Using the Library
Ten things you need to know about the Bodleian Library
- The majority of the collections in the Central Bodleian are reference-only and cannot be borrowed. The only exception is the Personal Development collection, housed in the Gladstone Link.
- The Bodleian Library is the second biggest in Great Britain, after the British Library itself. The Bodleian collection includes more than 9 million volumes.
- The Bodleian Library is one of five legal deposit libraries in the United Kingdom. We are entitled to claim a copy of every book and periodical part published in the United Kingdom or the Republic of Ireland. We are also obliged to keep them in perpetuity.
- The Bodleian Library is part of the Bodleian Libraries, a group of more than thirty research, faculty and departmental libraries that make up the largest part of Oxford University's library provision.
- The Bodleian's printed collections, as well as many electronic resources, are listed on Oxford University's catalogue SOLO, which is available for all to consult on the internet.
- Our large collections of online resources can be accessed remotely by current Oxford University members, and from within the libraries by non-Oxford library members.
- The Bodleian's holdings include internationally significant collections of manuscripts, maps, sheet music, and printed ephemera.
- A large proportion of our collections are kept in a remote storage in a state of the art facility in Swindon. Library members can order material from storage using SOLO.
- Readers can now move material across the Library complex through the Gladstone Link. (Material dating pre-1851 should remain in the Old Bodleian Library, and material dating pre-1701 should remain in Duke Humfrey's Library).
- If, having read this, you are unsure where to start or have any questions, please go to the Main Enquiry Desk in the Lower Reading Room, Old Bodleian Library, telephone 01865 (2)77162 or email reader.services@bodleian.ox.ac.uk for further assistance.
