Kidnapped Books in Paris: The Vatican Volumes in the Bibliothèque nationale de France

Abstract

The examination of a manuscript preserved in the archives of the Vatican Library (BAV Arch. Bibl. 53, pt. A, ff. 2–4), which contains a list of unreturned books, together with the printed catalogue of manuscripts and books confiscated by the French during the Napoleonic occupation (Recensio manuscriptorum codicum [Leipzig: impensis Paul Gotthelf Kummeri, 1803]), makes it possible to identify the Vatican printed volumes still held in the Bibliothèque nationale de France. Most of these are valuable incunabula and editiones principes, and there are even items that have not previously been identified as part of the Napoleonic looting