Rare books and Semi-rare books

Rare books

The designation of a “Rare Book” is assigned to: collections previously owned by famous economists and their manuscripts, precious books without any other existing copies, and classical documents (generally defined as foreign language books published before 1800, and Japanese language books published before 1900) concerning social sciences.  Our current Rare Book collection has approximately 2,400 items (as of May 1, 2013).

Economists’ Collections
Precious Books
Classical Documents

Besides the Economists’ Collection and the Precious Books, about 900 items are designated as Classical Documents.  These are Classical Documents in Japanese and other languages pertaining to socio-economics, including first editions of Adam Smith’s “The Wealth of Nations” and Karl Marx’s “Das Kapital”.

Classical Documents can be searched on UTokyo OPAC.  In UTokyo OPAC’s Status field, the “Rare book” designation will appear.  If you would like to browse, select “Eco.Lib.Vault” from the pull-down menu in the Location field on Advanced Search of the UTokyo OPAC, then click the search button.
Classical Documents are now archived in Digital Archive of Rare Books in European Languages and are made accessible.
Please contact the Shiryo-shitsu for using these books.

Semi-rare books

Collections and Classical Documents which are as precious in quality as Rare Books are designated as “Semi-rare books”; there are approximately 5,500 items (as of April 1, 2012).

Collection
Classical Documents

Within these classical documents, there are approximately 5,000 items that are not a part of collections (2,700 items in Japanese, 2,300 in foreign languages), and all can be searched on UTokyo OPAC.  In UTokyo OPAC’s Status field, the “Semi-rare book” designation will appear.  Please contact the Shiryo-shitsu for using these books.

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