Arthur J. Wilson opens his 1985 biography of Chester Beatty with the story of the ten-year-old Beatty's acquisition at an auction of a pink calcite specimen; it was, according to Wilson, "not his first auction-room purchase." By the time he died Beatty had put together one of the world's premier collections of Islamic illuminated manuscripts; snuff bottles; biblical papyri; Persian, Turkish, and Indian paintings; Japanese woodblocks; Chinese rhinoceros-horn cups; Chinese jade books (books with pages made from thinly sliced sheets of jade); manuscripts; printed books representing Eastern and Western culture, with concentrations in books with engravings and volumes on travel and topography, atlases, early printing, and the history of costume; and fine bindings, mostly from England, Ireland, Italy, France, and Germany.

Alfred Chester Beatty was born in New York City on 7 February 1875 to John Cuming Beatty, a banker and stockbroker, and Hetty Bull Beatty. He had two brothers, William...