Most overdue library book

This Extremely Late Library Loan Defies Belief!

Remember panicking over a few weeks late returning books in school, terrified by the fines tallying daily? Well one astonishing story reveals how centuries ticked by before the most overdue library loan ever finally made it back to its Cambridge birthplace – with hardly a penalty to pay!

17th Century Page Turner

In 1667 England, Colonel Robert Walpole checked out a 1609 German book on an Archbishop called “Scriptores rerum Germanicarum septentrionalium, vicinorumque populorum diversi” while studying at Cambridge’s Sidney Sussex College. The military man clearly got distracted by turmoil shortly after however, neglecting return duties. There are no surviving records of loans from that time, so the exact date he borrowed it is uncertain.

This seemingly vanished tome narrowly dodged trash heaps for nearly 300 years before astonishingly resurfacing in historian John Plumb’s hands. Now imagine his shock realizing the Marquess of Cholmondeley’s family library contained this pilfered Literary Lazarus!

No Fine For Tardy Term

After such lengthy misplacement, you’d expect steep late fees imposed. But graciously, Sidney Sussex representatives simply accepted the prodigal publication they likely wrote off as lost forever, relieved at its recovered condition.

Who knows – maybe they feared charging penalties might discourage other elaborate overdue story endings! Because while misplacing books for centuries is shameful, allowing mysterious masterpieces to resurface despite mistakes remains a redemption that libraries celebrate.

So next time you scramble frenetically misremembering a due date, take comfort from this misplaced antique emerging unscathed centuries later! Redemption hope endures for even the most disastrously overdue.

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