Harvard's Slavic collections highlights
1959-1999, Czterdziestolecie Wydawnictwa Znak. Kraków 2000 (fragment). Part of Polish assorted cultural, museum exhibitions posters. HOLLIS # 8001162585.
Some of Harvard's unique library holdings in Slavic studies include:
Unique collections of documents:
Harvard Project on the Soviet Social System/Harvard Interview Project (1949-1953).
Rare books:
Psaltir s Posledovanjem (Cetinje, 1495) – only copy recorded outside Eastern Europe and Russia and the earliest Old Church Slavonic printed book at Harvard.
Ivan Fedorov’s Primer (L’viv, 1574) – first book to be published on the territory of Ukraine and one of only two known copies outside Eastern Europe and Russia.
The Kilgour collection of Russian literature (1750-1920) – one of the finest collection of first editions of Russian belles-lettres, from Lomonosov to Blok, including the complete set of Pushkin's first editions.
Pre-Soviet Russian Law Collection - nineteenth- and twentieth-century pre-Soviet Russian collection, well over 5,500 separate titles, also available on microfilm.
Archival and manuscript collections:
The archives of Leon Trotsky (1904-1941), including Soviet and Exile papers.
Ukrainian Archives and Manuscript Collections (1870s-present).
Visual collections:
Soviet Information Bureau Photograph Collection
Audio collections:
The Millman Parry Collection of South Slavic Oral Literature.
Laura Boulton Collection of Byzantine Eastern Orthodox Chant (Armenian, Russian, Coptic, Ethiopian, and related repertoires).
Archives of independent publications:
The Solidarity Bibliographic Center collection of independent, underground, and uncensored Polish publications (1970s-1990).
The Czech and Slovak samizdat collection :1968-1990.
The independent/unofficial press of the Soviet Union (1987-1991).
Ephemera collections:
Russian ephemera (late 1980s-1990s)
Political and cultural ephemera from Russia, Ukraine, and Yugoslavia (1990s-present).
Rare topographic materials:
The collection of Soviet military topographic maps of the European areas of the Soviet Union. (Search HOLLIS for Author: "Soviet Union. Sovetskai͡a Armii͡a. Generalʹnyĭ shtab.")
Bohdan and Neonila Krawciw Ucrainica Map Collection. (Read a description of the collection here.)
Material culture collections:
Collections highlights by location
Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies Collection (Fung Library)
Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute Library
Government Documents/Microforms Collection (Lamont Library)
Dumbarton Oaks Research Library
Widener Library is home to the single largest collection of Slavic publications held by Harvard. The primary focus of the Widener Slavic collections is materials in the humanities and social sciences. The collections include both Slavic language materials and titles pertaining to Slavic studies published in English, French, German, etc. In addition to the traditional library materials (books and periodicals), the collection contains digital resources, audio and video materials and special collections of primary sources.
Houghton Library holds many of the Slavic rare books, manuscripts and archival collections at Harvard. Early Slavic publications include:
- Psaltir s Posledovanium (Prědislovie i skaz kako sʹstavlęn bystʹ Psaltirʹ, Cetinje, 1495) – only copy recorded outside Eastern Europe and Russia and the earliest Old Church Slavonic printed book at Harvard.
- Ivan Fedorov’s Bukvar’ (Primer) (L’viv, 1574) – first book to be published on the territory of Ukraine and one of only two known copies outside Eastern Europe and Russia. Fully digitized version also available.
- The Kilgour collection of Russian belles-lettres (1750-1920) is one of the finest collections of first editions of Russian literature, from Lomonosov to Blok, including the only complete set of Pushkin's first editions held by any library outside of Russia.
- Documents signed by Ivan Stepanovych Mazepa including a land grant from 1706 ; a charter confirming the purchase of a homestead in 1702 ; a charter granting a monopoly on the sale of tobacco and liquor in the village of Svityl’ne in 1695 ; and, a charter regarding Sloboda Mill from 1691.
Houghton archival collections include
- The Andrei Sakharov Archives which includes the papers of:
- Andrei Amal'rik, 1938-1980. Andrei Amal'rik papers
- Elena Bonner, 1923- . Elena Bonner papers
- Dewhirst, Martin. Martin Dewhirst papers
- Vasilii Semenovich Grossman, 1905-1964. Vasilii Semenovich Grossman papers
- Ludmila Gurevich. Ludmila Gurevich family papers
- Edward Kline. Edward Kline papers
- The Human Rights Collection
- Peter Reddaway photograph collection, 1968-1988
- The archives of Leon Trotsky (1904-1941) and related material, including:
- Leon Trotsky Soviet papers, 1904-1959
- Leon Trotsky exile papers, 1929-1940
- Additional papers, 1930-1938 and undated.
- The Russian Theatrical Designs from the Harvard Theatre Collection and the Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Dana papers on Soviet theater and film and university lecture notes are both part of The Harvard Theater Collection .
Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies Collection (Fung Library)
The Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies collection is comprised of books and periodicals related to the field of Russian and Eurasian studies, particularly in the social sciences (political science, economics, sociology) and history. The general collection consists of approximately 20,000 volumes, primarily scholarly monographs, reference books, archival guides, and statistical publications, as well as current newspapers and periodicals. Current collecting efforts place a particular emphasis on archives, photographs, and other special-collections material. The collection also includes microfilm, audio-visual materials, and ephemera, among other types of non-book formats.
Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute Library
The Library at the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute holds a small collection of monographs and serials, with an emphasis on reference materials. In addition, it holds a number of important manuscripts and archival collections. “The material in the collections includes personal documents, correspondence, telegrams, minutes, financial and administrative records, manuscripts, publications, press clippings, and photographs. The predominant languages of the various documents are Ukrainian and English, although some of the documents are written in other European languages. The collections are a particularly important historical resource for the study of Ukraine during the revolutionary years 1917 to 1921, and Ukrainian refugee and émigré life in Europe and the United States following the Second World War. The papers and archives are also useful for studying Ukrainian cultural life from the viewpoint of individual lives and institutional activities.” A list, many with descriptions, of these collections is available at http://huri.harvard.edu/library.html
Government Documents/Microforms Collection (Lamont Library)
Includes numerous Slavic microforms sets including the Archives of the Soviet Communist Party and Soviet State and Holodomor : famine in Ukraine, 1932-1933, from the Central State Archive of Public Organizations, Kiev , to name just two collections.
Holds an extensive collection of Slavic legal materials, both contemporary and historical. Of specific note is the Pre-Soviet Law Collection with over 5,500 nineteenth- and twentieth-century titles available as physical copies or on microfilm. Learn more about this collection.
Holds an extensive collection of Slavic and Eurasian art materials. Special emphasis is placed on, but not limited to, the acquisition of museum and exhibit catalogs.
“The Harvard Map Collection is one of the oldest and largest collections of cartographic materials in the United States with over 500,000 items. Resources range from 16th century globes to modern maps and geographic information systems (GIS) layers. A selection of our materials has been digitally imaged and is offered both as true picture images and georeferenced copies.’ Many of these maps have not been cataloged, you are encouraged to visit the Map Collection to review the full range of materials.
Map collection holdings include:
Some of these maps and atlas are available electronically and can be searched on the Scanned Maps site.
Holds a number of Slavic films which are mostly in 35mm format so they must be viewed onsite. Copies of Slavic films on DVD and VHS can be checked out of Widener Library.
“Collects comprehensively in all subfields of anthropology: cultural and social anthropology, biological and physical anthropology, archaeology, and anthropological linguistics.” The collections include a strong representation of Slavic and Eurasian materials.
Dumbarton Oaks Research Library (located in Washington DC)
Byzantine Studies; includes materials and images from Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Slovenia, Romania, Russia, Armenia, and Georgia. Dumbarton Oaks is located in Washington, DC and their collections do not circulate.
“The primary repository of musical materials at Harvard. The library's general collections include about 91,000 books, 143,000 scores, 83,000 sound recordings and video formats, and nearly 1,080 periodical titles that support research in a wide variety of musical disciplines including historical musicology, music theory, ethnomusicology, composition, and historically informed performance practice. In addition, the Isham Memorial Library houses a collection of 8,250 rare books and scores and 31,200 microforms.” The Laura Boulton Collection of Byzantine and Orthodox Music includes Russian music. Loeb Music Library also holds The Eduard Alekseyev Fieldwork Collection of the Musical Culture of Yakutia, 1969-1990 (see also Music of Yakutia : research guide).
Holds university records, faculty papers, historical collections that document Harvard, records of organizations associated with the university and dissertations, theses and prize papers.
HUA collections related to faculty members associated with Slavic studies include:
- Archibald Cary Coolidge
- Samuel Hazzard Cross
- Merle Fainsod (including his Smolensk Archives papers)
- Roman Jakobson
- Michael Karpovich
- Richard Pipes
- Wiktor Weintraub
- Leo Wiener
Holds materials on medical care and public health. The Center for the History of Medicine holds some Slavic-related special collections.
The history of Slavic collections at Harvard
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Archibald Cary Coolidge (1866-1928), one of the creators of the Slavic library collection at Harvard.
Painting by Page, Marie Danforth (1890-1940), 1930. © President and Fellows of Harvard College. Image from VIA (Harvard University Library Visual Information Access).
Record Identifier: HUAM304784 |
A systematic plan for the development of Harvard's Slavic library collections began in the mid-1950s following the creation of the Russian Research Center in 1948, and the official establishment of the Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures in 1949. After years when it had been difficult to obtain material from behind the Iron Curtain, the Library suddenly faced a flood of Slavic publications and made more Slavic acquisitions than during any previous decade, including the significant contributions to Harvard's collection of Slavic early printing, history, and literature made by Bayard L. Kilgour, Jr. (Harvard Class of 1927). The 1960s and 1970s brought a concerted effort to fill in gaps in Harvard's Slavic collections and the Library set out to complete sets of Slavic periodicals and to search out originals, copies and microfilms of out-of-print research materials, particularly from the Russian revolutionary period through the first half of the 20th century. With the formation of the Committee on Ukrainian Studies in 1968 and the establishment of the Ukrainian Research Institute in 1973, the Library also began to acquire unparalleled collections of Ukrainian material from private collectors. During the 1980s, the focus turned towards preserving Harvard’s Slavic holdings and towards raising endowed book funds to ensure future research needs and acquisitions. At the same time, the Slavic Division developed an elaborate network of exchange relationships throughout the Slavic world by which it acquired works in nearly all disciplines of the social sciences and humanities. As a result of these strategic decisions, Harvard’s Slavic collection grew from about 124,000 titles in 1950 to nearly 800,000 by 1998. Proceeding from an acquisition rate of approximately 500 volumes per year in the late 1940s to 1,000 volumes per month in the 1960s, the Harvard College Library’s Slavic collection has grown to an acquisition rate of approximately 1,700 volumes per month at the turn of the twenty-first century. Thus, even before the deluge of publications that attended the break-up of the Soviet empire in the Baltics, Eurasia, and East-Central Europe, Harvard University managed to acquire the single largest academic collection of Slavic materials in the world.