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Dutch Institutions abroad

UTRECHT

Universiteit Utrecht / Universiteitsbibliotheek / Afdeling Bijzondere Collecties

Universiteit Utrecht / University Library / Special Collections Department

Size 230 meter of manuscripts, 900 incunabula, 100,000 early imprints (before 1801); reference library 12,000 books and 75 current periodicals
Character and emphasis The origin of what is now the library of Utrecht University goes back to 1584, when the reformed city council confiscated the books and manuscripts from the many monasteries in what had been the ecclesiastical capital of the Netherlands. Functioning as university library since 1636, it has continuously been expanded both by purchase, donations and permanent loans. The manuscript department now holds ca. 650 medieval manuscripts, including the celebrated Utrecht Psalter (ca. 820 A.D.), and large quantities of later manuscript materials, including some tens of thousands of letters from the 16th-20th centuries. The early and rare book department owns some 900 incunables and ca. 100,000 early imprints (before 1801), many of which are illustrated. The department is particularly strong in (protestant) theology, complemented for catholic theology by the acquisition, in 1971, of the Thomaasse Collection (see below). The reading room of the department provides an ample reference library, concentrating on manuscripts, book illumination, the history of typography and the booktrade, bookillustration, bindings etc.

Special collections Thomaasse Collection: ca. 250,000 volumes from the libraries of (later) Franciscan monasteries in the Netherlands and the seminaries of the Archdiocese of Utrecht, including 128 incunables and some 15,000 early imprints; it is strong in catholic theology, ecclesiastical history, (Dutch) missals, devotional, liturgical and prayerbooks, but also including many books on art and art history.

Access Closed stacks; reference section in reading room on open shelves

Catalogues

• Online union catalogue of Utrecht University Library. Retrieval is possible on title, author's name, keyword and subject, and by place and institution for exhibition and collection catalogues. The early and rare editions have only in part been included in the online catalogue. The catalogue is incorporated in the national union catalogue NCC and is also accessible through the university library's website: http://www.uu.nl/library
• Alphabetical and systematic card catalogues
• Name list of printers for the early imprints:
  http://drukkers.library.uu.nl/en/
• Card catalogues of incunabula, pamphlets and academic disputations
• Card catalogue of letters; also included in Catalogus Epistularum Neerlandicarum (CEN), and accessible online through NCC
• Printed catalogue of the medieval illuminated manuscripts
• Digitaal Repertorium Utrechtse bijzondere collecties (digital repertory of the special collections, only in Dutch):
  http://repertorium.library.uu.nl/home.htm
• Digital special collections:
  http://digbijzcoll.library.uu.nl/index.php?lang=en
• Virtual showcase: a choice from the Special Collections of Utrecht University Library: http://vitrine.library.uu.nl/wwwroot/en/index.htm
• Digital edition of the Utrecht Psalter:
  http://psalter.library.uu.nl/default.asp?sl=en