The Elmer Belt Library of Vinciana
The Elmer Belt Library of Vinciana is a special collection of books and materials concerning Leonardo da Vinci and the Italian Renaissance. The Library was given to UCLA in 1961 by Dr. Elmer Belt, a Professor Emeritus in the UCLA School of Medicine and a collector of Vinciana for over sixty years.
Because Leonardo's interests were so diverse and his undertakings so profoundly important to subsequent developments in the arts and sciences, the scope of the Belt Library extends far beyond Leonardo's own time. The library's collection contains more than 70 incunabula and many early documents in the history of art, but also modern studies of Renaissance and post-Renaissance culture. Of special interest, however, are those works directly related to Leonardo. These include all editions of his Treatise on Painting (the Belt Library owns two very rare manuscript copies of the Treatise) and facsimile editions of all his extant drawings and manuscripts. Since the time it was donated, the Belt Library has continued to grow, so that there are now more than 10,000 volumes and many thousands of pamphlets. In addition to the continuing development of the collection on the part of the University, necessary support has come from generous donors, such as Professor and Mrs. Lynn White, Jr., who, in 1972, presented the Library with an important collection of early books relating to Renaissance and Baroque science. Among the Library's outstanding holdings are a first edition of the famous architectural treatise of Leon Batista Alberti, the extremely rare volumes of the medical writings of Ambroise Pare, a superb copy of the Nuremburg Chronicle, the Divina Proportione of Luca Pacioli, which contains woodcut illustrations based on designs by Leonardo, and the very first book containing a printed mention of Leonardo, Bernardo Bellincioni's Rime of 1493. The Belt Library's holdings of materials on human and animal anatomy are complemented by those in the Biomedical Library's History Division. Its holdings of early Italian imprints are complemented by those of the Special Collections Department in the Young Research Library.
Rare books from the Belt Collection may be paged at YRL Special Collections. Leonardo and associated materials may be paged from the Arts Library to be read onsite Monday-Friday, 9:00 am. to 4:00 pm. The Belt Collection is closed on weekends and holidays. For further information about the Belt Collection, please call the Visual Arts Librarian (310.206.5426) or the Rare Books Librarian (310.206.0568) for original imprints from 1550 to circa 1825.
Leonardo-related Web sites
