Documentary Heritage and Archives
The University of Montpellier possesses a rich collection of documents, including printed works, manuscripts, archives, drawings, and engravings. Most of this collection is housed in the university’s libraries.
Printed materials
The print collections span the history of printing from its earliest days to the present. Rich and varied, they include 300 incunabula, hundreds of thousands of printed volumes from the 16th to the 19th century (books and periodicals), and specialized collections often derived from donations. Encyclopedic scope is the hallmark of these collections, not only because they are housed in libraries covering all major disciplines, but also because they were generally conceived with a broad and generous vision of knowledge, as “libraries of the learned gentleman” aiming to provide the richest possible access to knowledge.
History of the School of Medicine
The Historical Medicine Library holds 100,000 volumes printed before the 19th century, half of which deal with medicine and the other half with all aspects of knowledge: languages and literature, history, geography and travel, and the physical and natural sciences. You will also find old medical dissertations from Montpellier and Paris dating back to the 18th century.
Science Library
The core of the Science Library’s heritage collections consists of the library of the former Faculty of Sciences, founded in 1809; this collection was later expanded through prestigious bequests, such as those from Dunal (1857) and Girard, Jeanjean, and Gergonne. It is particularly rich in works on botany, zoology, mathematics, and astronomy. It also contains numerous works from the collection of Candolle, the famous Genevan botanist, as well as a unique collection of glass plate photographs dating from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Richter Library – Law, Political Science, Economics, Business Administration
The Richter Library holds more than 22,000 historical documents in its collection, dating from the 16th century to the mid-20th century, including 500 volumes on law and economics published before the late 18th century. It is notable for its special collections, which were acquired through donations and bequests: the Antonelli, Barthélemy, and Geddes collections.
At the University Library of Law, Economics, and Management, you have access to the scientific and cultural heritage of the Montpellier Academy of Sciences and Letters. As the successor to the Royal Society of Sciences founded by Louis XIV in 1706, the Montpellier Academy of Sciences and Letters was established under its current name in 1846. Covering the sciences, humanities, and medicine, it established a library in 1921, which today holds 50,000 works, brochures, and periodicals dating from the 18th century to the present day, more than half of which are in foreign languages.
Pharmacy Department
The Pharmacy-PACES University Library houses the collections transferred in 1886 by the Montpellier School of Pharmacy, which include donations from Professors François-Joseph Rey (1758–1826) and François-Hugues Romeo Pouzin (1795–1860), as well as from the Montpellier School of Agriculture. This collection, comprising 5,000 documents, is both local and encyclopedic in scope. Botany and zoology account for a quarter of the volumes; significant attention is given to pharmacy and its history, medicine, and toxicology, as well as to literature, philosophy, and geography.
Full details on the various heritage collections can be found on the University Library’s website.
Manuscripts
The most prestigious manuscripts are housed in the Historical Medical Library. This collection consists of 900 manuscripts, two-thirds of which date from the Middle Ages, covering all fields of knowledge.
For the Middle Ages, literature takes center stage: classical works, chivalric romances (Chrétien de Troyes’ *Perceval*, three copies of the *Roman de la Rose*), and Italian poets such as Dante and Petrarch. Next come religious manuscripts: richly illustrated Bibles, Qur’ans, theological treatises, lives of the saints, breviaries, and missals. The essential medical texts are present: Hippocrates and Galen, Avicenna, Albucasis (in two illuminated copies, one in the Gascon language that belonged to Gaston Phébus), and Arnaud de Villeneuve, as well as Gui de Chauliac and Roger de Parme with their surgical treatises. Music, including an 11th-century Tonaire and the magnificent 13th-century songbook, as well as works on law and philosophy, are also represented.
