At Uppsala University Library we use the expression Early Imprints for publications printed before and including 1850. 

Most of the published books, journals and other printed matter, were printed in hand-presses using high quality paper. From about 1830 and onwards the printing processes started to change and paper was mass produced from wood pulp which gave an inferior quality of paper.

The University Library's collections of early imprints are made up of donations, war booty, purchases and Swedish legal deposits. Early imprints include various types of material such as books, journals, newspapers, brochures and emphemera.

A large part of the Library's early imprints can be searched online in Catalogue 1962. The catalogue covers publications up to and including 1962.

In certain cases for imprints up to and including 1796 it is necessary to use the Library's oldest catalogue Aurivillius (Pehr Fabian Aurivillius, Catalogus Bibliothecae Regiae Academiae Upsaliensis). The catalogue is also available in Carolina Rediviva's Special Reading Room and it is used together with a handwritten inventory. Much of the content of Aurivillius is however in Catalogue 1962, so you should begin your search for early imprints in that catalogue.

The older collections of Swedish theses are listed in a separate catalogue. 

The special collections mainly contain early imprints, but several collections are added to on a continual basis with new publications. Read more about the Special Collections. This is also where you will find the catalogues for specific collections.

At present only a small part of the library's early imprint collections are searchable in the Uppsala University Library Catalogue and the Swedish national catalogue LIBRIS.