The National Library of Brazil (, official name is ) is the depository of the bibliographic and documentary heritage of

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

. It is located in

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro, or simply Rio, is the capital of the Rio de Janeiro (state), state of Rio de Janeiro. It is the List of cities in Brazil by population, second-most-populous city in Brazil (after São Paulo) and the Largest cities in the America ...

, the capital city of Brazil from 1763 to 1960, more specifically at Cinelândia square. Considered by

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...

the largest library in

Latin America Latin America is the cultural region of the Americas where Romance languages are predominantly spoken, primarily Spanish language, Spanish and Portuguese language, Portuguese. Latin America is defined according to cultural identity, not geogr ...

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

Biblioteca Nacional do Brasil - Rio de Janeiro - 20230921132844

Americana 1920 Libraries - Bibliotheca Nacional Rio de Janeiro

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

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

. 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 ( ; ) is the capital and largest city of Portugal, with an estimated population of 567,131, as of 2023, within its administrative limits and 3,028,000 within the Lisbon Metropolitan Area, metropolis, as of 2025. Lisbon is mainlan ...

with the

royal family A royal family is the immediate family of monarchs and sometimes their extended family. The term imperial family appropriately describes the family of an emperor or empress, and the term papal family describes the family of a pope, while th ...

, except for his eldest son Prince Pedro de Alcântara of Braganza (future

Emperor of Brazil The monarchs of Brazil (Portuguese language, Portuguese: ''monarcas do Brasil'') were the imperial head of state, heads of state and hereditary rulers of Brazil from the House of Braganza that reigned from the creation of the Brazilian monarchy ...

), who would later proclaim the independence of Brazil in 1822. Here also remained the Royal Library. By that time it had grown significantly 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 Uruguay until the latter achieved independence in 1828. The empire's government was a Representative democracy, representative Par ...

, 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 Sterling (Currency symbol, symbol: Pound sign, £; ISO 4217, currency code: GBP) is the currency of the United Kingdom and nine of its associated territories. The pound is the main unit of account, unit of sterling, and the word ''Pound (cu ...

, 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

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 Francisco de Paula Rodrigues Alves, PC (; 7 July 1848 – 16 January 1919) was a Brazilian politician who first served as president of the Province of São Paulo in 1887, then as Treasury minister in the 1890s. Rodrigues Alves was elected the ...

. 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 the seventh president of Brazil. He was governor of Rio de Janeiro (1903–1906), then elected the fifth vice president of Brazil in 1906. H ...

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 Eclecticism is a kind of mixed style in the fine arts: "the borrowing of a variety of styles from different sources and combining them" . Significantly, Eclecticism hardly ever constituted a specific style in art: it is characterized by the fact t ...

, in which neoclassical and

Art Nouveau Art Nouveau ( ; ; ), Jugendstil and Sezessionstil in German, is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts. It was often inspired by natural forms such as the sinuous curves of plants and ...

elements are mixed, and contains ornaments by artists such as

Eliseu Visconti Eliseu Visconti, born Eliseo D'Angelo (30 July 1866 – 15 October 1944), was an Italian-born Brazilian painter, cartoonist, and teacher. He is considered one of the very few Impressionist painters of Brazil. He is considered the initiator of ...

, Henrique and Rodolfo Bernardelli, 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 D. Pedro II in 1891. This collection has been inscribed on

's Memory of the World international register in 2003 in recognition of its global significance. 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. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...

, and

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

Gallery

File:Americana 1920 Libraries - Bibliotheca Nacional Rio de Janeiro.jpg, Photograph of the National Library, 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 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 * 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 (1990–1996) * Eduardo Portella (1996–2002) * Pedro Corrêa do Lago (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)

References

External links

Official site

2009-11-01) {{Authority control ISBN agencies Government of Brazil

Libraries in Rio de Janeiro (city) World Digital Library partners Deposit libraries Libraries established in 1810 1810 establishments in Brazil National heritage sites of Rio de Janeiro (state)