What is the Hill Museum & Manuscript Library?
The Hill Museum & Manuscript Library (HMML) is a library located in the Benedictine community of St. John's Abbey and University in Collegeville, MN. Our central mission has been the preservation and study of texts and manuscripts important to Christian and monastic culture. Today, we are the world's largest archive of manuscript images, holding more than 30,000,000 page-images from almost 100,000 manuscripts.

When was HMML founded and why?
HMML was founded during the Cold War in response to the danger of nuclear war in Europe. Our mission has never solely been that of mere preservation. We seek also to increase understanding of our history and deeply held convictions by providing scholars with access to the manuscript images.

What is the HMML mission?
The primary mission of the Hill Museum & Manuscript Library at St. John’s University in Collegeville, MN is to preserve humanity’s historic, handwritten cultures from loss. We aspire to become the world’s preferred partner in the digital preservation of manuscripts, to ensure that copies of precious manuscripts will always be available in case of the loss of the originals.

Is HMML a religious institution?
HMML is a manuscript image library sponsored by a Benedictine monastery and university. Our primary focus is on the preservation of historical Christian manuscripts. At the same time, we preserve whole collections. Once we have agreed to digitize a manuscript collection, we undertake to preserve the entire collection, and not just those manuscripts with explicit religious content. We preserve the entire collection for several reasons:

• All manuscripts are precious and deserve preservation, whether they are religious or secular in nature.
• Secular manuscripts help to tell the complete story of a community.

What do you mean by 'manuscript'?
A handwritten text or collection of texts bound into book form. While all literature and archival records of the past are important, we at HMML are very focused on our mission to preserve handwritten manuscripts. Printed books exist in multiple copies, but each manuscript is a unique creation. There are many cultural artifacts of great value to human learning and memory. Manuscripts are valuable in part because they directly communicate what people in the past actually thought.

Preserve manuscripts from what?
Most manuscripts have not survived to the present day. Fire, whether accidental or deliberately set in time of war or persecution, has always been the principal threat. Natural disasters, political upheaval, and inadequate storage conditions are also perennial challenges. Manuscripts have always been favorite targets for theft, encouraged today by the lively market for rare books in economically developed countries.

Why preserve photographs of manuscripts?
In the past, western museums, libraries, and collectors built their holdings through practices that would never be condoned today. Entire collections were alienated from their original communities, with scant regard for the originating communities. HMML believes that manuscripts should remain in their communities and countries of origin. Our approach ensures that the contents of manuscripts, including every last detail, will be preserved for centuries to come and readily available to qualified scholars. The original manuscripts remain where they belong, as do all rights of publication. Should any kind of disaster befall the originals, their witness to the past will not be lost. Digital preservation thus addresses four compelling needs:

• It creates a copy of the original should the worst come to pass and the original be lost. This preserves the content of the manuscript, of great value to scholarship, in case of loss of the original.
• Digital images provide easier access for scholars. Many of the collections we digitize are in remote locations or in libraries not normally open to researchers.
• Digital images can be studied intently again and again. Examining them rather than the original manuscript protects against any further deterioration of the original.
• Finally, digital preservation means that the original manuscripts never leave the custody of their true owners and guardians. Their irreplaceable patrimony remains intact and secure.

Where are these manuscripts located? HMML is an archive of photographic copies, or images, of manuscripts. The original manuscripts remain with their owners.

Who owns the copyrights to the manuscripts?
All copyright remains with the owner. Manuscript image may not be published or reproduced for any reason without the express permission of the owners. HMML’s care, display, and sharing of manuscripts images is regulated by contracts with each owning library. There is no publication without their permission.

Who owns the images in HMML's collection?
HMML has only limited rights to use each of the manuscript images. Full rights are maintained by the owners of the originals. HMML provides the owners with copies of the images. HMML retains master images and stores these on a server farm maintained by St John's University. Scholars may come to HMML for research, or they may request copies of the images. HMML publishes sample images on its website, but these are low-resolution, and not suitable for reproduction. The owning institutions maintain sole rights to reproduction and their permission must be obtained before any image may be reproduced in print.

