Floor plan of Buda Castle with Palatinal Crypt and annotation letters

The National Széchényi Library (, ) (OSZK) is a library in

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...

, located in

Buda Castle Buda Castle (, ), formerly also called the Royal Palace () and the Royal Castle (, ), is the historical castle and palace complex of the King of Hungary, Hungarian kings in Budapest. First completed in 1265, the Baroque architecture, Baroque pa ...

. It is one of two Hungarian

national libraries A national library is a library established by a government as a country's preeminent repository of information. Unlike public libraries, these rarely allow citizens to borrow books. Often, they include numerous rare, valuable, or significant ...

, the other being University of Debrecen Library.

History

The library was founded in 1802 by the highly patriotic Hungarian aristocrat Count Ferenc Széchényi. Széchényi traveled the world buying Hungarian books, which he assembled and donated to the nation. In 1803, the public library was opened in Pest. Széchényi's example resulted in a nationwide movement of book donations to the library. In 1808, the Hungarian National Assembly (" Diet") created the Hungarian National Museum to collect the historical, archaeological and natural relics of Hungary. The Museum was merged into the Library and for the last 200 years this is how it has existed, a national depository for written, printed and objective relics of the Hungarian past. In 1846, the Hungarian National Museum moved into its new building but it was not until 1949 that the Library became a separate entity again, with its current name. In 1985, the library moved to its new home at the Buda Castle Palace. The NSZL works on its catalogue's semantic availability.

Directors

* 1803–1815: Jakab Ferdinánd Miller * 1815–1846: István Horvát * 1846–1875: Gábor Mátray * 1875–1879: Vilmos Fraknói * 1879–1893: Béla Majláth * 1893–1894: József Szinnyei * 1894–1919: Fejérpataky László * 1919–1922: János Melich * 1923: Bálint Hóman * 1924–1929: Imre Lukinich * 1930–1934: Emil Jakubovich * 1934–1945: József Fitz * 1945– 1946: József Györke * 1946–1947: Gábor Tolnai * 1948–1957: Béla Varjas * 1958–1966: Magda Jóború * 1966–1968: Géza Sebestyén * 1968–1982: Magda Jóború * 1982: Péter Zircz * 1982–1984: Ferenc Molnár * 1984–1986: Zoltán Havasi * 1985—1993: Gyula Juhász * 1993—1999: Géza Poprády * 1999—2009: István Monok * 2009—2013: Andrea Sajo (Katona) * 2013—2014: Péter Szemerei * 2014: János Káldos * 2014—2019: Dr. László Tüske * 2019—2020: Judit Hammerstien * 2020—: Dávid Rózsa

Collections

The library aims to collect "hungarica" which is describes as works published within Hungary, published in Hungarian, written by Hungarian authors, and those with Hungarian aspects. The library receives two copies of all publications and prints produced in Hungary.

Books

The library's Incunabulum Collection consists of 1,800 books printed before 1500; notable items include a fragment of the

Gutenberg Bible The Gutenberg Bible, also known as the 42-line Bible, the Mazarin Bible or the B42, was the earliest major book printed in Europe using mass-produced metal movable type. It marked the start of the "Printing Revolution, Gutenberg Revolution" an ...

and the '' Chronica Hungarorum''-the first book printed in Hungary. Its Antiqua Collection holds 13,000 items from the 16th century, including a first edition of Nostradamus' ''The Prophecies''. The Old Hungarian Library is a collection of 8,500 old Hungarian books including the Vizsoly Bible, the first complete Bible printed in Hungarian. The Apponyi Collection is a collection of over 3,000 Hungarian-related items donated by Count Albert Apponyi in 1924. One of its most notable items is the Tabula Hungariae, the earliest surviving printed map of Hungary. Other collections include the Leaflet Collection; Old Cyrillica Collection, mostly consisting of liturgical books written in Romanian Cyrillic, Early Printed Books Archive, and the History of Binding Collection.

Periodicals

With the influx of periodicals in the 19th century, established the National Newspaper Library in 1884. The library has about 250,000 volumes of periodicals. Of the Hungarian and international newspaper collection, almost 75 percent of its items are the only surviving copies. Notable items include the , the first regular newspaper in Hungary, and the

Journal des Sçavans The (later renamed and then , ), established by Denis de Sallo, is the earliest academic journal published in Europe. It is thought to be the earliest published scientific journal. It currently focuses on European history and premodern literatu ...

, the earliest academic journal in Europe.

Manuscripts

The library holds the largest manuscript collection in Hungary with about 1,400,000 total items. Notable items include the original copies of

Himnusz The "" () is the national anthem of Hungary. The lyrics were written by Ferenc Kölcsey, a nationally renowned poet, in 1823, and its currently official musical setting was composed by the romantic composer Ferenc Erkel in 1844, although other ...

, Hungary's national anthem, and Szózat, a Hungarian song.

Posters and Small Prints

The Collection of Posters and Small Prints, established in 1935, holds about four million documents, making it one of the biggest collections of the library.

Maps

In 1939, the Map Collection became an independent department of the National Széchényi Library. As of 2015, the map collection encompasses over 300,000 items, with 3,400 map sheets belonging to the original Széchényi-collection from the early 1800s.Kiss, E., Ungvári, Z., & Fulajtár, P. (2015). Digital Map Collection Project at the National Széchényi Library. ''e-Perimetron'', ''10''(1), 1-10. Approximately a quarter of the maps' coverage is of historical Hungary, and the remaining maps in the collection cover areas all over the world. The library has been digitizing its map collection in recent years to make cultural heritage items more accessible. The library partnered with the Department of Cartography and Geoinformatics at Eötvös Loránd University to digitize some of the library's globes to create th
Virtual Globes MuseumTabula Hungariae
the first printed map of Hungary, is now digitized and accessible online.

Theatre History

In 1949, the Theatre History Collection was established to take over the libraries of the theaters that remained after

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. It holds 30,000 plays and 380,000 documents.

Music

The library's music collection holds 170,000 items of printed sheet music. Notable items include

Joseph Haydn Franz Joseph Haydn ( ; ; 31 March 173231 May 1809) was an Austrian composer of the Classical period (music), Classical period. He was instrumental in the development of chamber music such as the string quartet and piano trio. His contributions ...

's manuscripts and first edition works, items from

Franz Liszt Franz Liszt (22 October 1811 – 31 July 1886) was a Hungarian composer, virtuoso pianist, conductor and teacher of the Romantic music, Romantic period. With a diverse List of compositions by Franz Liszt, body of work spanning more than six ...

, and Ferenc Erkel's operas' manuscripts.

Photos

The library's photo collection was established in 2007. Among other items, it holds 40,000 glass plates or photo and film negatives of the library's book collection.

Discovery of New Mozart Autograph

In 2014, a Hungarian librarian discovered four pages of Mozart's original score (autograph) of the Piano Sonata no. 11 in A Major (KV 331) in Budapest's National Széchényi Library. Until then, only the last page of the autograph survived. The paper and handwriting of the four pages matched that of the final page of the score, held in Salzburg.

Zoltán Kocsis Zoltán Kocsis (; 30 May 1952 – 6 November 2016) was a Hungarian pianist, conducting, conductor and composer. Biography Studies Born in Budapest, he began his musical studies at the age of five and continued them at the Béla Bartók Conser ...