CENTRE FOR REGIONAL AND LOCAL HISTORY LIBRARY
The libraries of the Centre for Regional and Local History libraries are located in the Attenborough Building on the University of Leicester campus.
Members of the Friends are welcome to use the library collections and other facilities.
Visiting the Libraries
Friends are welcome to visit the Library and Resource Centre during office hours.
To make sure there will be someone to let you into the Resource Centre rooms, you will need to inform the Centre in advance of your visit. Please contact Angela Muir, Richard Jones or libraryrequests@englishlocalhistory.org to make arrangements.
All collections are provided on a “Reference Only” basis and we ask that you do not take books or other material out of the rooms.
Library Collections and Facilities
Room 802
Room 802 contains the library collections previously held in the Reading Room at Marc Fitch House.
Subjects covered include: Palaeography; Historical Reference and Sources; General History and Social/Economic History; Parliamentary and Legal history; Religious History and Education; Personal Names; Historical Sociology; and Popular Culture.
The room also contains regional and local history journals not freely available online; Harleian Society, British Record Society and other major series; and “Featured Collections” from the stores.
There are several workspaces adjacent to power supplies to plug in laptops.
Amazing view from every window.
Gents’ toilets are available on the 8th floor, Ladies’ on the 7th.
Step-free access via the Ground Floor entrance to the Tower lift must be arranged in advanced with a member of staff.
Room 101
Room 101 holds the library collections previously located in the Topographical Library at Marc Fitch House and a selection of the maps and books from the 1st floor Map Rooms.
Subjects covered include: Topographical reference; Historiography; Cartography; Place names; History of the Landscape; Rural History; Communications and Architecture; and the County Collections.
Maps include major OS series folded maps; large-scale county maps, and atlases.
A few workspaces are adjacent to power supplies to plug in laptops.
There is audio-visual equipment for seminars and presentations.
Toilets are located on the Ground Floor of the Seminar Block.
Step-free access is via the lift from the Ground Floor – this is located to the left of the entry to the Attenborough Building.
The room may be available for meetings of organisations which support the Centre’s objectives – please contact Richard Jones or Angela Muir to discuss.
Store Rooms
The following collections are in storage and are not currently accessible. We are working to make these available and will update this page periodically.
- Hard-copy issues of journals or transactions which are freely available online.
- Monographs on Heraldry and Pedigrees; Histories of Individual Oxford and Cambridge colleges (histories of Oxford and Cambridge Universities is available in Room 802).
- Pamphlets and ephemera collections including the parish church histories collection.
- Printed Parliamentary Papers that are available to students and staff via the online Parliamentary Papers.
- Public and General Acts which are freely available online at www.legislation.gov.uk.
- Specialist dictionaries. Please note a good collection is available at the David Wilson Library.
- European Medieval Settlement Loan Collection
- Dissertations and theses – PhD theses are freely available online at https://elhleics.omeka.net/
Topographical prints have been scanned and are being uploaded to the University Library Special Collections website. Digitisation of the slide collection is underway.
For further information or for access to original slides, photographic prints and topographical prints please contact Richard Jones
CRLH Library Catalogue
The ‘live’ library catalogue is hosted on the University’s IT domain and is regularly updated as we work to capture uncatalogued material and enhance incomplete entries.
At this time, the catalogue is held as an Excel file. Friends are welcome to request a dated download of the catalogue for their personal use by emailing a request to libraryrequests@englishlocalhistory.org