The collections of Western manuscripts in the Department of Manuscripts of the Bibliothèque Nationale are enormously rich and varied. Many are highly relevant to the research work of scholars in widely different disciplines, from ancient Greek and Latin to modern French literature, from genealogy to medieval music.

Most of the 200 catalogues describing these Western manuscript collections were either never published or have long been out-of-print. This microfiche edition of the complete set of catalogues, with entries for more than 100,000 manuscripts, provides scholars with comprehensive access to almost all the holdings of the Department for the first time.