Rare Books. Brief Summary

Collection Holder:

Rare Books Department

Time Span:

from 15th cent. to the 19th cent.

Size:

72047 items (for 01.01.2022)

Range:

The library's stock of rare books began to form back in the 19th century as the Department of Incunabula, Aldine Editions and Elzevier Volumes. Later, it was enriched by the Voltaire Library (the only extant personal library of the 18th century in the world) and a number of collections consisting of book rarities.

Description of the Collection

Reading Rooms:

Rare Books Room (1-3, Ostrovsky Square);
Centre for Study of the Enlightenment 'Voltaire Library' (1-3, Ostrovsky Square).

Online Catalogues (a Russian interface):

European Publications of the 15th Century. /Incunabula/
For information on the availability of other rare publications, call by phone +7(812) 310-83-36.

Shalf Marks:

9.18.3.29a-f; II.2.13.а,б,в

Full-text resources:

ABC books, primers, grammar books, dictionaries of the 16th-17th centuries
Landmark Literary Works
Petrine Vedomosti (News)
Voltaire Library Catalogue (in Russian)
Online Exhibitions

Other holdings containing publications of the same type:

The continuation of the newspaper Sankt-Peterburgskie Vedomosti (Saint Petersburg News) is stored in the Newspapers Collection, Western European books of the 16th – 18th centuries are held in the collection of European Books, Cyrillic publications of the 16th – 18th centuries are part of the Russian Books Collection.