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Welcome to The Sloane Letters Project

sloaneA pilot of this project, Sir Hans Sloane’s Correspondence Online, was first launched at the University of Saskatchewan in 2010 to coincide with the 350th anniversary of Sir Hans Sloane’s birth. The project was renamed The Sloane Letters Project when it moved to this site in 2016.

The correspondence of Sir Hans Sloane (1660-1753) consists of thirty-eight volumes held at the British Library, London: MSS 4036-4069, 4075-4078.  The letters are a rich source of information about topics such as scientific discourse, collections of antiquities, curiosities and books, patients’ illnesses, medical treatments and family history. Most of the letters were addressed to Sloane, but a few volumes were addressed to others (MSS 4063-4067) or written by Sloane (MSS 4068-4069).

So far, we have entered descriptions and metadata for Sloane MSS 4036-4053 and 4075, as well as several letters from each of the following: Sloane MSS 4054-4055, 4066, 4068-4069 and 4076. Several of these entries also include transcriptions. Further entries and transcriptions are being made available gradually.

Please, explore the website and database. You can search through the letters, learn about Sir Hans Sloane or the letters written to him, and peruse blog posts about interesting letters!

Random Letter

Author:
Recipient:

Fol. 5 If I have been tardy in giving you account of myself so often as I ought to have done, it was not upon my word, that I wanted either leisure or inclination but only that I would not be troublesome. I know you have business enough for ye whole day, without having any of your time taken up, in reading or writing unnecessary letters and finding myself mend under ye directions you had given me, I did not think I ought to ask for more, or other. I continue in ye course you proscribed,(Blessed be God) with good success. The swelling I complain’d of is in a manner gone, nothing of it appears till towards bedtime and then it is so little, that nobody perceives it, (or will own they do) besides myself. I have a very good appetite to what I eat, I always digest well; evacuations are regular; and in short, people about me say, I look healthfully, and I am sure I find myself easy: so that I propose (with God’s leave) to be moving upwards about three weeks hence, and within a month, I hope to present to you in good plight…
Read more- Letter 2583


Latest Statistics

Pages digitised
4,545 Document summaries
Documents transcribed
People
1,527 Medical Cases
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