Library and Information Centre of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences

LIBRARY CATALOGS

METAK: The Library's online catalog

contains full bibliographic records of almost all resources:

books, periodicals, manuscripts, rare books, held in the Library’s collections,
digital documents in the REAL repository,
electronic open access and subscripted resources.

Featured subsets of the database:

Periodicals

contains the bibliographic data and holdings information of every periodical in the collection.

Hungarian Academy of Sciences: CSc & DSc dissertations (1953-)

contains the bibliographic data of CSc and DSc theses submitted to the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (1953–).

Old Books - Rare Books (RBK)

contains full bibliographic records of pre-1850 books in the Department of Manuscripts & Rare Books as well as the Miscellanea of the Oriental Collection.

Incunabula (INC)

contains full bibliographic records of incunables in the Department of Manuscripts & Rare Books.

Modern Manuscripts, Literary Bequests and manuscripts in Oriental and Western languages (MSS)

contains full bibliographic records of manuscripts held by the Department of Manuscripts & Rare Books and the Oriental Collection.

Catalogs of the Oriental Collection

Books related to the Orient (e.g. biblical studies, history of religion, philosophy etc.) but written in various European languages can often be found in the card catalog of the core collection.

Important remark

Since various systems have been used for the transliteration of Oriental names and titles, it might be necessary to search the catalogs according to different criteria. Diacritics should not be used for searching and browsing the online catalogue.

Our manuscripts and special collections can be searched in the following catalogues:

Printed catalogues:

Néhai Dr. Kaufmann Dávid tanár könyvtárának héber kéziratai és könyvei. Összeállítja és ismerteti Weisz Miksa. Budapest, 1906. [REAL-EOD]
Geniza-Fragmente der Bibliothek David Kaufmann s.A. im Besitze der Ungarischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Hrsg. von Max Weisz. Budapest, 1924. [METAK]
The Persian Manuscripts of the Vámbéry-Bequest. By Eve Apor. Budapest, 1971. 19 p., 1 t. [REAL-EOD]
A Scheiber-könyvtár katalógusa / Catalogue of the Scheiber Library. Összeállította / compiled by Kárteszi Á., Kordován V., Ormos I. Budapest 1992, 450 p. [REAL-EOD]
The Mongol and Manchu Manuscripts and Blockprints in the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Descr. by György Kara. Budapest, 2000. x, 602 p., [12] t. [REAL-EOD]
Catalogue of the Collections of Sir Aurel Stein in the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Comp. by John Falconer, Ágnes Kárteszi, Ágnes Kelecsényi, Lilla Russell-Smith. Ed. by Éva Apor and Helen Wang. Budapest, 2002. 350 p., ill. [REAL-EOD]
Supplement to the Catalogue of the Collections of Sir Aurel Stein in the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Comp. by John Falconer, Ágnes Kárteszi, Ágnes Kelecsényi, Lilla Russell-Smith. Ed. by Éva Apor and Helen Wang. Budapest, 2007. 191 p., ill. [REAL-EOD]
Catalogue of the Turkish Manuscripts in the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Comp. by Ismail Parlatir, György Hazai and Barbara Kellner-Heinkele. Budapest, 2007. 664 p., 27 pl. [REAL-EOD]
A Catalogue of the Tibetan Manuscripts and Block Prints in the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Comp. by Gergely Orosz. Budapest, 2008–2009. Vol. 1. xv, 752 p., Vol. 2. 891 p., Vol. 3. Indices, viii, 303 p., 14 pl., CD-ROM. [REAL-EOD]
Catalogue of the Arabic Manuscripts in the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. By Kinga Dévényi with Munif Abdul-Fattah and Katalin Fiedler. Budapest–Leiden, 2015. xviii, 554 p., ill. [METAK]
Catalogue of the Persian Manuscripts in the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. By Benedek Péri with Mojdeh Mohammadi and Miklós Sárközy. Budapest–Leiden, 2018. xiv, 390 p., ill. [METAK]

Online collections in METAK:

The Genizahs of The Kaufmann Collection can be studied in REAL-MS repository and at the website of the Friedberg Genizah Project after registration.

Several historic photographs of the Stein Collections are freely available in REAL-I repository and at the website of the International Dunhuang Project (British Library).

The miniatures of the Shahnama manuscripts form part of the Cambridge Shahnama Project, the Persian manuscripts are available in REAL-MS repository.

Catalogs of the Department of Manuscripts & Rare Books

Manuscripts & autographs:

The holdings processed before 1954 are to be found in a subject catalog and two alphabetical card catalogs in boxes: the material of volumes or analecta type documents and that of the correspondence are separated. The manuscripts processed after 1954 are given the shelf mark "Ms" plus numerus currens; they are accessible in an alphabetical author catalog kept in drawered cabinets.
METAK contains full bibliographic records of all these documents and the recently processed manuscripts. Some collections and bequests of major importance have printed catalogs, which are available online as well. Obituaries preserved here can be searched in a separate alphabetical card catalog and can be browsed in REAL-MS repository.

Old Archives of the Academy (RAL):

Its material is searchable in a card catalog up to 1890; indexes and other auxiliary guides are available for the subsequent period.

CSc & DSc theses:

The theses are searchable in the alphabetical author card catalog, in three printed catalog volumes (1950–1974, 1975–1979, 1980–1984) and in the DIS sub-base of METAK.

Old & rare books:

Sub-base RBK contains full bibliographic records of pre-1850 books in the Department of Manuscripts & Rare Books as well as the Miscellanea of the Oriental Collection. The modern catalog of incunables, with descriptions of the individual copies (provenance, owners’ notes, embellishments, binding, completeness of the copy etc.) – compiled by Marianne Rozsondai and Béla Rozsondai – is accessible in the sub-base Incunabula (INC). The English version of the catalog has been published (Catalogue of the Incunables in the Library and Information Centre of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Budapest: Argumentum, 2013). The electronic processing of 16th-century books is in progress.