This division holds over 1,100 manuscripts (codices) and around 200 fragments. A selection of manuscripts have been digitised and are accessible online in the virtual e-codices manuscript library. 

Please note: If you wish to access the collection in the reading room, you must place an order via the archives catalogue and thus make an appointment. In order to ensure their conservation, certain documents are not available for use in the reading room.

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The Bongarsiana are a collection of manuscripts from the French humanist and diplomat Jacques Bongars (1554–1612). After Bongars’ death, his library was left to his heir, Jakob Graviseth (1598–1658), the son of a Strasbourg banker who married Salome von Erlach (1604–1636), the daughter of Bern’s mayor (Schultheiss). This is how the Bongarsiana collection was moved first from Strasbourg to Basel and then in 1632 to the Bern City Library. The collection consists of around 700 mediaeval and early modern manuscripts and 150 fragments, most of which come from monasteries around Orléans (Fleury, Micy), with some also from Paris and northern France as well as the regions around Strasbourg and Metz. Also included are around 3,000 printed documents that can be accessed through the Historical Collections Center at the University Library of Bern. 

The old Bern collection comprises a good 100 manuscripts that were already held by the Bern City Library before the Bongarsiana donation was made in 1632. The collection includes manuscripts from monasteries dissolved during the Reformation and from the private libraries of Bernese scholars and members of the clergy. After the merger with the Bongarsiana collection around 1700, a further 100 manuscripts were donated to or acquired by the Library in the 18^th and 19^th centuries. 

In the late 19^th and 20^th century, the collection was expanded to include further donations and acquisitions, with around 200 mainly early modern European, Oriental, Greek and Hebrew manuscripts being added. There are also 100 fragments, most of which consist of binding waste (Einbandmakulatur) recovered from the Burgerbibliothek’s own holdings in the 20^th century. This group is not covered by Hermann Hagen’s catalogue, which was printed in 1875.