The Biblioteca Nacional do Brasil (English: ''National Library of Brazil'') is the depository of the bibliographic and documentary heritage of
Brazil
Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...
. It is located in
Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...
, the capital city of Brazil from 1822 to 1960, more specifically at
Cinelândia square.
The largest library in
Latin America
Latin America or
* french: Amérique Latine, link=no
* ht, Amerik Latin, link=no
* pt, América Latina, link=no, name=a, sometimes referred to as LatAm is a large cultural region in the Americas where Romance languages — languages derived f ...
and the seventh largest in the world, its collections include about 9 million items. It organized the first library science courses in Latin America and its staff has led the modernization of library services, including the development of online databases.
History
![Americana 1920 Libraries - Bibliotheca Nacional Rio de Janeiro](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9e/Americana_1920_Libraries_-_Bibliotheca_Nacional_Rio_de_Janeiro.jpg)
The history of the National Library began on 1 November 1755, when Lisbon suffered a violent earthquake. The Royal Library was considered one of the most important libraries in Europe at that time. This irreparable loss to the Portuguese was the impetus for moving many of its contents to Brazil. The collection was brought in three stages, the first being in 1810 and two in 1811. The library of 60,000 books was accommodated initially in the upstairs rooms of the Third Order of Carmel Hospital (in accordance with the charter of July 27, 1810), located in the old back street of Carmel close to the
Imperial Palace. The facilities, however, were considered inadequate and as well potentially jeopardizing the valuable collection. Therefore, on 29 October 1810, a date that was assigned to the official founding of the National Library, Prince Regent John (later King
John VI of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves) issued a decree which provided that a royal library should be established from the funds of the royal treasury.
Expansion
![Bibliotecanacional2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fa/Bibliotecanacional2.jpg)
The works for the new building of the Library only took place in 1813, when the collection was transferred. While the process of setting up the books, which began in 1810, was taking place the consultation of the Library collection could already be carried out by scholars, by royal consent, and in 1814, after the collection of the collection was completed, the consultation was public.
Officially established, the library continued to have a significant expansion through purchases, donations, mainly, and "tips", that is, by the obligatory delivery of a copy of all printed material in the typographic offices of Portugal (By decree of 12 September 1805) and in the Royal Printing, installed in
Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...
. This legislation on tips was improved over the years and culminated in Decree No. 1,825 of 20 December 1907, commonly called the Legal Deposit Decree, still in force.
Transfer of sovereignty
After the death of
Queen Maria I in March 1816, the reign of
King John VI began, and it remained in Brazil until 1821, when political circumstances made him return to
Lisbon
Lisbon (; pt, Lisboa ) is the capital and largest city of Portugal, with an estimated population of 544,851 within its administrative limits in an area of 100.05 km2. Grande Lisboa, Lisbon's urban area extends beyond the city's administr ...
with the
Royal Family
A royal family is the immediate family of kings/queens, emirs/emiras, sultans/ sultanas, or raja/ rani and sometimes their extended family. The term imperial family appropriately describes the family of an emperor or empress, and the term ...
, except for his eldest son
Prince Pedro de Alcântara of Braganza (future
Emperor of Brazil), who came to proclaim the independence of Brazil in 1822. Here also remained the Royal Library. At that time it had grown a lot and, after Independence, in 1822, became property of the
Empire of Brazil
The Empire of Brazil was a 19th-century state that broadly comprised the territories which form modern Brazil and (until 1828) Uruguay. Its government was a representative parliamentary constitutional monarchy under the rule of Emperors Dom Pe ...
, because its purchase is included in the Additional Convention to the
Treaty of Friendship and Alliance signed between Brazil and Portugal on 29 August 1825. For the goods left in Brazil the Royal Family was indemnified in two million
pounds sterling, of that value, eight hundred ''
contos de reis'' were destined to the payment of the Royal Library, which was then called the Imperial and Public Library of the Court.
