We regret to inform users that this resource is no longer available. The site has been withdrawn as the technologies which it is built with have reached end-of-life.

Date withdrawn:
24 OCtober 2024

Please contact digitalsupport@bodleian.ox.ac.uk with any questions.

About the Project

The Bodleian has had to take the difficult decision to take the MLGB3 resource offline, as a precaution in order to protect the Bodleian from the risk of cyberattack.

Medieval Libraries of Great Britain began as a card catalogue held in the Bodleian from the 1940s, and following three printed editions was turned into a digital resource, known as MLGB3 through the intellectual vision and scholarly leadership of the late Prof Richard Sharpe FBA, and thanks to a generous grant from the Mellon Foundation. In the Bodleian we have already been discussing plans for the next phase of the resource, in terms of technology, content, and scholarly direction.

The lessons of the British Library’s cyberattack have, however, led the Bodleian to review the digital resources that it currently supports, especially those that depend on older technologies, and which are consequently vulnerable to attack. A small number of sites, including MLGB3 have therefore had to be taken offline as a precaution, in order to protect the library’s wider digital infrastructure.

We realise that this decision will be highly disruptive and inconvenient to users of MLGB3. It is the Bodleian’s firm intention to rebuild the resource onto a more secure technological platform, as soon as is practicable. This work, and the larger task of setting MLGB with a refreshed future direction, will take time and significant financial resources. We are therefore currently seeking funds to enable us to both return MLGB3, and then to develop it into MLGB4. We appreciate your patience as we work to reinstate this important piece of scholarly infrastructure, and to reassure you of our commitment to it as a scholarly resource.

Richard Ovenden
Bodley’s Librarian

A reminder that digitised copies of the print catalogue can be found on HathiTrust:

1964 edition: https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uva.x000937945

1987 supplement: https://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015021966216

[1941 edition:] https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uiug.30112113075359