Old Library, Irish College, Paris
Paris was always a popular destination for the Irish. From the end of the sixteenth century until the 1930s a community of Irish clerics lived in the university district on the Left Bank. Today the library of the collège des irlandais is accessible to researchers in the Centre Culturel Irlandais, housed in the old Irish College in the Latin Quarter.
The austerely beautiful Old Library, built between 1772 and 1775, is located in a vaulted room above the Chapelle de St. Patrick in the Collège des Irlandais, now home to the Centre Culturel Irlandais in Paris. The original library collection was lost during the French Revolution. The current holding of 8000 items, of which almost half date from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries, consists of books and manuscripts from suppressed religious establishments, including the Scottish and English colleges in Paris, which were presented to the Collège by Napoleon when it was re-opened by consular decree in 1805. Works of Irish interest were added during the following centuries, creating a library of books on theology, history, geography, philosophy and music. The Library was entirely restored at the same time as the Centre Culturel and conservation work was undertaken from 2006 to 2010. Books were cleaned and repaired; leather bindings, with their gilded lettering, restored to their original beauty and an on-line catalogue provides detailed information for scholars and researchers. Pride of place goes to three special volumes which, after many years in a bank deposit box in Dublin, moved to the specially-commissioned display cases in the Old Library. The jewel in the crown is a manuscript dating from c.1500 which is an important and, in some ways, unique example of the final flowering of English Gothic illumination. It is a world chronicle of the descent of the kings of England from Adam and Eve to Richard III. The second illuminated manuscript is a Flemish Psalter of imposing size, also dating from around 1500. The smallest of the three is a 1470 Book of Hours of Notre Dame, also very beautifully illustrated. To make the collections even more visible, as well as easily accessible to all, the three illuminated manuscripts forming the core of the collection have been digitized. They can be consulted online. Each individual folio is featured, allowing the manuscripts to be viewed in their entirety, with a zoom facility to show every detail of these splendid works. An index of illustrations, as well as a diaporama function, allows both amateurs and professionals to navigate easily into the manuscripts. The restoration of the Old Library has been made possible by the generosity of the Irish and French governments, with expert advice from specialists in both countries, and is thus the latest manifestation of a relationship which goes back to 1578, when Fr. John Lee came from Waterford to found the first Irish collegiate community in the University of Paris. The library collection is accessible for research purposes only, by appointment, further to a written request to Carole Jacquet, Head of Libraries and Archives. Access to the collections of the Old Library or the Archives is free of charge. The guidelines for readers and the application form are available from centreculturelirlandais.com/library
