Harvard to digitize its collection of rare Chinese books in a 6-year-deal with China

Harvard to digitize 51,000 rare Chinese books

BOSTON — One of the most extensive collections of rare Chinese books outside China will be freely available as Harvard University has agreed to digitize the titles.

Representatives from the Harvard College Library and the National Library of China signed a deal Friday to digitize more than 51,000 volumes in the Harvard collection. Some are more than 1,000 years old.

All the rare books are held at the Harvard-Yenching Library. They will be examined to identify those that are fragile, damaged or sewn in a way that hides text along the binding margin.

Harvard technicians have been designing new equipment as they prepare to begin the six-year project in January.

Officials have not disclosed the cost, saying only that it’s a multimillion-dollar project.