Manuscript Collections
Special Collections maintains a small collection of manuscripts that date from antiquity to the present. The collection is intended to demonstrate the physical characteristics of the book before printing, and it contains a wide variety of scripts and materials from various time periods. From antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Renaissance, the collection includes:
- Eight cuneiform tablets from the Ur III and Old Babylonian periods
- Around a dozen manuscripts in book form, ranging in date from ca. 1150 to ca. 1600
- Over 200 leaves and fragments, including seventeenth century book collector John Bagford’s manuscript leaves and fragments, Fragmenta Manuscripta, dating from the eighth to the seventeenth century
- A handful of leaves from the Koran, palm leaf manuscripts, and other examples of manuscripts from non-Western cultures
Libraries Catalog: Special Collections
Finding Aids for Manuscript Collections
Cuneiform tablets.
Special Collections holds eight cuneiform tablets whose exact provenance is unknown. Six of the tablets date from the Ur III period (2100-2000 BCE),…
Fragmenta Manuscripta Collection.
Fragmenta Manuscripta is a collection of over 200 manuscript leaves and fragments dating from the eighth to the seventeenth century. Originally…
Literary and Historical Manuscripts
Special Collections holds modern manuscript materials in the form of books, correspondence, and personal papers. These materials were collected at…
Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts.
Special Collections maintains a small collection of European manuscripts intended to demonstrate the physical characteristics of the manuscript books,…
Pages from the Past Collection
Pages from the Past is a collection of original manuscript and rare book leaves compiled and sold by a New York book dealer Alfred W. Stites from 1964…
Selected Items
Fragmenta Manuscripta 210: Calendar May, June
Contents: May: line 9, "secundum usum sarum.," line 11, "in festo reliquiarum eiusdem ecclesie sarum." Lessons counted up to nine; the "capitulum" of…
Fragmenta Manuscripta 187: Theological Text
One column visible with 21 visible lines, with bounding lines, with recto and verso ruled separately (with ink ?).
Fragmenta Manuscripta 214: Legal document, William Skrene, John Quynton, and John Bleathe with his wife, Mary
Binding: Not bound.
Number of scribes, f. 1r-v: 1.
Script, f. 1r-v: Cursive.
Layout, f. 1r-v: One column visible with 10 lines of text with 2…
Fragmenta Manuscripta 197: Sermons on the deadly sins
Script: Greek minuscule bouletee. Script is no later than the first quarter of the 10th century, and it might be copied at the very end of the 9th…
Fragmenta Manuscripta 199: Pen trials
Contents: Pen trials including the opening words for legal documents "Sciant presentes" and a possible owner name, __?___omfrey Stoket.
Fragmenta Manuscripta 130: Canon Law
One column visible with 19 visible lines, with bounding lines, with recto and verso ruled separately with leadpoint.
Psalter
Contents: Fragment contains parts of Pss. 68 and 70 with hierarchy accorded to the psalm "Salvum me fac," implying use in a liturgical context.