- Joined
- Jan 20, 2008
I didn't know there's an actual term for binding books in human skin .. it's 'Anthropodermic bibliopegy' apparently:
Anthropodermic bibliopegy - Wikipedia
Anthropodermic bibliopegy - Wikipedia
The book is bound in human flesh and ..
- Thread starter Swofty
- Start date
Nothing beats the Necronomicon Thong (NSFW)
- Joined
- Jan 20, 2008
Harvard Library has announced that they had removed human skin from the binding of their copy of Des destinées de l’âme, a book first published in 1879 by French author Arsène Houssaye.
The decision to remove the human skin from the binding followed a review by Harvard Library of the book’s stewardship, which was prompted by recommendations from the Report of the Harvard University Steering Committee on Human Remains in University Museum Collections, issued in the Autumn of 2022.
The review concluded that the human remains in the book’s binding no longer have a place in Harvard Library’s collections.
The Library is now in the process of conducting additional provenance and biographical research into the book and the anonymous female patient whose skin was used to make the binding.
The Library will be consulting with appropriate authorities at the University and in France to determine a final respectful disposition of these human remains.
The decision to remove the human skin from the binding followed a review by Harvard Library of the book’s stewardship, which was prompted by recommendations from the Report of the Harvard University Steering Committee on Human Remains in University Museum Collections, issued in the Autumn of 2022.
The review concluded that the human remains in the book’s binding no longer have a place in Harvard Library’s collections.
The Library is now in the process of conducting additional provenance and biographical research into the book and the anonymous female patient whose skin was used to make the binding.
The Library will be consulting with appropriate authorities at the University and in France to determine a final respectful disposition of these human remains.
Harvard University removes human skin binding from book
The book, from the mid-1880s, was reportedly bound with the skin from the body of a female patient.
www.bbc.co.uk
- Joined
- Jan 20, 2008
I'd love to attend this talk in London on the the 10th of October:
This is just one lecture amongst many for this year's annual London Month Of The Dead convention.
| SECOND SKIN Human leather, Mortality and Self Authorship with Katie Taylor At Kensal Green Cemetery On Saturday 10th October 2026 from 3:30 pm Human leather has long been associated with punishment, violence and atrocity, from the trophies of ancient warfare to books bound in the skin of executed criminals and the horrors of the Holocaust. In this fascinating talk, artist Katie Taylor explores the extraordinary history of anthropodermic leather and the many ways human skin has been used throughout history, asking how these unsettling traditions have shaped our understanding of the material. But what happens when human leather is created with the full knowledge and consent of its donor? Katie then reveals her own remarkable project to preserve and transform her surgically removed skin into leather following major weight loss. Challenging long held assumptions about the body, consent and mortality, her work invites us to reconsider human remains not as objects of horror, but as deeply personal expressions of identity, memory and self authorship. Tickets £12.50 including a Victorian punch. Please click here to buy. Katie Taylor Katie Taylor is a PhD researcher in Fine Art at Oxford Brookes University whose practice explores death, memory and human remains through sculpture and material culture. Drawing on archaeology and forensic science, her work investigates how identity can be recovered from the traces we leave behind. |
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This is just one lecture amongst many for this year's annual London Month Of The Dead convention.
- Joined
- Dec 26, 2023
"Human Leather" would be a great name for a punk band or album.
- Joined
- Jan 20, 2008
I don't go looking for this stuff, I swear.
I've just stumbled across the legend of 'Big Nose George' ..
George was a train robber in 1878. To skip to the end of this story, a pair of shoes were made out of his skin.
... skip to 9:40 in this roadside attraction video to see a pic of the shoes and hear the whole story around them.
I've just stumbled across the legend of 'Big Nose George' ..
George was a train robber in 1878. To skip to the end of this story, a pair of shoes were made out of his skin.
... skip to 9:40 in this roadside attraction video to see a pic of the shoes and hear the whole story around them.
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IAmWillGibson
Loud Mouth Braggart
- Joined
- Dec 28, 2025
- Location
- Canada
Nu-uh! There's THREE or maybe more if they say so. There's a whole 64 volume master collection this door-to-door guy sold my parents in 1995!
- Joined
- Jan 20, 2008
In 1828, Edinburgh's medical schools were desperate for dead bodies to teach anatomy. William Burke and his friend William Hare, two Irish labourers, found a way to supply them.
Over about ten months, they killed 16 people. Most were poor, lonely or drunk visitors to Hare's lodging house. The two men would get them drunk and then smother them, leaving almost no marks. They sold the bodies to the anatomist Dr Robert Knox, usually for £8 to £10 each.
They were caught in November 1828, when two lodgers found the body of their last victim, Margaret Docherty, hidden under straw.
Hare saved himself by testifying against his partner. Burke was hanged on January 28, 1829, in front of a crowd of perhaps 25,000 people.
The judge ordered that his own body be dissected, just like his victims. Professor Alexander Monro cut him open in the university anatomy theatre, then dipped his quill in Burke's blood and wrote: "This is written with the blood of Wm Burke, who was hanged at Edinburgh." When crowds rioted to get in, the public was let in to file past the body in groups of fifty.
Burke never left the building. His skeleton still stands in the Anatomical Museum of the University of Edinburgh.
And a piece of his skin was tanned like leather and made into a small pocketbook. On its cover, in gold letters, are the words "Burke's skin pocket book." On the back: "Executed 28 Jan 1829."
It is kept at Surgeons' Hall Museums in Edinburgh, along with his death mask..
Over about ten months, they killed 16 people. Most were poor, lonely or drunk visitors to Hare's lodging house. The two men would get them drunk and then smother them, leaving almost no marks. They sold the bodies to the anatomist Dr Robert Knox, usually for £8 to £10 each.
They were caught in November 1828, when two lodgers found the body of their last victim, Margaret Docherty, hidden under straw.
Hare saved himself by testifying against his partner. Burke was hanged on January 28, 1829, in front of a crowd of perhaps 25,000 people.
The judge ordered that his own body be dissected, just like his victims. Professor Alexander Monro cut him open in the university anatomy theatre, then dipped his quill in Burke's blood and wrote: "This is written with the blood of Wm Burke, who was hanged at Edinburgh." When crowds rioted to get in, the public was let in to file past the body in groups of fifty.
Burke never left the building. His skeleton still stands in the Anatomical Museum of the University of Edinburgh.
And a piece of his skin was tanned like leather and made into a small pocketbook. On its cover, in gold letters, are the words "Burke's skin pocket book." On the back: "Executed 28 Jan 1829."
It is kept at Surgeons' Hall Museums in Edinburgh, along with his death mask..
That so weird because Last night , me and my partner are on a Tales From The Crypt run of start to finish and last night's episode was basically all about this .
But also as a fellow Brit, this leaves me reminding myself How weird we are as a nation .
- Joined
- Jan 20, 2008
Anthropodermic bibliopegy is international. Well, Europe and America as far as I've learned yet.
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