Map found, history uncovered

You can't lose something you don't know you ever had. But the serendipity of finding something you never knew you owned is always a pleasure.
Take the tale of the librarian at Oxford University's Queen's College who recently uncovered two remarkable treasures which had lain unknown among its manuscripts since at least the 18th century.
It turned out that they dated from 1816 and while no further details were available the librarian, Veronika Vernier, traced them to the cartographer, Joao Teixeira.
According to the Times Higher supplement, Nick Millea, map librarian at the Bodleian Library, University of Oxford, directed Miss Vernier to a six-volume "bible" of Portuguese cartography.
Mr Millea told THS that the atlases were "stunningly attractive" and "a very important find, because so few copies of this material exist and the ones at Queen's look almost new".
"It's great that they found them and that they were able to work out just how important they are," he added. "You don't get discoveries like this every day or even every year: I don't remember anything of similar quality turning up at Oxford since I joined the Bodleian in 1992."
It just goes to show, sometimes you can find something you weren't looking for and discover real treasure.

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