The early Christian encyclopedias 

• Institutiones (560 CE) of Cassiodorus'. 

• Etymologiae (636) of St. Isidore of Seville's . 

• Bibliotheca by the Patriarch Photius (9th century) which is earliest Byzantine work that  qualifies as an encyclopedia 

• De Proprietatibus Rerum (1240) of Bartholomeus de Glanvilla

• Speculum Majus (1260) of Vincent of Beauvais, which had over 3 million words.

The early Muslim encyclopedias are:

• Encyclopedia of the Brethren of Purity. 

• Abu Bakr al-Razi's encyclopedia of science, 

• The Mutazilite Al-Kindi's prolific output of 270 books, 

• Ibn Sina's medical encyclopedia, 

• Works of universal history (or sociology) from Asharites, 

• Tabari's History of the Prophets and Kings,

• Muqadimmah which contains cautions regarding trust in written records that remain wholly applicable today.

The early Chinese Encyclopedias

• The Four Great Books of Song, compiled in the 11th century during the early Song Dynasty (960-1279), 

• The last encyclopedia of the four, the Prime Tortoise of the Record Bureau, with 9.4 million Chinese characters in 1000 written volumes. 

• The Dream Pool Essays of Shen Kuo (1031-1095) 

• The Nong Shu of Wang Zhen (1290-1333)

• The written Tiangong Kaiwu of Song Yingxing (1587-1666).

• Yongle Encyclopedia, one of the largest encyclopedias in history.