Rare Books and Early Manuscripts at the University of Chicago Library
This guide contains resources, descriptions, and tutorials on how to use the rare book and early manuscript collections at the University of Chicago Library. There is also information and resources on book history, printing, and book collecting.
Early English Books Online (EEBO) contains digital facsimile page images of virtually every work printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America and works in English printed elsewhere from 1473-1700 - from the first book printed in English by William Caxton, through the age of Spenser and Shakespeare and the tumult of the English Civil War. Digital facsimile page images of virtually every work printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America and works in English printed elsewhere from 1473-1700. Subjects include literature, history, philosophy, linguistics, theology, music, art, education, mathematics, and science. Titles from Pollard & Redgrave (1475-1640), Wing (1641-1700), Thomason Tracts (1640-1661) and Early English Books Tract Supplement.
Early English Books Online (EEBO) features page images of almost every work printed in the British Isles and North America, as well as works in English printed elsewhere from 1470-1700. Over 200 libraries worldwide have contributed to EEBO. From the first book printed in English through to the ages of Spenser, Shakespeare and of the English Civil War, EEBO's content draws on authoritative and respected short-title catalogues of the period and features a substantial number of text transcriptions specially created for the product.
Offers electronic texts selected from the current output of American university presses, as well as those from a specially selected backlist of titles. American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) project.
Early English Prose Fiction is a balanced and representative survey of fictional prose in English from the period 1500-1700, comprising more than 200 works. The collection explores the rich diversity of prose fiction preceding the emergence of the realist novel as its dominant form.
The English Short Title Catalogue (ESTC) lists over 460,000 items published between 1473 and 1800, mainly published in the British Isles and North America.Works are from the collections of the British Library and over 2,000 other libraries.
English Short Title Catalogue (ESTC) is an invaluable research tool for scholars in English culture, language, and literature. From the beginnings of print to 1800, ESTC provides extensive descriptions and holdings information for letterpress materials printed in Great Britain or any of its dependencies in any language ? as well as for materials printed in English anywhere else in the world. ESTC serves as a comprehensive bibliography of the hand-press era and as a census of surviving copies. All recorded English monographs printed between 1475 and 1700 are now represented in the file. Produced by the ESTC editorial offices at the University of California, Riverside and the British Library, in partnership with the American Antiquarian Society and over 1,600 libraries worldwide, the file continues to be updated and expanded daily.
The HathiTrust Digital Library brings together the immense book collections of partner institutions in digital form, preserving them securely to be accessed by anyone for years.
HathiTrust is a shared digital repository created by major research libraries. It offers searching of the full text of books and full access to works in the public domain
UChicago users may login to download high quality PDF versions where available.
Locate and Request Rare Books Using the Library Catalog
Rare Book Digital Highlights from the Library's Collection
UChicago Librarys print collection includes more than 400 first and early printed editions of musical compositions by Frdric Chopin. The online collection consists of digitized images of all scores in the U of C Library's collection.
5,000 pages of original historical material documenting the land, peoples, exploration, and transformation of the trans-Appalachian West from the mid-eighteenth to the early nineteenth century. The collection is drawn from the holdings of the University of Chicago Library and the Filson Historical Society of Louisville, Kentucky. Among the sources included are books, periodicals, newspapers, pamphlets, scientific publications, broadsides, letters, journals, legal documents, ledgers and other financial records, maps, physical artifacts, and pictorial images.