HMML has beautiful greeting cards for sale in its gift shop with images from manuscripts. Are these from HMML's imaging projects?
All images appearing for sale in the HMML gift shop are from manuscripts that HMML actually owns, or from manuscripts in other collections used by express permission of their owner.

Is HMML still using microfilm?
HMML began its work using microfilm, and made the transition to digital preservation in 2003. Digital imaging offers greater cost-efficiency and images that are richer in information than black-and-white microfilm. Digital images also allow for easier access by scholars all over the world.

Digital imaging does have its challenges, the chief of which is long-term archiving and retrieval. Given the rapid evolution of technology, we can anticipate that data storage and retrieval systems will develop that will require migration to new systems in the next 5-10 years. We can expect that this cycle will repeat itself indefinitely into the future. This is why HMML’s commitment and Benedictine setting, which create our “think in centuries” perspective, are so important. We anticipate and plan for these technological changes in order to ensure perpetual image archiving and retrieval.

What does HMML do with the images in its collection?
HMML’s central focus is to preserve humanity’s hand-written culture, so that the rich information of word and image which manuscripts contain are accessible to all generations. Thus, the first concern is to take digital images especially of endangered manuscripts. The second is to ensure long-term storage and back-up of these images. The third is to equip scholars with search tools that will allow them to find exactly what they need in our vast digital collection.

HMML maintains a constantly updated archive on the server farm of Saint John’s University, and regularly updates the search tool on the HMML website, www.hmml.org. HMML posts sample manuscript images to our website, in order to give scholars and visitors finding aids for our digital collection. In order to safeguard the rights of the manuscripts’ owners, these images are in low resolution.

Can researchers get copies of the manuscripts in HMML's collection?
To gain access to high resolutions images of the entire manuscript, the scholar must travel to HMML, or seek permission from both HMML and the manuscript’s owner.

Is HMML conducting imaging work now?
HMML is currently carrying out preservation projects in Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Africa. See www.nnnnnnnn.org.

HMML seems to be working all over the world. How does HMML decide which manuscripts to preserve?
HMML applies the following criteria when deciding to pursue a specific project:

• Risk to the materials
• Likelihood of attaining access
• Permission to photograph and to retain suitable rights of use
• Centrality of the content to Christian history and culture
• Coherence in relation to HMML’s existing and envisioned collections
• Significance for researchers
• Volume of material likely to be acquired

Guided by these criteria, HMML has chosen the preservation of manuscripts belonging to the several Eastern Christian cultures as its current strategic focus. This means that we work to preserve all manuscripts created and kept by these cultures, and not just manuscripts of religious or Christian content. It also means that we preserve manuscripts held by secular and state institutions, as well as private collectors, in addition to those retained by monasteries and churches.

I've heard stories of HMML's staff spending years in Europe photographing manuscripts. Is this still going on?
HMML now hires and trains local technicians to carry out manuscript digitization. This not only reduces cost, but also builds goodwill among and technological capacity within the communities preserving their manuscript collections.

How does HMML support itself?
HMML is a non-governmental, not-for-profit organization. Our mission is to rescue and preserve humanity’s hand-written cultures, in order to make the stories of our diverse cultural ancestors known to present and future generations. HMML generates no profit for these services. Rather, HMML is supported entirely by the generosity of foundations and individual donors who support our mission.

We have a manuscript collection that we'd like HMML to photograph for preservation purposes. How do we pursue that possibility?
Your manuscript collection is a suitable candidate for HMML to preserve if:

• It is a pre-modern manuscript collection of historic importance.
• It relates to HMML’s collections in Latin and Eastern Christianity.
• You allow HMML limited rights to make the manuscript images available to qualified scholars either on-site at HMML, or by copying.