Manuscripts and Early Printed Books: Catalogs
UIUC's Rare Book and Manuscript Library
Located on the third floor of the Main Library, holds numerous editions and rare works of incunabla, medieval manuscripts, early modern works, and many other treasures in bibliographic history. It most prominently has a rich Shakespeare collection that include all four folios, a set of Pavier quartos (1619), a copy of the 1640 Poems, and the stationer's fragment (ca. 1603–1607) that documents the possible lost play by Shakespeare, Love's Labor’s Won. The RBML also holds 16th- and 17th-century editions of works by John Northbrooke, Thomas Kyd's Spanish Tragedy, Thomas Heywood, William Prynne's Histro-mastix, among many others.
- Renaissance Imprints (1454-1650)
The combined catalog of nearly 100 major UK and Irish libraries.
The English Short Title Catalogue | ESTC: Temporary search interface for pre-1700 records
The ESTC lists over 480,000 items in English published between 1473 and 1800 published mainly in the British Isles and North America.
Other
The ISTC is a catalog of 15th-century European printing created by the British Library with help from institutions worldwide.
Allows for searching for digitized items as well in the catalogs of print holdings of libraries in 46 countries across Europe.
Manuscripts and Early Printed Books Online
British Library
British Library: Manuscripts Online
British Library Catalog: Search for early printed books.
There are some 12,500 incunabula at the British Library, which represent about 10,390 editions out of an estimated total of surviving 28,000 editions published in the 15th century. We have over 230 incunabula printed in England of which over 120 are in English. A substantial number of our 16th-century printed books came into the Library with the large foundation collections, and we have added to the collections through regular acquisitions. Our printed books cover every possible subject, including religion, literature, editions of the Classics, editions of the Bible, grammars and dictionaries, and medical and scientific books.
Brotherton Library Leeds
Brotherton Library's Online Collection
Literary Manuscripts: Leeds
This database features complete facsimile images of 190 manuscripts of 17th and 18th century verse held in the celebrated Brotherton Collection at the University of Leeds. Alongside original compositions are painstakingly copied verses, translations, songs and riddles. The whole collection is situated within an assortment of manuscripts, some entirely dedicated to poetry, while others contain medicinal recipes, household accounts, draft letters, musical scores and plays. There are also several printed works, with handwritten verse additions.
Folger Shakespeare Library
Early Modern Manuscripts Online (EMMO)
Early Modern Manuscripts Online (EMMO) is a project of the Folger Shakespeare Library, funded by a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), to provide scholars and the general public with convenient web access to transcriptions, images, and metadata for manuscripts from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
- Perdita Manuscripts This link opens in a new windowPerdita means "lost woman" and the purpose of the project has been to find early modern women authors who were "lost" because their writing exists only in manuscript form. Over 230 entries have been selected and digitized. In addition to the digital facsimiles, the site includes biographical and bibliographical information and essays by specialists in the field.
- Women Writers Project This link opens in a new windowWomen Writers Project, a research project that is devoted to early modern writing by women and electronic text encoding. Offers access to a searchable catalogue, bibliographic information, the history of the project, documentation, an archive of the newsletter, and suggested readings.
Research Databases
- Academic Search Ultimate This link opens in a new window
- Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature This link opens in a new window
- Arts and Humanities Citation Index This link opens in a new window
- Bible in English This link opens in a new window
- Brepolis Medieval and Early Modern Bibliographies This link opens in a new window
- British Literary Manuscripts Online This link opens in a new window
- Early English Books Online This link opens in a new window
- Early English Prose Fiction This link opens in a new window
- EEBO-TCP This link opens in a new window
- English Drama This link opens in a new window Contains more than 3,900 plays in verse and prose from the late thirteenth century - the likely date of the Shrewsbury Fragments - to the early twentieth. It offers exhaustive coverage of the prodigious dramatic literature of the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods, as well as Restoration plays, medieval morality plays and mystery cycles, and nineteenth-century closet dramas.
- English Poetry This link opens in a new window
- MLA International Bibliography This link opens in a new window
- ProQuest One Literature This link opens in a new window
Book History and Early Printed Works
The Library of Congress provides an overview of England's Early English printing. The Rare Book and Special Collections Division holds fifteenth and sixteenth-century English printing materials including English imprints or incunabula.
The bibliography is a database of secondary sources on women's writing and labor in the Early Modern period.
- Book History ResourcesA brief list of open-access resources for studying early modern book history, with a preference for British history.
- Descriptive Cataloging of Rare MaterialsThe manuals are intended for catalogers, but are useful for understanding how to use catalogs (RBMS).
- Early Modern ResourcesEarly Modern Resources is a research portal for the early modern period (c.1500-1800 CE).
In the Worldcat Collection or OCLC, it's possible to find alternate editions and formats of titles held by University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and other libraries worldwide. Using this search feature, rare or obscure books can be located. To do so, search for a title and your search results will yield items that will have "other editions and formats" available. "View all" to trace the history of book formats and editions for that specific item.
Stationers' Company Archive
This resource provides an overview of the early book trade, the printing and publishing community, the establishment of legal requirements for copyright provisions and the history of bookbinding. The company was founded in 1403 and received a royal charter in 1557. In the beginning, stationers held occupations such as text writers, booksellers, bookbinders and Illuminators. By 1557, printing displaced manuscript production. The company's monopoly on book production allowed only them to publish books once they were approved. No one else had the right to copy these books.
Stationers' Company Archive holds the administrative records of the company since 1557. Reports include: The Stationers' Company Registers 1554-1842, Court Books (from 1602 to the present day), membership records (1555 to the present day), financial and legal documents, and photographs and ephemera.
The History, Philosophy and Newspaper Library holds the microfilm collection of the Stationers' Company Archives.
Subject Headings
Use the following subject headings to search for books, periodicals, and electronic resources in the Library Catalog.
Literature
English literature--Early modern, 1500-1700
English literature--Early modern, 1500-1700--History and criticism
English literature--16th century
English literature--16th century--History and criticism
English literature--17th century
English literature--17th century--History and criticism
Poetry
English poetry--16th century
English poetry--16th century--History and criticism
English poetry--17th century
English poetry--17th century--History and criticism
Drama
English drama--16th century
English drama--16th century--Criticism, Textual
English drama--16th century--History and criticism
English drama 17th century
English drama--17th century--Criticism, Textual
English drama 17th century--History and criticism
Basic Resources
Gathering Force: Early Modern British Literature in Transition, 1557-1623: Volume 1 by ISBN: 9781108419635Publication Date: 2019
The Oxford Handbook of Early Modern Literature and Religion by ISBN: 9780199672806Publication Date: 2017
The Oxford handbook of early modern women's writing in English, 1540-1700 by ISBN: 0192604732Publication Date: 2022
Teaching Early Modern English Literature from the Archives by ISBN: 9781603291569Publication Date: 2015
