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The Project and Our Continuing Mission

The AGU Digital Access Project provides online access to special collections held by Aoyama Gakuin University in Tokyo, with a focus on digitizing rare bibles and other religious editions within our library system. This project was begun in 2018 with support from the Aoyama Vision Initiative in conjunction with the Folger library's digital access team in Washington, D.C. We also collaborated with the Aoyama Gakuin Religious Center and with the help and kind cooperation of the university Shiryo (Archives) Center, which curates many of these books. Though our progress was halted for a period by the Covid 19 pandemic, we are now moving forward with generous support from the Aoyama Gakuin University Information Media Center and the University’s Institute of the Humanities.

 
Biblia Latina (1478)
The Aoyama Gakuin Archives along with the university library system hold many items of historical significance, including rare print editions of religious works in Latin, Japanese, English, and other languages. The special holdings of the AGU libraries are one of the finest collections of rare Christian editions in Japan. We also host speakers and schedule events, in person and online, that are related to digital development in library science, religion and early modern studies (with a focus on Shakespeare).

This effort is advanced by a Project Team, that works to digitize and catalogue, page by page and with detailed annotations, our special holdings. We owe an enormous thanks to the staff of the Aoyama Gakuin Shiryo Center for their help with this project. We are also working closely with the Aoyama Gakuin Christian Activities Center, which supports a non-discriminatory and ecumenical approach to religious worship. 
 
Global Digital Access:

 As we continue to grow in the digital age, we wish to provide open access to our special collections by making select editions available online for viewing. To achieve this goal, AGU entered initially into a relationship with the Folger Shakespeare Library. Along with its enormous holdings of Shakespearean material, the Folger also holds a superb collection of early modern religious editions, including early printed Bibles.

Rare Bibles:
The Digital Project Team at AGU has begun by digitizing rare Bibles held by the Aoyama Archive and the main library consortium. The Digital Access Team at the Folger, has put three editions on display on their new, state-of-the-art Miranda Digital Access Platform. Our project began with an exquisite edition from the Aoyama Archive, the Biblia Latina, printed in 1478.


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Project Team

Our project team in Tokyo began our work in conjunction with the Digital Access team at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C. The project has enjoyed the gracious assistance of the staff at the Aoyama Gakuin Shiryo (Archives) Center. We are also closely aligned with the Aoyama Gakuin Christian Activities Center at our university, which supports a non-discriminatory and ecumenical approach to religious worship.    The technical effort we are using to transition rare books into open-access digital editions is not unlike the work of early printers in the 15th and 16th centuries, who used moveable type to reproduce and distribute works that were only in manuscript form. In our age, we are faced with the challenge of making these early editions accessible to all, an effort that requires hours of hands-on work and great care. Team Members Thomas Dabbs, Co-Director Professor Dabbs serves on the faculty of English and American Literature at AGU, where he teaches Shakespeare
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Biblia Latina (1478)

The AGU digital access team has digitized the 15th-century  Bible Hieronymi , or  Biblia Latina,  from the Aoyama Archive. This edition is an early print version of Jerome's Vulgate. A full list of references to this edition and holdings may be viewed at the British Library's Incunabula Short Title Catalogue .  Professor Shinichi Takeuchi of the AGU Department of English has studied this edition. Below is a translation of his commentary on this work: " From the mid-15th century, when Gutenberg began utilizing mechanical movable type, to the time when printing became prevalent at the turn of the 16th century, this is a special period in the history of the book. Books printed during this early period of moveable type are called incunabula . This is a crucial period that saw a transition from hand-transcription to a new era of reproducing texts with mechanical movable type presses. Within just half a century, upwards to potentially 40,000 titles and 12 million copies of
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