Where to Find Descriptions of Vatican Library Manuscripts

Researchers must find descriptions of Vatican Library manuscripts through a variety of printed and handwritten catalogues, inventories, and indexes, since there is no comprehensive printed or on-line catalogue that describes the entire collection.

The Vatican Film Library has a complete set of the Vatican Library’s printed catalogues, which offer detailed, scholarly descriptions of their manuscripts. Unfortunately the volumes published up to now cover only a limited part of the Vatican’s total holdings. These catalogues are of three main types:

  • Analytical catalogues published since 1885 in the series Bibliothecae Apostolicae Vaticanae codices manuscripti recensiti

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  • Summary catalogues published since 1989 in the series Cataloghi sommari e inventari dei fondi manoscritti appearing in the Vatican Library's monographic series Studi e testi

  • Inventories of various fondi or language groups within the Vatican's collections also appearing in Studi e testi

ALTERNATE SOURCES OF DESCRIPTIONS

Handwritten inventories
For the many thousands of manuscripts lacking printed descriptions, there are handwritten inventories of varying age and quality. Their importance becomes clear when one considers, for example, that printed descriptions exist for only the first 150 of the roughly 10,000 Barberini latini codices; for only around 4,000 of the roughly 15,000 Vaticani latini codices; and for only a few of the 3,916 codices making up the Chigi collection. These handwritten inventories are available on microfilm in the Vatican Film Library as part of F. Edward Cranz, Microfilm Corpus of Unpublished Inventories of Latin Manuscripts through 1600 A.D. (New London, Conn., 1988), and we have additionally our own complete microfilm set of these inventories (see in Online Catalog).

Card catalogue
Between 1928 and the beginning of World War II the Bibliotheca Apostolica Vaticana compiled a card catalogue consisting of some 250,000 cards and covering some 7,000 manuscripts from various collections. This catalogue provides entries for author, title, subject, and incipit, with extensive cross references. The only existing photostatic copy of these cards is available to readers in the Vatican Film Library.

Other printed resources
In addition to catalogues issued by the Vatican Library itself, scholars can find descriptions of Vatican manuscripts in catalogues issued by other institutions, as well as accounts of individual manuscripts published in numerous monographs and scholarly journals. For bibliographies of published and unpublished catalogues, descriptions, and discussions of Vatican Library manuscripts, see:
  • Robert Beylot, Répertoire des bibliothèques et des catalogues de manuscrits ethiopiens, Documents, études et répertoires publiés par l'Institut de recherches et d'histoire des textes (Paris; Turnhout: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique; Brepols, 1995)

  • Bernard Coulie, Répertoire des bibliothèques et des catalogues de manuscrits arméniens, Corpus Christianorum (Turnhout: Brepols, 1992)

  • Alain Desreumaux, with Françoise Briquel-Chatonnet, Répertoire des bibliothèques et des catalogues de manuscrits syriaques, Documents, études et répertoires publiés par l'Institut de recherches et d'histoire des textes (Paris: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1991)

  • David Djaparidzé, Mediaeval Slavic Manuscripts: A Bibliography of Printed Catalogues (Cambridge: Mediaeval Academy of America, 1957)

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  • A.J.W. Huisman, Les Manuscrits arabes dans le monde: Une Bibliographie des catalogues (Leiden: Brill, 1967)

  • Paul Oskar Kristeller, Latin Manuscript Books before 1600: A List of the Printed Catalogues and Unpublished Inventories of Extant Collections, 4th ed., ed. Sigrid Krämer, Monumenta Germaniae historica, hilfsmittel, 13 (Munich: Monumenta Germaniae Historica, 1993). A 5th edition is now available online at http://www.mgh-bibliothek.de/kristeller/

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  • Répertoire des bibliothèques et des catalogues de manuscrits grecs de Marcel Richard, 3rd ed., ed. Jean-Marie Olivier, Corpus Christianorum (Turnhout: Brepols, 1995)

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  • Vatican Film Library Bibliographies (available online)

Bibliographic references for individual manuscripts may be found in:

  • Paul Canart and Vittorio Peri, Sussidi bibliografici per i manoscritti greci della Biblioteca Vaticana, Studi e testi, 261 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1970; rpt. 1987)

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  • Marco Buonocore, Bibliografia dei fondi manoscritti della Biblioteca Vaticana (1968-1980), 2 vols., Studi e testi, 318–19 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1986)

  • M. Ceresa, Bibliografia dei fondi manoscritti della Biblioteca Vaticana (1981-1985), Studi e testi, 342 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1991)

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  • Marco Buonocore, Bibliografia retrospettiva dei fondi della Biblioteca Vaticana, I, Studi e testi, 361 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1994)

  • M. Ceresa, Bibliografia dei fondi manoscritti della Biblioteca Vaticana (1986-1990), Studi e testi, 379 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1998)

  • M. Ceresa, Bibliografia dei fondi manoscritti della Biblioteca Vaticana (1991-2000), Studi e testi, 426 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2005)