Taylor Institution

The Taylor Institution stands in Oxford at the southern end of St Giles’, sharing a neo-classical building with the Ashmolean Museum. Designed by Charles Cockerell, it opened in 1845 to house the university’s growing collections. The building was later extended northwards along St Giles’ in the 1930s. Sir Robert Taylor’s bequest funded its creation, though Modern European languages only became part of Oxford’s curriculum in 1903. Initially, the space also stored lectures and natural history specimens before becoming a dedicated library. The library holds around half a million volumes covering European languages from French and German to Greek and Russian. Its German collection began with Max Müller, who brought early works including Martin Luther’s first editions. Italian shelves hold texts from Dante to Futurist manifestos, while Spanish and Portuguese shelves feature first editions of Cervantes and Camoens. The French Enlightenment section includes the world’s only complete set of Voltaire’s Candide from 1759. A lock of Goethe’s hair and one of two known copies of Benjamin Constant’s Adolphe also reside here. Visitors find oak-panelled reading rooms lined with shelves of early printed books and modern scholarship. The building’s east wing, with its classical proportions, offers quiet study spaces for undergraduates and researchers alike. The collections support degrees from Bachelor of Arts to DPhil, with materials spanning medieval manuscripts to contemporary literature. Occasional lectures continue the tradition begun in 1889, adding to the institution’s role in language and literature study.