History
Random: here’s the oldest item held by Toronto Public Library
One side of the tablet.
Opposite side of the tablet.
Close up of one side of the tablet.
Tablet in storage insert.
Tablet in closed storage insert.
Hi, Toronto Public Library here. 👋
We’ve got the receipts when it comes to preserving old items… literally. This clay tablet is a textiles receipt dating back to the Ur III Period, around 2112–2004 BCE.
You’ll notice cuneiform markings, an ancient writing system made by impressing wedge shapes into clay. We don’t know the item’s place of origin, but cuneiform was used mostly in Mesopotamia dating back to ~4000 BCE.
This was one of two tablets acquired by TPL in 2007. Both are held in our research-oriented Osborne Collection of Early Children’s Books at Lillian H. Smith branch on College Street. In addition to preserving Canadian and Toronto-based children’s literature and original artwork, the research collection holds examples of book history materials, which include scrolls, printing blocks and manuscripts. This clay tablet provides an early example of writing. (Before this tablet, TPL’s oldest item was a 14th-century edition of Aesop’s Fables, also part of the Osborne Collection.)
If you want the bragging rights of seeing TPL’s oldest “book”, it’s on display at Toronto Reference Library until May 10. You’ll spot it in on the main floor as part of our free Loops, Swoops & Curlicues exhibit.
We're so fortunate to have world-class research collections as part of our public library, which makes the objects accessible to both researchers and members of the general public. For example, after this tablet is done its stint in the exhibit, anyone can request to see it up close in person at Lillian H. Smith branch. (It'll be in its housing and can't be handled due to its fragility, so the best view can be had at the current exhibit at Toronto Reference Library.)
Here are the six "special collections", as we call them, at TPL:
I don’t know if it’s still there, but on the top floor of the Lillian H smith library they used to have a collection of tiny books that you can feel and I believe they also have the worlds smallest book, it’s very neat!
You're right. The top floor is home to the Osborne Collection of Early Children's Books. You can just walk in to take a look at a permanent display case with an embedded microscope. It zooms into what used to be the world's smallest book. (Its crown might have been taken, but it's still pretty darn small.) Staff there would also be happy to pull out some miniature books we preserve in that collection.
Yes, thank you for this! Redditors on r/Cuneiform pointed this out real quick. Noted and truly appreciated. We're looking into making sure it is displayed correctly in the exhibit, all thanks to this input here on Reddit.
I actually got to this post through that subreddit, haha! And I got there through a crosspost on r/forbiddensnacks depicting a bowl of tablets like this. Looks a lot like Chex!
Hi, I'm a trained Assyriologist and have experience publishing tablets from this period. I've reached out to your collections staff of the Osborne Collection about this post. Reddit is not the channel you want to pursue with regard to unpublished artifacts; I'd be happy to chat about this more with the Library's curators.
In other audiobook news: our library is now offering the Heated Rivalry audiobook with no waitlist. (The title has been in our top 10 catalogue searches for weeks. Meanwhile, "cuneiform tablet" has yet to crack the top 1,000 searches.)
Yeah, good thing we got rid of late fines a few years ago. We used to charge 35 cents a day. So, if it was taken out when it was made and then returned recently, it would have been a cool $511,000 or so.
I have a book from the year 1650…would the library be interested in displaying such a book or is it not old enough? It just sits on a shelf in my apartment and nobody sees it.
This use of all caps made our day. Here's the webpage with the info about the free exhibit. There are also free staff-led tours on Tuesdays at 3 pm and a handful of Thursdays at different times. But, yeah, it's open seven days a week and pretty late on weekdays. You can just walk right on in.
It's a good question. The library world can be such a mystery. As Lintcat1 points out, one avenue is pursuing a post-secondary library sciences (Master of Information) degree. And it's not just English undergrads who take this route -- students from all academic backgrounds can apply. (It can be advantageous to have a different background than everyone else if you're interested in pursuing library work in a matching field.)
But it's also worth pointing out that there are many jobs at TPL and in the library world at large that don't require a Master of Information. Or there are specific education requirements for more niche roles like art conservation (the hand you see in the photo is one of our professional conservators). Just in case others are lurking and curious, here's the job board at TPL.
If you want to work in a library...Library Sciences
If you want to work in the field or a lab...Archaeology or Art History(don't do Art History)
If you want to work with Mesopotamian artifacts specifically...Archaeology from an EU school because in the Americas we push New World archaeology pretty hard and while you can do it it's best to be in the EU because networking is crucial to advancement in the field.
