By Lauren Stein
Introduction: The Unique World of Rare Book Crimes
“‘If anyone take away this book, let him die the death; let him be fried in a pan; let the falling sickness and fever seize him; let him be broken on the wheel, and hanged. Amen.’”[1] This ominous warning inscribed into a twelfth-century Bible was meant to deter would-be thieves.[2] Book theft has long plagued libraries, collectors, and institutions. In the Middle Ages, chaining books to shelves became the “most wide-spread and effective security system in libraries across Europe.”[3] Although we no longer call for chaining books to shelves or frying book thieves, today our security strips and lenient prison sentences are insufficient to deter theft. Given the cultural and historical damage of book theft, modern penalties feel out of step with the gravity of the crime.
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