Microfilm collection to draw Vatican scholars

ST. LOUIS -- The Vatican library in Rome closes today for three years of renovation, a move that's expected to bring scholars interested in the collections to, of all places, St. Louis.

Thanks to a project that began in the 1950s, Saint Louis University, a Jesuit school, has microfilm copies of nearly half of the Vatican library's medieval and Renaissance manuscripts.

Saint Louis University is preparing to welcome more out-of-town scholars than usual in the upcoming weeks and years. Many academics were caught off guard by word earlier this year that structural weaknesses in the 16th-century Vatican library will force the building to close for repair and improvements.

"From what I'm hearing, the Vatican reading room is inundated these days," said Gregory Pass, head of the Vatican Film Library in St. Louis.

Scholars who haven't been able to squeak into the Vatican library before it closes are looking into Saint Louis University's microfilm collection as an alternative.

The microfilm from the Vatican came to St. Louis after a Jesuit priest here, the Rev. Lowrie Daly, received approval from Pope Pius XII to place many of the Vatican's rare manuscripts on microfilm. The Knights of Columbus Vatican Film Library opened in 1953 at Saint Louis University.

"Certainly, the Vatican was very concerned about the safety of its collections during the Second World War," Pass said. Valuable manuscripts were even hidden in caves or underground vaults in Europe to protect them during the war, he said.

The collection in St. Louis allowed for microfilm copies to be kept of rare manuscripts, and made it easier for scholars in the Western Hemisphere to access the materials.

The Vatican Film Library in St. Louis may look frozen in time to an outside observer. It has several large microfilm readers from decades ago that don't make copies and even a retro-looking wall clock.

But Pass said the machines here "are easy on the eyes" and scholars can read off the machines for hours, if that's what they wish.

They can use the microfilm elsewhere in the library building and take advantage of more updated readers.

The collection includes microfilm of historic manuscripts, like the Codex Vaticanus -- a fourth-century Greek Bible -- and handwritten manuscripts by scholars like Thomas Aquinas and Petrarch.

Pass said an advantage to the microfilm collection is that it allows researchers to work quickly. He said the St. Louis library is well stocked with reference materials related to the Vatican manuscripts that can be a significant help to researchers.

"What a great boon to have this material on microfilm and available in this country," he said.