Bibliophile Peeter Tulviste - Oldest publications

It is difficult to say when and why Peeter Tulviste developed an interest in ancient books. A few times, he mentioned his university time in Moscow, where antiquarian bookshops offered a lot of old foreign-language literature, especially in German and French, which attracted little local interest. As a speaker of both languages, Tulviste had an excellent opportunity to buy the books that appealed to him. We will probably never know why he chose certain titles and not others. In some cases, the age of the book may have caught his attention. If you come across a 16th-century printed work at a reasonable price, you may develop a strong temptation to buy it – this may explain the presence of the 1557 book Von Entvrloubung Illyrici, vnnd Wygandi in his collection.

Another time, it may have been the beautifully designed title page or frontispiece (the decorated page facing the title page) that caught the eye and sparked the desire to buy. Several of the books are unique copies in Estonia; at least, there are no copies of them in public libraries. A connection with Livonia or, more broadly, Estonia was undoubtedly another reason for acquiring a book. Notable examples in the exhibition include the 1798 book by the Estophile and Lettophile Garlieb Helwig Merkel, August Wilhelm Hupel’s Estonian-language dictionary from 1818, Danielis Cramer’s book from 1602, a work by Christian Friedrich Scherwinzky, a school headmaster in Pärnu, and Adam Johann von Krusenstern’s journal of circumnavigation, published in Berlin in 1811.

It was interesting to discover a significant work by Immanuel Kant on Tulviste’s shelves, and a reprint of Karl Ernst von Baer’s doctoral thesis from Germany, issued more than a hundred years after the original was written in 1814.

Find out more about the exhibition here.