Explore the untold stories of the women who shaped Sir Hans Sloane’s vast collections.
About the Project
In 1753, Hans Sloane, an eminent physician and naturalist, left a remarkable legacy to the nation — a colossal cabinet of curiosity, amassed from around the globe and across a lifetime.
Sloane’s historic bequest provided an invaluable resource for ‘all curious and interested persons’ and helped lay the foundation for the British Museum, the British Library, and the Natural History Museum.
The Sloane Lab project, supported by the AHRC’s “Towards a National Collection” programme, aims to digitally unify and forge new connections across these dispersed collections.
Tucked away in the margins of Hans Sloane’s catalogues lies the untold stories of countless individuals whose contributions to science have largely remained in the shadows.
In the Margins of Early Modern Science: Pioneering Women in Sloane’s ‘Paper Museum’ seeks to illuminate the intricate and vital roles that women played in the scientific networks of the early modern period.
The project leverages the rich repository of data provided by the Sloane Lab Knowledge Base to explore the contributions of women within Sloane’s “Paper Museum” — a vast compendium comprising over 1,000 illustrated books, 100 picture albums, an estimated 60,000 drawings, prints, and paintings, as well as manuscript catalogues spanning thousands of handwritten pages.
This project was developed by Dr. Rosalind White, Community Research Fellow at University College London (UCL), as part of The Sloane Lab, one of five ‘Discovery Projects’ under the Towards a National Collection initiative, supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. The project was supervised by Alicia Hughes and Kim Sloan at the British Museum, and Victoria Pickering at the Natural History Museum.
Discover the contributions of women to Sir Hans Sloane’s collections, offering an introduction to their roles across various fields and the hidden stories within.
Sloane’s collection of prints and drawings was both vast and varied, comprising approximately 100 picture albums containing an estimated 60,000 drawings, prints, and paintings.
Sloane’s library of over 50,000 books was recognised during his lifetime as one of the largest and most significant of its era, though women feature primarily as subjects rather than as contributors.
Comprising over 120,000 specimens, Sloane’s herbaria were enriched by contributions from a diverse network of correspondents, including many women.
Please cite this resource as follows: White, Rosalind. A Guide to Finding Women in the Sloane Lab Knowledge Base. 2024. University College London, The Sloane Lab [reconstructingsloane. org/women/download] Access Date.
If you would like to follow along with my future research projects, you can find me on X (formerly Twitter) @DrRosalindWhite.
Available as an Excel file (.xlsx) or in CSV format.
This dataset is designed as an initial step in understanding and expanding the representation of women within Hans Sloane’s collections via the Sloane Lab Knowledge Base.
It offers a snapshot of the various ways women are documented and represented, detailing their roles (e.g., artist, author), the type of entries associated with them, and additional contextual information.
Available as a PDF file in both double-page & single-page view.
This guide is part of a broader effort to enhance how narratives of marginalised individuals are accessed, understood, and valued within the SLKB.
The knowledge base is available at knowledgebase.sloanelab.org
The Search functionality of the SLKB features a search engine offering the most exhaustive search of the Sloane Collections’ ingested datasets to date. The Advanced Search, allows you to search and browse specific types of entries that meet one, or more search queries.
This dataset is designed as an initial step in understanding and expanding the representation of women within Hans Sloane’s collections via the Sloane Lab Knowledge Base. It serves as a diagnostic initiative to test and refine data collection and interpretation methodologies aimed at reducing archival absences.
The dataset offers a snapshot of the various ways women are documented and represented in the SLKB, detailing their roles (e.g., artist, author), the type of entries associated with them (e.g., Pictures Catalogue Entry, Printed Books Catalogue Entry), and additional information about their work or the context of their contributions. Where possible, I have provided a link to each entry in the SLKB, allowing for deeper exploration of these figures and their works.
Please note that this dataset is the outcome of a scoping exercise using the methods outlined in this guide and should not be regarded as comprehensive or fully representational.
Available to download as an Excel file (.xlsx) or in CSV format.
White, Rosalind. (2024) In the Margins of Early Modern Science: Pioneering Women in Sloane’s ‘Paper Museum’, University College London, The Sloane Lab, [reconstructingsloane.org/women/]. Accessed [insert access date].
The Sloane Lab Knowledge Base (SLKB) is a powerful tool for uncovering the often-overlooked contributions of women to Sir Hans Sloane’s extensive collections. The intention for this resource is to make it easier for users to locate and engage with these narratives.