The earliest manuscripts found in the Collection are letters exchanged between Venetian merchants regarding goods transported through Famagusta harbour between 1407 and 1493.
The printed editions include travel books by Europeans who visited Cyprus during the Frankish (1192-1489), the Venetian (1489-1571) and the Ottoman (1571-1878) periods, historical books of the 16th century written by the official historiographers of Venice, and a series of books regarding the “War of Cyprus” (1570-71). It includes also a group of the so-called “war reports” that circulated in various languages in Europe to inform Europeans on the invasion of Cyprus by the Ottoman Empire. A more recent group of books on Cyprus under the British rule (1878-1960) includes a series of pamphlets issued during the first years after the Anglo-Turkish Cyprus Convention of 1879.