Founded in Paris in 1929, jointly by the American scholar Thomas Whittemore and the Byzantine Institute of Boston (Massachusetts), the Byzantine Library has a collection of almost 50,000 works on Byzantine civilization, with particular emphasis on early Christian and Byzantine archaeology and art, byzantine history and literature, the history of the Orthodox Church, liturgy, art and the history of the countries where Byzantine civilization had its influence (Slavic countries, Georgia, Armenia, the Near East, etc.), as well as the history of Byzantium.), as well as Coptic art and literature.
In conjunction with its research teams, it is developing specialized collections focusing on Byzantine epigraphy, numismatics, diplomacy and sigillography, as well as on Mount Athos, in the context of the publication of the archives of the Athos monasteries, which has been carried out for many years by one of its teams.
It offers 58 WIFI-equipped seats, including 2 carrels and a group-work room accessible by prior reservation.
The library also holds part of Thomas Whittemore's archives (correspondence, various files, photos), as well as a number of objets d'art (Coptic fabrics, icons, crosses) acquired by him.
In May 2021, the library was awarded the "CollEx- collections d'excellence" label by the Collex-Persée scientific interest group. This label identifies research-level documentary holdings that are remarkable for their scope and originality, and enables the labeled library to be associated with national projects for mapping holdings, digitization, or to participate in calls for projects involving researchers.
