Durham University Library is the third oldest university library in England after those of Oxford and Cambridge.

A History of Durham University Library is now available via the Library's website at:

http://www.dur.ac.uk/library/about/history.htm

Library historians may also be interested in accessing short histories of some of the other older and larger CURL (Consortium of Research Libraries in the British Isles) institutions:

British Library
http://www.bl.uk/about/history.html

Cambridge
http://www.lib.cam.ac.uk/History/

Edinburgh
http://www.lib.ed.ac.uk/resources/collections/specdivision/history.shtml

Glasgow
http://www.lib.gla.ac.uk/AboutLibrary/past.html

Manchester
http://rylibweb.man.ac.uk/about.html

National Library of Scotland
http://www.nls.uk/helpfor/nlshistory.html

National Library of Wales
http://www.llgc.org.uk/gwyb/gwyb_s001.htm

Oxford
http://www.ouls.ox.ac.uk/campaign/history.html

Trinity College Dublin
http://www.tcd.ie/Library/about/history.php

Wellcome
http://library.wellcome.ac.uk/doc_WTL039313.html