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Down a few flights of stairs underneath a pretty nondescript building in Cardiff sits some of the rarest books in the world.

A secret gem to most who live in the city, the Cardiff University Special Collections and Archives holds more than 100,000 books dating back to the 15th Century.

Although it sounds like something owned by a rich private collector stored under lock and key, the collection that spans around 2km of shelves is open to the public.

From rare books about Wales and personal letters of public figures to texts by Queen Elizabeth's personal sorcerer and Victorian sex advice, the collection is full of beautiful books from across the world.

Some of the books stored on its vast shelves don't exist anywhere else in the world.

Here are just a handful of books from the collection:

John Speed’s map of Cardiff, 1676 edition

(Image: Cardiff University Special Collections)

The archive is full of Cardiff history, including guides for Victorian travellers and local histories. John Speed's map of the city, first drawn in 1610, has some has some familiar sights, such as the castle and St John’s Church.

Some of the street names might also ring a bell – Hummanbye Street, known today as Womanby Street, home to Clwb Ifor Bach.

(Image: Cardiff University Special Collections)

St Mary’s Church, destroyed by floods over the 1600s, is shown at the bottom of the map, standing proud – but not for long.

The Book of Wonder

(Image: Cardiff University Special Collections)

The archive has a whole section call the 'Fine Bindings collection' full of examples of books that are beautiful objects in themselves.

Some editions aren't that rare or valuable, but their covers have been designed to show off their owner's wealth and taste.

(Image: Cardiff University Special Collections)

The Book of Wonder, by Lord Dunsany in 1912, is one in the collection, full of fanstasy tales from "the edge of the world".

The inscription reads: "Come with me, ladies and gentlemen who are in any wise weary of London : come with me : and those that tire at all of the world we know : for we have new worlds here."

Cosmographica

(Image: Cardiff University Special Collections)

This 16th Century book gave readers a guide to space, geography and navigation.

The book was written by Peter Apian, a German professor and pioneer of his time.

Apian talks about several scientific instruments, but the book includes working paper examples of what he was writing about.

Readers could use the moving parts to find the position of the sun, moon and planers or calculate latitude.

Despite the age of the book the example in the collection is still working.

Le Bijou Galant

(Image: Cardiff University Special Collections)

The smallest book in Cardiff University’s Special Collections and Archives stands under 3cm tall.

Le Bijou Galant is a mix of poems, illustrations and a Saints’ Day calendar all in a gilded red binding from 1822.

The Floure and the Leafe

(Image: Cardiff University Special Collections)

Completely covered in hand embroided flowers and printed on handmade paper, this book is the epitome of the arts and crafts movement – painstakingly made and extremely beautiful.

Knowns as ‘Private Press’ books, these were made in very limited runs, and were often collected for their craftsmanship and their beauty.

(Image: Cardiff University Special Collections)

The archive holds one of the best private press collections in the world – rivalled only by collections held in Glasgow and Los Angeles.

Duoglott Letter-Writer

(Image: Cardiff University Special Collections)

This small book is a guide for "the art of polite correspondence" in English and Welsh from 1832.

It deals with everything from business, friendship and romance, providing bilongual templates for letter writers in all sorts of situations.

From a merchant's widow, to a lady, a distant relation, or even from a "lover to a mistress recovered from sickness" the book covers it all.

The pages of the book are full of ink splodges and fingerprints, showing it was well used.

Fasciculus Temporum (Little Bundles of Time)

(Image: Cardiff University Special Collections)

This was one of the first bestsellers in history, and aimed to tell the history of the world.

Published in 1474, it uses a mixture of diagrams, timelines and columns of text to try and tell the entire history of the world.

The copy held by the collection once belonged to Prince Augustus Frederick, Duke of Sussex.

The Gentleman’s Diversion

(Image: Cardiff University Special Collections)

This 17th Century book is the only known copy of the earliest book dedicated to teaching the violin.

Before this if you wanted to learn an instrument you'd have to pay someone to teach you.

The book from 1693 once belonged to the Mackworth family, wealthy industrialists from Neath who built up a huge collection of musical scores.

The collection is open to members of the public from 9am to 5pm Monday to Friday, apart from Bank Holidays.

There's no need to be a member and if you want to see a particular book they can be contacted ahead of time via their website here.