One of the world’s most valuable special collections has to be the Vatican “Coins and Medal Collections” or “Medagliere” which is kept in the Vatican Library and includes over 300,000 pieces of coins, medals, seals, foil strips, plaques, engraved stones, casts, and other similar materials.
The coin and medal collections are of incalculable value and include ancient coins and medals dating back to the beginnings of Christianity. Among the most valuable collections are the Greek, Byzantine, Medieval and Oriental (especially Chinese) coins, the collections of pontifical and Byzantine lead seals (or "bulls") and the “Pontifical medals and coins” from the early Popes until the pontificate of Benedict XVI. 
The technical library for the special collections is also very rich in books and supported material, many of which are old or rare, and which complete the numismatic collection of the Popes. An example of the supported material is the “The history of St. Pauls through 3,600 coins”.
The cataloguing of the Technical Library was started in 2001 with the main objective of cataloguing in MARC21 format for “three-dimensional materials” a digital scans of all the items in the library. The project is still in progress, but all the information already completed is available on-line through the “Catalogue of coins and medals”.
An interesting fact that I found during my research are the stringent security measures that are in place to protect the value of this unique collection. All the images available in the catalogue are protected by the copyright of the Vatican Library and any type of abuse is prosecuted according to the law. However, to help collectors to access some of the material, every year the Vatican produces replicates of selected collections and sell them to the public as a mean to generate income. Currently the income generated by selling coin replicates is limited up to a maximum of 1 million Euros per year.
I also found that in addition to copyright laws and in order to prevent plagiarism or illegal copying of “coin images”, access to the numismatic department is heavily restricted and visitors are required to obey the following security measures:
1. Visitors must request a reader's ticket from the Admissions Office;
2. Pre-arrange an appointment with Numismatic Cabinet.
3. Report to the Library entrance, from where they will be accompanied to the Numismatic Department.
4. Upon presentation of the reader's ticket, visitors receive a key and placed their personal belongings in a locker.
5. Sign the register of readers in the Numismatic Department, indicating the time of arrival and of departure.
Through my discovery journey of the Vatican library, I’m now realizing and becoming more aware of all the procedures and security measures that must be put in place in a library to ensure that the items are not only made available to users through a comprehensive cataloguing systems, but also the value of the collections must be protected and preserve to ensure that the value and quality of the items is not compromise by cheap imitations, or worse, by items being stolen and not being accessible to the academic/collectors community.
Research Process
Applying the feedback received on my previous blogs, I have now added a blog roll to my site as well as included other type of references in my posts (i.e. YouTube clips).
As I continue to dig in into the Vatican Library I have continued to discover a great amount of information about the library, in particular that there is more to a library than shelving and cataloguing books, there is also a vast amount of procedures and security measures that need to be put in place to protect the integrity of the information stored in the library.
My research has continued to be based in WEB articles, primarily from the main source of information which in this case is the Vatican Library. Even though I have also looked at other references, the Vatican Library appears to have the most authoritative and up-to-date information. I have used the other references mainly to confirm that the information I’m extracting is correct as well as reading opinions from other authors.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Weinberg A 2010, The Vatican Coin and medal collection, e-Sylum, Viewed on 17 October 2011,
http://www.coinbooks.org/esylum_v14n17a21.html
http://www.coinbooks.org/esylum_v14n17a21.html
Department of the Numismatic Cabinet, The Vatican Library, viewed 17 October 2011, http://www.vaticanlibrary.va/home.php?pag=dipartimento_numismatico&ling=eng&BC=11
RomeReports 2010, The history of St. Pauls tomb told through coins, 13 April, Viewed on 17 October 2011, <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAuTbE-eKHs&feature=relmfu>
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