Building
![0200 years Biblioteca Nacional in Rio de Janeiro city](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bd/0200_years_Biblioteca_Nacional_in_Rio_de_Janeiro_city.jpg)
In 1858, the Library was transferred to the Passeio street, number 60, in Lapa square, and installed in the building that had the purpose to better shelter its collection. As its collection continued to grow with donations, acquisitions and through legal contributions, purchase of rare art collections at auctions and in bookstores around the world, a new building was needed that best suited its needs.
The constant and permanent growth of the collection of the library was fundamental for the realization of a project of construction of a seat that would attend all the needs of the library, adequately accommodating its collections. Based on this, his current building was designed, which had its cornerstone launched on 15 August 1905, during the government of
Rodrigues Alves. The inauguration took place on 29 October 1910, during the
Nilo Peçanha
Nilo Procópio Peçanha (; 2 October 1867 – 31 March 1924) was a Brazilian politician who served as seventh president of Brazil. He was governor of Rio de Janeiro (1903–1906), then elected the fifth vice president of Brazil in 1906. He assu ...
government and in the first centenary of the Library.
The building of the National Library, whose project is signed by the military engineer Sousa Aguiar, has an
eclectic style, in which
neoclassical and
art nouveau
Art Nouveau (; ) is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts. The style is known by different names in different languages: in German, in Italian, in Catalan, and also known as the Modern ...
elements are mixed, and contains ornaments by artists such as
Eliseu Visconti,
Henrique and
Rodolfo Bernardelli
José Maria Oscar Rodolfo Bernardelli y Thierry (18 December 1852, Guadalajara - 7 April 1931, Rio de Janeiro) was a Mexican-born Brazilian sculptor and art professor, of Italian ancestry.
Biography
He was the oldest of four children born to a v ...
,
Modesto Brocos and
Rodolfo Amoedo. Eliseu Visconti, still in 1903, had already designed the ''ex-libris'' and the emblem of the National Library.
The library building is located at
Rio Branco Avenue, number 219,
Cinelândia Square, in the center of Rio de Janeiro, composing with the
National Museum of Fine Arts and the
Municipal Theater an architectural and cultural ensemble of great value.
Catalog
In 1911, Manoel Cicero Peregrino da Silva started a national union catalog for all Brazilian libraries. He set up the first library science course in South America. Many librarians went on to study in European and North American universities.
Legal deposit
In 1907, presidential Decree no. 1825 established the duty of all publishers to send one copy of each publication to then-called ''Bibliotheca Nacional''. In 2004, this decree was revoked by congressional Law no. 10,994, still in force, upholding the same mandate but updating its provisions.
Article 1st of Law no. 10,994 specifies that the legal deposit's aim is "to ensure the registration and custody of national intellectual production, to allow for the control, development and spreading of current Brazilian bibliography, and to defend and preserve national language and culture."
Significant collections
Among the significant collections of the National Library of Brazil is the Teresa Cristina Maria photograph collection, which includes 21,742 photographs dating from the nineteenth century. These photographs were left to the Library by
Emperor Pedro II
Dom PedroII (2 December 1825 – 5 December 1891), nicknamed "the Magnanimous" ( pt, O Magnânimo), was the second and last monarch of the Empire of Brazil, reigning for over 58 years. He was born in Rio de Janeiro, the seventh child of Empe ...
in 1891.
This collection has been inscribed on
UNESCO's Memory of the World Programme Register in 2003 in recognition of its world significance and outstanding universal value.
It features images related to Brazil's history and people from the 19th century, including photographs by
Moritz Lamberg. There are also photographs from
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
,
North America
North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...
, and
Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...
.
[
]
Gallery
File:Americana 1920 Libraries - Bibliotheca Nacional Rio de Janeiro.jpg, Photograph of the National Library, c. 1920
File:Biblioteca Nacional 5.JPG, Entrance from the outside
File:Biblioteca Nacional 4.JPG, Left wing
File:Biblioteca_Nacional_(Brasil).JPG, The Library as seen from the Municipal Theatre A municipal theatre is a theatre
Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific ...
