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

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.

Medieval manuscript fragment on parchment with Latin text in brown and red links and early musical notation<br />

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.

Medieval manuscript page with black lettering, occasionally highlighted with blue or red

Special Collections maintains a small collection of European manuscripts intended to demonstrate the physical characteristics of the manuscript books,…

Pages from the Past Collection

Papyrus fragment with Greek letters in black ink

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 046: Psalter, glossed

medieval manuscript fragment written in brown ink, with initials in green and red inks, and two letter sizes. Small hole on the parchment on the lower half (recto)

Single column with 22 lines of text visible, gloss alternates, but no ruling for glossed lines, bounding lines, with one outer line, 8mm out, ruling…

Missal with musical notation

Contents: Contains texts for 11 and 20 July; added text is for the feast of Margaret.

Fragmenta Manuscripta 016: Psalter, glossed

Medieval manuscript leaf fragment written in two columns with black ink over light parchment and in two letter sizes. Partial illumination and initials (recto)

Provenance: John Bagford (1650s-1716) to St. Martin-in-the-Fields; sale 1861 to Sir Thomas Phillipps, n.15758; his sale 22 May, 1913, lot 742; Sir…

Fragmenta Manuscripta 135: Miroiror Evangiles des Domnees

Medieval parchment fragment with text in two columns written in brown ink.

Two large columns with 41 visible lines, recto, and 39 visible lines, verso, each column preceded by narrow column to the left consisting of a capital…