Research Guides: Historical Performance Practice: Manuscripts & Early Editions

Finding Manuscripts & Early Printed Editions of Older Music

The following reference works can help you identify existing primary sources for music composed before 1800, as well as which research libraries and archives hold those sources. The International Inventory of Musical Sources (RISM) is a comprehensive multi-volume series of print indexes to musical primary sources, and has more recently released searchable databases of its contents in CD-Rom format and online.

The British union-catalogue of early music printed before the year 1801: a record of the holdings of over one hundred libraries throughout the British Isles by Edith B. Schnapper (Editor)
Call Number: MUSIC REF ML116.B7
Publication Date: 1957

RISM Online Catalog
The online RISM catalog contains over 1,000,000 records for music manuscripts, printed music, libretti, and treatises from between the years 1600 and 1850, held in music libraries, archives, churches, and other institutions around the world.

Einzeldrucke vor 1800 = Individual prints before 1800 (RISM series A/I) : database on CD-ROM.
Call Number: ML113 .I6 vol. A/I CDROM material
Publication Date: 2011
An index to individual printed musical sources from before 1800. CD-Rom available in the Knight Library Douglass Room.
Recueils imprimés, XVIe-XVIIe siècles (RISM series B/I) by François Lesure
Call Number: MUSIC REF ML113 .I6 vol. B/I
Publication Date: 1960
An index to printed musical sources from the 16th and 17th centuries, held in libraries worldwide.
Recueils imprimés, XVIIIe siècle (RISM series B/II) by François Lesure
Call Number: MUSIC REF ML113 .I6 vol. B/II
Publication Date: 1964
An index to printed musical sources from the 18th century, held in libraries worldwide.
Recueils imprimés, XVIIIe siècle; supplement (RISM, series B/II) by François Lesure
Call Number: MUSIC REF ML113 .I6 vol. B/II suppl
Publication Date: 1972
A supplement to the index to printed musical sources from the 18th century, held in libraries worldwide.
Écrits imprimés concernant la musique (RISM series B/VI) by François Lesure
Call Number: MUSIC REF ML113 .I6 vol. B/VI
Publication Date: 1971
An index to theoretical and historical writing about music published before 1800, held in libraries worldwide.
Handschriftlich überlieferte Lauten- und Gitarrentabulaturen des 15. bis 18. Jahrhunderts (RISM series B/VII)
Call Number: MUSIC REF ML113.I6 vol. B/VII
Publication Date: 1978
An index to manuscript sources for lute and guitar music written in tablature during the 15th-18th centuries.

Music and Dance Librarian

Ann Shaffer

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Subjects: Dance, Music