The book, from the mid-1880s, was reportedly bound with the skin from the body of a female patient.

The passages that I found important

Des Destinées de l’Ame is a meditation on the soul and life after death, written by Arsène Houssaye in the mid-1880s.

He is said to have given it to his friend, Dr Ludovic Bouland, a doctor, who then reportedly bound the book with skin from the body of an unclaimed female patient who had died of natural causes.

In its statement, Harvard said its handling of the book had not lived up to the “ethical standards” of care and that in publicising it, it had on occasion used a “sensationalistic, morbid and humorous tone” which was not appropriate.

It apologised and said it had “further objectified and compromised the dignity of the human being whose remains were used for its binding”.