This guide provides an overview of how to search for archives and rare books held by the University of Exeter.
The boxes below provide guidance and tips on how to search the catalogues, as well as links to the online catalogues, through which you can explore the collections further.
Archives and rare books held by Special Collections are available for everyone - students, staff and members of the public - to access in our reading room for general interest or study. More information about accessing the collections can be found in our Visiting Heritage Collections LibGuide.
Rare books and reserve collections can be found by searching the University of Exeter Library catalogue https://www.exeter.ac.uk/library/
Once you have your search results in the Library Catalogue, use the 'Publish Date' box from the options in the left hand column to refine results to a specific date range.
You can also look for the options illustrated above at the top of your search results, click 'Date' to display your search results in date order.
Once you have your search results displayed in the Library catalogue click on a book title to view the full item record.
From here you can click on the item's Call No, seen below.
This allows you to browse a virtual bookshelf to see other similar titles shelved nearby. Click on the arrows to scroll through the shelves, click on a title to view the full item record. You can also select 'List browse' to see results as a straightforward list.
You can browse titles from one of our book collections on the Library's classic catalogue by performing a 'local classmark' search. Select 'Local classmark' from the drop down list then enter the name of the collection in the search box.
You can then choose to arrange the results by year by selecting this option from the dropdown list beside the search button.
For the Brooks collection you can also search 'Brooks P' to view the periodicals in the collection.
For the Hypatia Collection enter 'Hypatia' into the search box for books and 'Hypatia Jou' for journals. To browse all titles within a subject add the first 3 letters of the subject eg ‘Hypatia Bio’ will find all the material in the Biography section. The books and pamphlets are arranged within these subjects: Archaeology and Anthropology; Art; Biographies; Crime; Diaries; Domestic Science; Education; Fiction; Folklore; Health; History; Literary Criticism; Marriage and the Family; Natural World; Nursing; Occupations; Performing Arts; Poetry; Politics; Religion; Science; Topography; Travel; The Cornish Woman; The American Woman; Women in War; The Woman; and Journals and Periodicals.
Archive material can be found by searching the University of Exeter Special Collections archives catalogue http://lib-archives.ex.ac.uk/Default.aspx?
EXAMPLE: A search for the keyword “Blast” restricted to 1910s will bring up 1 result:
You can then click on the Ref No to see a more detailed catalogue entry:
Getting to grips with hierarchical structuring
Information in archives is arranged according to the person or organization that created it, to reflect how the records were created/ used. This results in hierarchical structuring. It also means that researchers may have to search across several archives (possibly in different countries) to get the fullest possible picture of their research topic.
Hierarchical structuring refers to the different levels of description in an archive catalogue, beginning with the fonds, or collection level. This top level description provides a broad overview of the archive as a whole, including its size, information on the origin of the collection and the creator, a date range, and information on catalogues or guides associated with the archive - often known as finding aids. It may also tell you whether there are any specific access conditions or copyright requirements.
The catalogue is then arranged in levels from largest [collection] to smallest [item] as below
Not every archive will use all these levels, and occasionally there will be additional sub-levels for complex hierarchies. To view the full hierarchy of the archive collection that your search result belongs too, simply click on the Ref No in the detailed catalogue entry.
This will bring up a hierarchical depiction of that specific archive collection. You can then click on the plus symbols to expand the levels, and on individual record titles to open their detailed catalogue entries.
Viewing descriptions over several levels
With collections that have been fully catalogued the information tends to become more specific the further down the hierarchy you go. However, archivists try not to duplicate information down the levels so it is good practice to look at the collection, section, series, file and item descriptions from a particular items hierarchy in order to build up a full description of that item and where it fits within the archive collection.
Our reference numbers reflect the hierarchy of a record so EUL MS 397/8/3/1 denotes the collection (EUL MS 397), the section (/8), the series (/3) and the item (/1). The hierarchy of a record is always shown at the top of the catalogue entry for that record; click on these links to read the catalogue entry for each level.
Searching by reference number
You can search within one particular​ archive collection rather than the whole archive by entering the collection's Ref No into the advanced search. If you are searching using the Ref No for the entire collection (eg. EUL MS 397), or for a large section within this, consider using "/*" at the end so that all the records lower down the hierarchy within that collection will also be displayed in your search results.
Assessing the amount of material
Take a look at the extent field for any search results you think you would like to research. This will provide you with an idea of how large that section is and allow you to judge whether it is practical for you to consult that much material in one visit. For example, in the image above you can see that the reference number EUL MS 397/8/3/1 comprises 1 item, however if you requested EUL MS 397/8/3 (the series level reference) it would comprise 129 items. If you request an entire collection/ section we may ask you to narrow it down as this can be several hundred boxes.
Information that is not on the catalogue
Collections that have not yet been fully catalogued may have legacy finding aids that aren’t on the online catalogue. Special Collections staff will be able to advise you on accessing these. It is always worth emailing Special Collections staff and asking for suggestions on material to research around your topic; we often know of connections that aren’t easily seen in the catalogue
This step-by-step tutorial will guide you through searching our archives catalogue and the key information to look for to make a request to view the materials in our dedicated Reading Room.
