Adyar Library and Research Centre is one of the foremost centres of Indological research in the world. This is situated in the sylvan areas of the Theosophkal Society in Chennai. Colonel H.S. Olcott, the President-Founder of the Theosophical Society founded this research centre in 1886.
Adyar Library and Research Centre was meant to be a non-sectarian centre of research on eastern civilization, philosophy and religion. During the initial stages, one of the principal projects of this institution was the collection and translation of rare and important manuscripts, which were in danger of being extinct. The Libraray gathered 12,847 manuscripts and 13,188 printed volumes in a very short time.
The Adyar Library and Research Centre has now collected about 18, 600 manuscripts (both palm-leaf and paper), which include many Sanskrit works and also manuscripts from Sri Lanka, China, Thailand, and other eastern countries. The collections are now transferred to a modern building to preserve them carefully. There are several rare unpublished manuscripts preserved in this library. These are later published along with translations in the Adyar Library Series, Adyar Library General Series and Adyar Library Pamphlet Series. This library contains about 2, 00,000 printed volumes here, which include almost every aspects of Indian culture and literature. These consist of the manuscripts on the Vedas, Upanishads, Buddhism, Jainism, Yoga, Dharmasastras, the fine-arts (music, dance, painting, sculpture etc.), linguistics, lexicography, aesthetics, history, archaeology and many others.
The books in Chinese, Japanese, Tibetan, Latin and other eastern and western languages are also preserved in the Adyar Library and Research Centre of Chennai. Several valuable possessions like a miniature Bhagavad Gita and a miniature Bible, a Chinese scroll brought from the Imperial Library at Peking containing Buddhist hymns can also be found here. There is a display room near the library, which contains few rare palm leaf manuscripts in various languages with artistic binding, Tibetan painting on handmade paper, etc.
The Adyar Library and Research Centre`s journal named `Brihmavidya` is being published since 1937. It contains articles on various aspects of eastern culture such as religion, philosophy and literature by internationally renowned scholars. This library has several significant publications like the Pali Text Society, the critical editions of the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, publications from the Harvard Oriental Series, and few others from Indological research institutions of all over the world.
The Adyar Library and Research Centre is visited by numerous young and old scholars of the country and from abroad for research work throughout the year.
