The Institute of Lithuanian Literature and Folklore was established in 1990. That year, the Lithuanian government reorganised the Institute of Lithuanian Language and Literature, which was part of the Academy of Sciences, into two independent research institutes: the Institute of Lithuanian Literature and Folklore, and the Institute of the Lithuanian Language. The Institute of Lithuanian Literature and Folklore is the main research institution conducting research on Lithuanian literature and folklore. The institute has seven departments, a publishing centre, and a research library. The Manuscript Division is part of the library.

The research library has a special collection of documents on Lithuanian studies made up of books, periodicals, manuscripts, photographic documents, small prints, cartographic publications, and audio-visual documents (on 1 January 2014, there were 292,108 physical units). The Manuscript Division has about 90,000 document units.