File:Biblioteca Nacional do Brasil.jpg, The main staircase with a bust of King John VI
File:Biblioteca Nacional .jpg, Stained glass ceiling
File:Interior, Biblioteca Nacional do RJ.jpg, Entrance Hall
File:Biblioteca Nacional do Brasil, hall, 01.JPG, Entrance Hall
File:Biblioteca Nacional do Brasil, hall, 00.JPG, Entrance Hall: ceiling
File:Biblioteca Nacional (6738800857).jpg, Entrance Hall
File:Detalhe com Fachada da Biblioteca Nacional II.jpg, Façade details
File:Ex-libris da Biblioteca Nacional BRA-RJ.jpg, Ex libris
List of Former Directors
(incomplete list)
* Frei Camilo de Monserrate (29 April 1853 to 19 November 1870)
* Benjamin Franklin Ramiz Galvão
* João Saldanha da Gama
* F. L. Bitencourt Sampaio
* Francisco Mendes da Rocha
* Raul Pompeia
Raul d'Ávila Pompeia (April 12, 1863 – December 25, 1895) was a Brazilian novelist, short story writer and chronicler. He is famous for the Impressionist romance ''O Ateneu''.
He is patron of the 33rd chair of the Brazilian Academy of Letters ...
* José Alexandre Teixeira de Melo (1895-1900)
* Manuel Cícero Peregrino da Silva (1900-1924)
* Mario Behring (interim, 1923)
* Aurélio Lopes de Souza
* Basílio de Magalhães
* Rodolfo Garcia (1932-1945)
* Rubens Borba de Moraes (1945-1947)
* Josué Montello (1947-1953)
* Eugênio Gomes (1951-1956)
* Adonias Aguiar Filho
* Jannice Monte-Mór
* Plínio Doyle
* Celia Ribeiro Zaher
* Affonso Romano de Sant'Anna
Affonso Romano de Sant'Anna (born March 27, 1937), is a Brazilian poet, essay writer, and professor.
Background
He was a professor of Brazilian Literature at UCLA and the University of Texas at El Paso, and a writer for the O Globo newspaper. In ...
(1990-1996)
* Eduardo Portella
Eduardo Portella ( Salvador, Bahia, 8 October 1932 – Rio de Janeiro, 2 May 2017) was a Brazilian essayist, author, and Professor Emeritus at the Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro. He authored thirty books and was President of UNESCO's genera ...
(1996-2002)
* Pedro Corrêa do Lago
Pedro Corrêa do Lago (born March 15, 1958) is a Brazilian art historian and curator who has formed the largest private collection of autograph letters and manuscripts in the world today. He is the author of over twenty books on manuscripts and B ...
(2003-2005)
* Muniz Sodré (2009-2011)
* Galeno Amorim (2011-2013)
* Renato Lessa (2013-2016)
* Helena Porto Severo da Costa (2016 - 2019)Nomeados novos presidentes da Biblioteca Nacional e da Funarte
Agência Brasil. Acesso em 5 de outubro de 2016.
* Rafael Nogueira (2019-2022)
* Luiz Carlos Ramiro Junior (2022-present)
See also
*
List of libraries in Brazil
*
Legal deposit
*
National library
*
Minuscule 2437
Minuscule 2437 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering), is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament, on 220 parchment leaves (20 by 15 cm). Paleographically it has been assigned to the 11th or 12th century. K. Aland, M. Welte, B. Köster, K. J ...
*
Brazilian National Archives
*
References
External links
Official siteArchived2009-11-01)
{{Authority control
ISBN agencies
Government of Brazil
Brazil
Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...
Libraries in Rio de Janeiro (city)
World Digital Library partners
Deposit libraries