Using the Taylor Institution Library

Hello and welcome to the Taylor Institution Library, commonly known as the Taylorian. We are the University's centre for the study of modern European languages and literatures, other than English.

We also have collections in Linguistics and Women's Studies.

You can find us on the corner of St Giles and Beaumont Street, next to the Ashmolean Museum.

The main entrance is on St Giles. There are steps and a ramp for access. 

We are open to anyone with a University or Bodleian Reader Card. Hold your card to the pad and the main doors will open.

You will then need to tap your card on top of the access gates in the lobby to enter. The Premises Team are available in the Lodge to help if there are any problems with your card. 

Library staff are here to help you. Do approach staff at the desks and around the library if you need help finding something, or have any questions. You can also contact us by phone or email as shown on the screen.

The Issue Desk is located by the entrance to the Teaching Collection on the Ground Floor. You can check out and return books here as well as asking any questions you may have. 

There is a self-issue machine for checking out books and a book drop for returns, located on the ground floor at the entrance to the Teaching Collection. 

A lift is available by the library entrance, and we have a range of accessibility equipment available to borrow from the issue desk such as magnifiers, book stands, and a daylight lamp.  The library also has five height-adjustable desks and a number of ergonomic and adjustable chairs.

There is another staffed Enquiry Desk on the second floor, next to the Main Reading Room. The Taylorian also has a team of subject librarians with subject and language expertise who can help you with more detailed research queries. You can find their details on our Contact and Support webpage. 

The library spans all 5 floors of the building, and the layout may seem confusing at first. Maps and guides are available throughout the library, and staff are always happy to help. 

The Taylorian has over 750,000 volumes in its collections, although many of these are held in offsite storage. 

The collections are divided into two main sections: 

• the Teaching Collection, designed for undergraduates and taught postgraduates, chiefly on the ground and first floors;
• and the Research Collection, chiefly on the 2nd and 3rd floors and in the basement. Most modern books in the Taylorian collections are borrowable.

As well as books, the library holds a wide range of print journals in the subject, both modern and historical, which can be consulted in the library but not borrowed. 

We also have special collections such as manuscripts and early printed books – and even objects such as a piece of the Berlin Wall!

You can look up all our library resources using SOLO, the library catalogue, including our electronic resources such as ebooks and online journals.

Seating is available on all five floors of the library. The Main Reading Room on the second floor is a popular spot. 

We also have numerous smaller reading rooms and study spaces.

Library computers, and quick search terminals for browsing SOLO, are available throughout the building, as are print, copy and scan machines. 
We have a bookable film viewing room and bookable group study room, and facilities to read and print from microform material. 

You are allowed to bring bottled water into the library, with the exception of the Voltaire Room. Hot drinks in secure cups are allowed in designated locations; please see signage for details. Please help to keep the library and its books clean and pest-free by only consuming food in the Common Room, accessed via the ground floor corridor. 

We hope you enjoy your time here in the Taylorian and we look forward to welcoming you. 

There are two types of classification scheme in the Taylor Institution Library.

New books in the Research Collection and the Teaching Collection are classified according to a standard version of the Library of Congress classification (LCC) scheme. This scheme is used across all the Bodleian Libraries.

Older books in both collections are classified according to in-house schemes. Some of the in-house schemes can look similar to LCC. LCC shelfmarks always have a year at the end.

The Teaching Collection is sometimes referred to as the Undergraduate Collection or the Modern Languages Faculty Collection and is housed on the library’s ground and first floors. It includes books for undergraduate and taught postgraduate courses, as well as a small selection of language magazines.

Oversize books are located in the Teaching Collection Reading Room on the first floor, along with a selection of dictionaries and reference materials. 

Maps are displayed in the Teaching Collection to help you find your way around. 

The collection is intended primarily for use by undergraduates and taught postgraduates at the University, although other readers are welcome. 

Research Collection books are housed on the second and third floors, as well as in the basement. The collection includes books for Linguistics and the Women's Studies Collection. All readers can access the shelves to fetch their own books.

For West European languages you can find a selection of journals in the Periodicals & Reference Room (PRR), the reading room for Spanish, Portuguese & Latin American, Linguistics and Italian, and a selection of French and German journals in the Main Reading Room (MRR). PRR is on the second floor, opposite the Enquiry Room. There is also a Basement Periodicals (BPer) section. All West European titles are shelved alphabetically.

Slavonic periodicals are housed in the Slavonic Reading Room (Room 3) and the basement. Slavonic journals are shelved using an in-house classification sequence.

Rare materials are generally housed in closed stacks, either onsite or offsite at the Bodleian Libraries' Book Storage Facility. Onsite items are fetched by library staff upon request. You can request these in person at the Enquiry Desk, or by emailing tay-enquiries@bodleian.ox.ac.uk with details.

You can request offsite items online via SOLO, and these may be collected in the Enquiry Room.