Letter 2691

Hyde thanks Sloane for the French book. He begs Sloane to recover the Persepolis papers, mentioned in their previous correspondences, so he can continue his work. Hyde criticizes the muddled scholarship on the subject in the Philosophical Transactions. He apologizes for the number of letters he has sent requesting the papers. Hyde was the librarian of the Bodleian Library from 1665 to 1701. He possessed excellent linguistic skills in eastern languages, especially ancient Persian and Arabic (P. J. Marshall, Hyde, Thomas (16361703), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/14336, accessed 19 June 2013]).