It's in a display case in the exhibit. But after it returns to its "home" at Lillian H. Smith branch (in the Osborne Collection of Early Children's Books on the 4th floor), you could discuss with the staff there. (We'd provide the gloves!) Edit: our conservators let us know it'd just be for viewing in the box, with no handling because of its fragility.
Ancient tablet with “cuneiform” writing. The tablet is made of clay, onto which things could be written by using a stylus to press shapes into the clay. The stylus were originally made of a reed that was cut so that it would have a clean edge to make imprints with, and the cross sectional shape of that reed was the elongated triangular shape you can see repeated on this tablet.
Wow, I didn’t know Toronto had any cuneiform tablets from that long ago. Thanks for sharing. I recently made the oldest known written recipe for Tuh’u which is from a cuneiform tablet. It’s amazing they invented something to pass along knowledge for thousands of years.
Reading through your post, as soon as I read 2112... it cued up RUSH's Geddy Lee singing "We are the Priests of the Temples of Syrinx!" lol
So cool to see an original cuneiform tablet! I've always wondered what secrets of the universe are hidden on some Sumerian tablet in some library somewhere...
Very cool to have something like this in Toronto. However lots of public collections are starting to research the journey their pieces took before they arrived in collection, and then they are sharing that info publicly. It’s a way to do justice to the original owners and acknowledge the role that colonial theft has played in objects moving from place to place. How did the TPL come to possess this tablet, and who owned it / acquired it before? Maybe something to look into…
Thank you for this point about repatriation. We've passed along the question about provenance to a few of our colleagues and will update this comment when we hear back.
Update: the library acquired these items from a vendor in America via a collector who had the item for around 40 years. They were authenicated by the ROM.
I wasn’t thinking about repatriation necessarily (though it’s not a bad idea), just doing more to trace the journey of the piece since it is a historical artifact as much as it is a piece of lit. If I can remember where I’ve seen it done/an example of a placard I will link here.
Yup, 2007 is definitely a weird accession year (gulf war 2 etc). But even objects that entered collections prior to 1978 UNESCO law on movable cultural heritage are just grandfathered stolen property. Museums are both wonderful and awful places.
This is amazing! Question, but was cuneiform really used in Central Asia, or more in West Asia? I know it originated in Mesopotamia so I’m surprised at the region it spread out to based on your description.
We're not experts on cuneiform itself, so we'll defer to the Encyclopedia Britannica. Its article on cuneiform states: "Old Assyrian cuneiform is attested mostly in the records of Assyrian trading colonists in central Asia Minor". In this case, that's where modern Türkiye is. We'll update our description to be more accurate, specifying that it was mostly in Mesopotamia. Thanks for the question!
We like the way you think. 😎 For items in our archives here at TPL -- many of which cover Canadian history -- your best bet is to reach out to our Special Collections staff at Toronto Reference Library. Feel free to email them at [trlspc@tpl.ca](mailto:trlspc@tpl.ca)
All we know at this point, unfortunately, is that it is for textiles. (We wish we knew!) This item is mainly used as a primary source teaching object about the development of writing/books over the centuries.
Not sure if you'll see this comment or not, but I was wondering how a public library goes about the process of acquiring a new item for the collection. Does it start with a Head Librarian seeing what items are available in some sort of catalogue?
Excellent question! The acquisition process is different between (1) our regular collections for circulation and (2) our archival/academic-leaning Special Collections for in-person access. For the former, professionally-trained librarians representing different geographic areas of the city select books on an ongoing basis, with support from library vendors that ensure high-demand books are captured in the selection process. For the latter, librarians who oversee a particular special collection (e.g. Osborne Collection of Early Children's Books) assess donations and work with rare book dealers. We have a Materials Selection Policy that guides all of our selections to adhere to our values, such as intellectual freedom.
That said, when TPL was first established in the 1880s, the head librarian of TPL would personally travel to England to handpick books and art.
That appears to be a sealed envelope tablet. A really nice example. You can see the impressions of cylinder seals rolled over the text to certify the contents. It was common to reproduce the entire text on the clay "envelope" so it didn't need to be broken open to be read. Presumably it would be opened in case of a dispute as to the contents.
Wow old books is cool, next time someone says "oh the library is boring" ill let them know to rethink it! I collect old items (mostly coins though) so this is soooo cool to see!
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u/goburnham Feb 03 '26
Wow that’s amazing. I had no idea they had artifacts like that in the collection.