A guardbook in which are mounted papers on which Locke recorded notes on his reading, mostly made when he was abroad and did not have access to his larger commonplace books.
There are three distinct sets of papers:
(a) ff. 3-16 consist of single folded sheets ruled with columns headed A to Z so that the entire alphabet appears on each page; these date from Locke’s travels in France, although Locke continued to use them for a short time after he returned to England.
(b) ff. 17-18, 21-22, 25-26, 29-42 consist of single folded sheets ruled with broad columns, headed with letters of the alphabet, the entire series comprising a single alphabet; the sheets are mostly undated, although dates in January 1687 appear on one sheet.
(c) ff. 19-20, 23-24, 27-28 consist of single folded sheets, arranged as in (b), but forming a separate series captioned “Adversaria”; the sheets are dated September 1687, May 1688 and October 1688; the final sheet contains some notes dated [16]90 in the margin.
44 leaves (ff. 1-2, 43-44 blank).