The Vilna Collections

What are the Vilna Collections? They are history in the raw, a treasury of untold stories of Jewish life.

YIVO’s “Vilna Collections” include all of YIVO’s prewar documents and books that survived the war, as well as rare books from the famed Strashun Library of Vilna. 

The greater part of these collections is in New York, with a significant remnant in Lithuania. The materials in these collections represent Jewish life throughout Europe, including Eastern Europe, Central and Western Europe, and the Americas. The time frame runs from the seventeenth century to 1940, with the bulk of materials dating from the years between the two world wars. They are among the few prewar Jewish collections to have survived the Holocaust. As historian Jack Jacobs notes, “It is simply impossible to write a dissertation or do any serious research project related to Eastern European Jewry without consulting the YIVO materials.”

YIVO Vilna Collections in Lithuania and New York

YIVO Library in New York:

• 41,000 rare rabbinical and secular Hebrew works from the Strashun Library
• 6,000+ Books in Yiddish and other languages from YIVO’s prewar library in Vilna
• 3,000 periodical titles from YIVO’s prewar library in Vilna

Martynas Mažvydas National Library of Lithuania:

• 3,000 Yiddish-language books from YIVO’s prewar library in Vilna
• 1,200 rare Hebrew books from the Strashun Library
• 100+ Yiddish periodicals from YIVO’s prewar library in Vilna
• Newly discovered documents: from YIVO’s prewar archives in Vilna, Vilna Ghetto, and postwar Vilna (approximately 170,000 pages)

Wroblewski Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences:

• 19,000-20,000 documents from YIVO’s prewar archives in Vilna

YIVO Archives in New York:

• 61 record groups (500 linear feet) of archival material from YIVO’s prewar archives in Vilna

Lithuanian Central State Archives:

• About 150 linear feet of archival material from YIVO’s prewar archives in Vilna

The Vilna Collections remain the core and the most heavily consulted part of YIVO’s collections in New York. The materials at the Lithuanian Central State Archives are fragments of the collections in New York and heavily mirror them in terms of content. These materials include the official records of Jewish communal institutions, the papers of prominent individuals, and general collections on theater, music, and literature. The collections document Jewish life primarily in Poland and the lands of the Russian Empire, but also contain materials on other Jewish communities in Europe and worldwide, covering the early nineteenth century to the eve of World War II. The materials are in several languages, including Yiddish, Hebrew, Russian, Polish, and German.