The oldest book I know I possess is an 1829 Old Farmer’s Almanac, found it in an antique store for a buck. We used to have a Hoyle’s from ca. 1840 but in several moves I’m afraid it’s gotten lost (fingers crossed).
The oldest written work I’ve read in the original (and held in my hands, not looked thru glass at it) was a note from Ivan the Terrible commissioning the construction of a church outside Moscow, IIRC. The National Library in St. Petersburg has some cool stuff!
An early 1900’s copy of the Just So Stories by Rudyard Kipling. My grandfather found it in an abandoned farm house, the paper in it is amazing, it’s so thick it feels like cardboard, unlike the cheap stuff we get today.
Keith
Nothing really old, I’m afraid. My favorite is Don Quixote with plates by Dali.
My reference atlas here at work is from 1951. Rally handy for resolving debates coincerning the population of Indochina.
In law school, Ms. D. worked for a professor who was a big deal in a historical book society. His apartment was a trip. He had stacks of really really old books all over the place, supporting the t.v., etc.
I own some first edition works by poet Sara Teasdale that date to around 1918 or so. Not amazingly old, but each and every one of them is signed by her, so I’m still rather proud of my collection. And in 18 more years, they’ll all feel that much older for being a hundred years old 
a leather-bound edition of Burns’ poems, ditto Browning. Not sure of the dates, but they came down to me from my great-grandparents, who homesteaded in the 1880s.
I know you said you weren’t interested in reprints, Eve, but I just have to mention my reprint of Dr. Johnson’s Dictionary, re-issued a few years ago by Longmans, which was one of the original publishers of the Dictionary.
I’m a bit disappointed to find that among the 1,000 or so books I own, I have only 3 (maybe 4) that are over 100 years old. They are [ul][li]1869 Bible[/li][li]1883 Gulliver’s Travels[/li][li]1899 Heidi[/li][li][maybe] a very old edition of Caesar’s Gallic War There is no date.[/li][/ul]I also have a 99-year old book, Bennett’s Odes and Epodes of Horace
The most out-of-date book I have is probably a 1919 edition of Automotive Engineering. I wouldn’t part with it for the world.
An 1822 edition of The Analogy of Religion by Joseph Butler
“The People’s Common Sense Medical Advisor,” printed in the late 1880s (I don’t have it here in front of me).
It offers such excellent medical advice as to not let old people and kids sleep in the same room because old people emit “effluvia” which can infect a child. It also speaks out against the dangers of “self abuse,” and says that women should never exercise to the point of perspiring. Moreover, it is just full of testimonials for “Dr. Pierce’s Purgative Pellets” which cured these poor souls of everything from “loss of manly vigor” to “consumption” to “hysteria.” As you may have guessed, the emminent Dr. Pierce also wrote the book. His “hospital” was located in Buffalo, NY if I recall correctly.
I also have first editions of most of Hemingway’s works, but they aren’t particularly old.
Bib, re: out-of-date. I know what you mean. One of my favorites is our Textbook of Geology from the 1920s. It’s a scream reading about evidence for continental drift, and see the authors feebly struggle to explain how it might have happened!
My favorite notation is from that 1880s Social Encyclopedia, which explains that freckles are actually rust spots from where the iron in your blood meets the moisture in the atmosphere.
“Ah! The atmopshere! Ah!”
Don’t know for sure which is THE oldest, but in general my
oldest books would be:
The Winter 1923 edition of the Los Angeles High School Semi-Annual (They had semi-annuals rather than yearbooks in those days because they used to have Winter and Summer graduating classes).
A complete collection of Edgar Allen Poe, probably from around 1900.
The Grand Canyon/Colorado R. expedition around that time
was indeed interesting. I forget at what point they had to abandon their boat, which was discovered around 1930 in the Colorado R. wetlands, south of the border. This was before
most of the river got variously dammed and diverted, and
an appreciable amount of water still reached the sea. Nowadays, most of the time, the Colorado doesn’t reach the
ocean at all, but just withers away in the desert. Even
more interesting, in the 19th century there was a small port
at the mouth of the Colorado, and a riverboat line along the
lower reaches of the river.
I have an old book of alphabets (78 of 'em) published in Wurzburg, Germany in 1893. Some of them have more letters than today, and many are no longer in use. My secret lust is for an original edition of Edmund Frye’s Pantographia, containing all of the world’s known alphabets, and published in 1799. Now if I can just part with the $800…
(I guess I’m just like that.)
My mother recently passed away which makes her oldest book now mine. It is a 14th century, hand bound, leather bound bible. Very nice book although I am deathly afraid to touch it.
It has a nice clasp on it as well.
I liked your comment about the photograph, Eve. I’ve often been wandering through an antique store and come across an old photograph of a prosperous looking man, or a family all dressed up in their Sunday best. Like you, I’ve wondered: Who is this man? What’s his story? Why don’t his descendants have this photograph?