rare Books Collection, State Library Victoria

The music on this page was sung on the feast day of St Lawrence, a Christian living in the 3rd century, when Roman Emperor Valerian ordered the persecution of Christians. Lawrence was burned to death on a grill, famously quipping to his torturers, 'Turn me over, I'm done on this side!' He is the patron saint of chefs and comedians, and – for his efforts to preserve the written documents of his faith – also of librarians and archivists.

The first European star atlas

John Flamsteed, Atlas coelestis (Celestial Atlas), London, 1729, Rare Books Collection, State Library Victoria

In 1675, John Flamsteed became the first Royal Astronomer of Great Britain at the newly built observatory at Greenwich. His catalogue of stars took more than 20 years to produce and was published after his death, as was this celestial atlas. A perfectionist, Flamsteed's work set a new standard for astronomical scholarship; he had earlier fallen out with Isaac Newton and Edmond Halley, after they pushed for premature publication of his work.

A Tibetan palm-leaf manuscript

Dam tshig thams cad kyi ñams chag bskoṅg baʼi lung lnga bshags pa thams cad kyi rgyud Dri ma med paʼi rgyal po zhes bya ba (The fivefold method of appeasing transgressions against one's tantric vows), Mongolia [written in Tibetan], 18th century, Rare Books Collection, State Library Victoria

Palm leaves were one of the first ever writing surfaces, emerging around the 5th century BCE on the Indian Subcontinent and in South-East Asia. This important 8th-century Buddhist text describes the rituals around the confession of sins and broken tantric vows, both of which hinder the passage of a deceased person's consciousness towards rebirth. From the 4th century onwards, Tibetan missionaries shaped Buddhist practice in Mongolia; most Mongolian Buddhist texts are written in Tibetan.

The birth of European printing

Leaf from the 'Gutenberg Bible', Mainz, Germany, Johann Gutenberg, c 1450–55, Rare Books Collection, State Library Victoria

Johan Gutenberg's great Bible was the first European book printed by means of movable type. The key to Gutenberg's success lay in casting the 26 letters of the alphabet individually in metal. These letters could be assembled to form a page of text, and then be reused to print further pages. Within a decade of Gutenberg's invention, printing had spread to every major city in Europe.

Restricted books

Viva Gibb, photograph showing the restricted books in the chief librarian's office, 1985, Pictures Collection, State Library Victoria

Select books have always been kept aside in libraries for reasons of rarity and value. In the past, libraries also locked away some books to 'protect' readers: these restricted sections contained controversial titles, frequently those relating to sex, and were accessible only with permission of the chief librarian. This photograph shows some of the formerly restricted books at State Library Victoria, a selection of which is on display in the World of the book exhibition.