The Biblioteca nazionale Vittorio Emanuele III ('' Victor Emmanuel III National Library'') is a national library of

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

. It occupies the eastern wing of the 18th-century

Palazzo Reale This is a list of royal palaces, sorted by continent. Africa * Abdin Palace, Cairo * Al-Gawhara Palace, Cairo * Koubbeh Palace, Cairo * Tahra Palace, Cairo * Menelik Palace * Jubilee Palace * Guenete Leul Palace * Imperial Palace- Massa ...

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

, at 1 Piazza del Plebiscito, and has entrances from piazza Trieste e Trento. It is funded and organised by the Direzione Generale per i Beni Librari and the

Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali The Ministry of Culture ( it, Ministero della Cultura - MiC) is the Ministry (government department), ministry of the Government of Italy in charge of List of museums in France, national museums and the ''Monument historique, monuments historiqu ...

. In quantitative terms it is the third largest library in Italy, after the national libraries in

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

and

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico an ...

, with 1,480,747 printed volumes, 319,187 pamphlets, 18,415 manuscripts, more than 8,000 periodicals, 4,500

incunabula In the history of printing, an incunable or incunabulum (plural incunables or incunabula, respectively), is a book, pamphlet, or broadside that was printed in the earliest stages of printing in Europe, up to the year 1500. Incunabula were pro ...

and the 1,800 Herculaneum papyri.

History and collections

The library was founded at the end of the 18th century in the Palazzo degli Studi (which now houses the Museo Archeologico), with its nucleus formed of books holdings of the Palazzo Capodimonte, the library from the celebrated Farnese Collection that Carlo di Borbone had transferred to Naples in 1734). Opened to the public in 1804 under the name of the Reale Biblioteca di Napoli, and directed by the great humanist

Juan Andrés Juan Andrés y Morell (15 February 1740 in Planes, Alicante12 January 1817 in Rome) was a Spanish Jesuit priest, Christian humanism, Christian humanist and literary critic of the Age of Enlightenment. He was the creator of world history and compar ...

, who composed his most important memoir, in Latin, published in Madrid by the Instituto

de Comparatística y Globalización with a study that broadens and renews the knowledge of this key and very intricate place in European culture.

, ''La Biblioteca Real de Nápoles'', Madrid, Instituto Juan Andrés de Comparatística y Globalización, 2020

In 1816 it changed its name to Reale Biblioteca Bourbons, Borbonica. Additions to its collection came from abolished religious houses and those confiscated from private collections. With the unification of Italy in 1860 it took up its present name of the Biblioteca Nazionale. In 1910 the ''Officina dei papiri ercolanensi'' was added to the library – this was the workshop founded by Carlo di Borbone to conserve the

papyri Papyrus ( ) is a material similar to thick paper that was used in ancient times as a writing surface. It was made from the pith of the papyrus plant, ''Cyperus papyrus'', a wetland sedge. ''Papyrus'' (plural: ''papyri'') can also refer to a d ...

found in excavations at

Herculaneum Herculaneum (; Neapolitan and it, Ercolano) was an ancient town, located in the modern-day ''comune'' of Ercolano, Campania, Italy. Herculaneum was buried under volcanic ash and pumice in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79. Like the nea ...

. After long debate and on the suggestion and efforts of

Benedetto Croce Benedetto Croce (; 25 February 1866 – 20 November 1952) was an Italian idealist philosopher, historian, and politician, who wrote on numerous topics, including philosophy, history, historiography and aesthetics. In most regards, Croce was a lib ...

, in 1922 the library was moved to its present location at Palazzo Reale, granted to the library by King Victor Emmanuel III (whose name it still bears). After the transfer, the collections of other important Neapolitan libraries were annexed to it, including the ''Biblioteca Brancacciana'' (formed in Rome by cardinal

Francesco Maria Brancaccio Francesco Maria Brancaccio (15 April 1592, in Canneto, near Bari – 9 January 1675) was an Italian Catholic cardinal.Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

due to the German and Allied occupations of Naples (being set fire to by the Germans in the four days of Naples), though the most precious manuscripts had been transferred to safer locations and remained there until the library reopened in 1945. In 1980 a wing of the building was seriously damaged by an earthquake, forcing the library to transfer some of its holdings to another part of the building.

Notes

External links

*
Biblioteca Nazionale Vittorio Emanuele III
(official site) {{DEFAULTSORT:Biblioteca Nazionale Vittorio Emanuele Iii Libraries in Naples Government of Italy Italian culture

Tourist attractions in Naples Education in Naples Royal Palace of Naples 1790s establishments in the Kingdom of Naples

History and collections

See also

Notes

External links