Special Collections

• The Danielsson-Kalmari Collection (Councilor J. R. Danielson-Kalmari). The collection contains about 2,500 volumes of literature mainly pertaining to general history and Finnish history
• The Hämäläinen Collection (Professor Albert Hämäläinen). Approximately 1,400 volumes primarily of Finno-Ugric literature.
• The Paasikivi Collection (President J. K. Paasikivi). The collection contains mainly social sciences and politics, national economy and history, approx. 7,500 volumes.
• The Mikkola Collection (Professor Jooseppi Mikkola). The collection primarily consists of literature on general and Slavic linguistics, approx. 2,500 volumes.
• The U. Leht. Collection (Professor Uno Lehtonen). The collection contains a wealth of literature related to historical research, especially the era of Napoleon and Bismarck, as well as the history of Russia, Poland, and the Baltic countries, approx. 4,500 volumes.
• The Koskenniemi Collection (Professor, poet V. A. Koskenniemi) approximately 2,800 volumes.
• The Volter Kilpi collection (author, University Librarian Volter Kilpi) approximately 1,500 volumes

• The German collection (German state donation in the 1930s and 1940s, approximately 1,000 volumes)
• The Winter Estonian collection (Lecturer Helmer Winter's 1950s collection of literature in Estonian and about Estonia, c. 600 volumes)

The donations received at the time of the library's establishment stage included a significant number of Swedish dissertations from previous centuries. These are especially from Uppsala University (approximately 3900 volumes from the years 1620–1899) and Lund University (approximately 1300 volumes from the years 1700–1879). These dissertations form a collection and are organized chronologically for each university, but they cannot be found in the library’s database Volter.

s. Amer (Finnish American literature, mainly from the early 20^th century)

The collection of Finnish American literature includes literature in Finnish, Swedish and English published in the United States and Canada at the turn of the 19^th and 20^th centuries. The material was published to meet the needs of the immigrants who arrived from Finland and the collection includes both non-fiction and fiction, magazines and newspapers (the newspapers are located in the Newspaper and Ephemera Services in Raisio).

s. Ambomaa (Finnish Namibian literature)

The collection includes literature that appeared in the languages of the Owamboland region of present-day Namibia, from the 1870s until the 1980s. The collection consists mainly of religious literature, but also e.g. local language guides such as primers, grammars and other textbooks. The Finnish missionaries who worked in the area developed the local literary language. The earliest books were printed in Finland. The missionary workers had their own printing press from 1901, but many books were still printed in Finland, sometimes in London and Cape Town too.

s.FeKa (Fenno-Kareliana, literature in Finnish or about Finland, printed in Russian Karelia)

The collection includes books and magazines in Finnish and Russian as well as in Finnish-related languages published in the Autonomous Socialist Republic of Karelia (1940-1956 Karelo-Finnish Socialist Soviet Republic) and since 1991 in the Republic of Karelia. The collection also includes newspapers, which are located in the Newspaper and Ephemera Services in Raisio. The collection contains approx. 1,000 volumes. The main bulk of the collection consists of literature in Finnish, the publication of which was initiated by the population who moved or fled to the Soviet Union from Finland in the 1920s and 1930s. Later, the importance of Karelian writers increased. Initially, the books were printed and published in St. Petersburg (Leningrad), but as early as the 1920s, Petrozavodsk became a publishing center for Finnish-language literature. After the Second World War, the amount of literature began to decrease, and in the 1990s only few works were published in Finnish in the Republic of Karelia.