Marquette University is pleased to present the complete collection of illustrations contained within Galerie Illustrée de la Compagnie de Jésus (Paris: 1893).  The original eight volume set is preserved within the Raynor Memorial Libraries’ rare book collection.

Rev. Alfred Hamy, S.J. (b. 1838), a French scholar, assembled and edited Galerie Illustrée in order to commemorate the 350th anniversary of the founding of the Society of Jesus.  Hamy had previously described the lives of 400 Jesuits in Essai sur l'Iconographie de la Compagnie de Jésus (1875).

Although the plates featured in Galerie Illustrée were printed on high-quality, folio-size rag paper, the textual entries were printed on inexpensive, highly-acidic paper.  The fragile condition of Galerie Illustrée – owned by a limited number of research libraries in the North America – usually limits access to the historic collection.  In 2007 the Raynor Memorial Libraries digitized Galerie Illustrée in order to improve access to this cornerstone collection of Jesuitica.  During the process librarians assigned more than 1100 unique descriptive headings according to rules established by the Library of Congress.

Project developers extend their sincere thanks to the staff at the John J. Burns Library at Boston College for their advice and cooperation.  The Burns Library graciously contributed many scans for this digital project, offering images of original plates either missing or damaged within Marquette’s collection.

Questions about this collection may be directed to Matt Blessing, Department of Special Collections and University Archives.