...housed on the fourth floor of Van Pelt, is devoted to Anglican Studies. It is housed here at Penn but actually owned by St. Clement's Church in center city Philadelphia. St. Clement's funds its ongoing development and every year makes generous contributions to its upkeep. Though broadly covering Anglicanism, the collection focuses on its relationship with Catholicism. Consequently, it contains some large sets, unique in Penn's collections, which come from the Roman Catholic tradition.

Here are some examples:

The Acta Sanctorum, as it is usually known, provides the lives of the saints with documentary evidence. It is arranged in calendar order with each saint listed under the appropriate day. The first January volume was published in the seventeenth century with the final supplements and indexes appearing 300 years later. It is the basic source for all hagiographic study. Yet because of the importance of those profiled, the data about them embraces civil society and the historical context in which they lived.

This is the official record of what was the single most innovative force affecting the Roman Catholic Church in the twentieth century. It contains, in Latin, of course, the texts of the constitutions, decrees and declarations. Among the most famous are the Constitution of the Church in the Modern World and the Declaration on Human Freedom. One that remains controversial to this day is the Constitution on Sacred Liturgy.

Has long, signed articles across the spectrum of Roman Catholic devotion. What makes it special in a university setting is the historical depth of the scholarship. With its extensive bibliographies and broad coverage, it deserves a broader audience than its title suggests.