Museums
Since the foundation of the Royal Veterinary College in 1791, many thousands of items – official College records, books, museum objects and ephemera – have been accumulated. These Historical Collections are housed in the Eclipse Building at the RVC's Hawkshead Campus at Potters Bar.
Since 1990 substantial progress has been made in gathering, relocating, and arranging the various items, and in preserving some material. After several years work the entire Rare Book Collection has been catalogued. The titles can be searched using the library's Unicorn catalogue and items may be consulted on request at the Hawkshead Campus.
Museum objects have also been catalogued and, in many case, photographed. This online database allows instant access to the collection. A feature of the database is a collection of virtual themed tours of the museum. These display and explain the history of subjects such as veterinary anaesthesia, farriery, changes in animal doctoring and developments in veterinary surgery (see “Take a tour...”in box on right).
If you would like to arrange to consult our Rare Book Collection, please contact Simon Jackson.
If you would like to arrange a visit, it is essential that you make an appointment in advance.
Take a tour...
Choose a tour from this list, then click Go!
Or search the Museum holdings
Search Tips
You can search the database for up to two terms at once, e.g. to find records relating to surgery on horses, enter the word horse in the first box and surgery in the second. The search will find those records containing both words. You can, of course, search using only one term, e.g. horse. Just enter it once, in the first box.