Fifty-nine manuscripts date from the Carolingian period, including the oldest in the collection, a psalter from 780 that once belonged to a member of Charlemagne’s family. Others date from the 16th century—a superb portolan chart combining medieval cartography and the Age of Discovery—the 17th century—correspondence from Christina of Sweden—or the 18th century—lectures by Montpellier physicians. The collection of such a diverse range of manuscripts within a medical school is unparalleled and constitutes the library’s true treasure and unique character.
Manuscripts may also be found in specialized collections, such as the Gergonne Collection at the Science Library.
Archives
Archives, for their part, are an indispensable and unique source for any scientific research on the history, organization, and development of the institution, as well as on teaching and research.
The oldest administrative records are now preserved, in part, at the Hérault Departmental Archives and, in part, in university libraries. The latter are, in particular, the legally designated depositories for theses and hold some collections donated to them by professors.
For modern and contemporary records, the archives are maintained by each faculty, and their processing is coordinated by the Archives Department. Several collections have been organized and inventoried, and in some cases transferred to the Hérault Departmental Archives. Other transfer projects are currently underway.
Depending on the period you're interested in, you can contact either of these departments.
Archives of the School of Medicine
The Faculty's archives consist of two parts:
The historical collection (13th century–1808), which was cataloged by Joseph Calmette, archivist and paleographer, and published in 1912 in the second part of Volume 2 of the Cartulaire de l’Université de Montpellier.
The modern and contemporary collection (19th–20th centuries) is currently being organized and cataloged.
Currently, the following are available for viewing:
- the records pertaining to the general administration of the School of Medicine from 1794 to 1981
- records related to education from 1739 to 1982
- the collection of posters held by the School of Medicine, dating from 1862 to 1985
- as well as numerous records, including enrollment records, exam registration records, exam results, and thesis defense records from the 19th and 20th centuries.
The completed inventories are available for download in the “Online” section below. The inventory of the historical collection is available on the Foli@ digital library.
Due to ongoing construction work in the historic building and in accordance with the rules governing access to public archives, the Historical Archives of Medicine are currently making the two collections available by appointment only. In addition, all users are subject to the law on the reuse of public data.
Archives of the School of Law, Economics, and Management
The original Liber Rectorum is held by the University Medical Library under call number H595. This document includes statutes, regulations, concessions, and confirmations of privileges dating from 1326 to 1523. A 17th-century copy of the Liber Rectorum is held in the Departmental Archives in Series D (archives prior to 1790).
Individual student records, course schedules, minutes of council and assembly meetings, and other documents have also been preserved at the Hérault Departmental Archives since 1997 under the reference number 8ETP (University of Montpellier 1 – Education in law, medicine, pharmacy, management, dentistry, and sports science (1800–1985)).
The most recent records are kept at the faculty.
Archives of the School of Pharmacy
The 19th- and 20th-century records, which are currently held by the faculty, are in the process of being transferred to the Hérault Departmental Archives.
As for the most recent records, they are also kept at the faculty.
Faculty of Science Archives
The archives of the Faculty of Sciences were transferred to the Hérault Departmental Archives in 2014. The most recent records are kept at the faculty.
Since 2020, the Archives Department has been preserving the Francis Gleizes collection. For the record, Francis Gleizes (1938–2019) was a Professor specializing in planetary nebulae and affiliated with the Languedoc Research Group Research Astronomy and Astrophysics (GRAAL). In 2024, this collection was organized and inventoried; the inventory is available for download in the online section below.
It includes, in particular, educational materials, scientific documents, gray literature, and personal papers. The Archives Department makes this collection available to the public in accordance with the rules governing access to public archives.
Online
Access a selection of the university’s heritage resources online for free, thanks to the digitization efforts carried out by the Interuniversity Documentary Cooperation Service as part of the Foli@ online heritage library. The first digitized collections include more than 90,000 items, ranging from medieval manuscripts and early printed works (15th–19th centuries) on the history of medicine and pharmacy in Montpellier and the history of botany, to 18th-century optical illustrations.
Archival inventories can be downloaded by clicking on the following links:
