Rare Book and Manuscript Library

Access

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The Rare Book & Manuscript Library is located on the sixth floor of the Van Pelt-Dietrich Library. The entrance to the building faces Locust Walk between 34th and 36th Streets. The Rare Book & Manuscript Library is open Monday through Friday from 9:00 A.M. to 4:45 P.M., and Saturday from Noon to 4:00 P.M. during the fall, spring, and summer academic semesters.

The library is open to all who need to consult its collections. Readers must provide current photographic identification for admission to both Van Pelt-Dietrich Library and this department; they may also need to make special arrangements if planning to use the collections on Saturdays. Please call 215-898-7088 for more information regarding Saturday access.

Bibliographic records for approximately half of the printed book collections can be found on Franklin, the Library's online catalog, and more continue to be added as the Library retrospectively converts the remaining card catalogs to machine-readable form. Until this process is completed, it is still necessary to consult the public card catalog located in the Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Access to modern manuscript collections is provided through two electronic bibliographic utilities, Franklin and WorldCat. A card catalog and printed guides (manuscript registers and inventories) are also available in the RB&M Library. Most of the codex manuscripts have been cataloged in Franklin and WorldCat, but for those that have yet to be converted, please refer to the published guide, Catalogue of Manuscripts, edited by N. Zacour and R. Hirsch, and its supplements.