Oshkosh High School - Index Yearbook (Oshkosh, WI)

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APRIL INDEX FOR NINETEEN HUNDRED SEVENTEEN The Franciscans had a considerable library at Oxford to which Adam ■de Murisco left his books in 1253. The Bodleian library, the foundation of the existing Oxford library, was opened in 1602. The library of the Uni- versity of Cambridge dates from 1475. In 1550, Edward VI destroyed all illuminated manuscripts belonging to the colleges as necessarily Popish. The custom of establishing libraries in connection with universities was begun in 1348 with the one at Prague. This was soon followed by a library at Heidelberg in 1386, Leipzig in 1409, Ratisbon in 1430, Vienna in 1440, and Frankfort in 1484. The Renaissance brought with it a zeal for letters that led to the formation of the great principal colleges, which were often made the bases of public libraries. The suppression of monasteries soon led to the founding of royal, ducal, and town libraries. Many of the important ones were established during the eighteenth and nineteenth cen- turies. AU the German universities have large libraries. Those of Prague, Heidelberg, and Leipzig have already been mentioned, and in 1737 one was founded at Gottigen and the one at Bonn in 1818. The royal libraries of Berlin, Vienna, Dresden, Munich, and other places are among the most notable collections today. The libraries of Austria and Germany are the best equipped for scientific research of any in the world. Spain is mentioned early in the history of libraries. Its first one was •established at the University of Palencini in 1212 and removed to Salamanca in 1254. The National library at Madrid has seven hundred thousand vol- umes and is the largest in the country. The Corvina library, established by Matthais Corvinus of Hungary about 1460, probably contained the largest and finest collection of manu- scripts in Europe. It originally contained more than fifty thousand volumes, but was dispersed by the Turks in 1527 and now specimens are to be found in more than thirty of the libraries of Europe. The library at Copenhagen, which was founded in 1479, has over eight hundred thousand volumes and is the largest in the Scandinavian peninsula. It is especially strong in Icelandic literature and has a fine collection of Persian manuscripts. The first library in Italy was founded at Florence in 1437 on a bequest by Nicoli, the Florentine Socrates, of his own collection of eight hundred manuscripts. Cosimo de ' Medici erected a building for it in 1444, and it was from, his grandson, Lorenzo de ' Medici, that it received the name Laurentian. Later, it was bought by Pope Leo X, but in 1521 Cardinal Giulio returned it to the city and had Michael Angelo erect a building for it. In Italy, it is surpassed only by the Vatican. The present Vatican library was erected in 1588 by Sixtus V. In 1658, it acquired the Urbini library, in 1746 the Ottoboni collection of German and Page twenty-one

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APRIL INDEX FOR NINETEEN HUNDRED SEVENTEEN his adopted son, added a fine library to liis many other gifts to Rome. How- ever, Asinius Pollis, an orator and senator, was the first to establish a public library in Rome. Under the influence of Augustus, two libraries, the Octa- vian, founded in honor of his sister, and the Palatine, so called because it was in the royal palace itself, were established. The latter contained books in both Latin and Greek. Of this library, John of Salisbury says: The learned and most holy Gregory not only banished astrology from the court, but also, as is reported by those of old time, gave to the flames those writ- ings of approved merit, and whatever else the Palatine library in Apollo ' s temple possessed. Preeminent among these were some which seemed de- signed to reveal to men the will of the celestial beings and the oracles of the higher powers. Among the other libraries of Rome was that founded by Tiberius, in the royal palace soon after the death of Augustus. In time, Vespasian also collected a library which was placed in the temple of Peace. Trajan gath- ered another that is commonly called Ulpian. There was also the Capi- toline library, gathered by men of old and destroyed when the building was struck by lightning. It is thought that Domitian was its founder and he was at great pains to reestablish it, even sending servants to Alexandria to copy and edit books for his library. At the time of Constantine, there were twenty-nine public libraries in Rome. Many wealthy citizens had private libraries. Tyrannion, the grammar- ian, had three thousand volumes; Epaphroditus of Chaeronea is said have owned thirty thousand of the best and rarest, while Samonicus Serenus had a library of sixty-two thousand volumes which he left to Gordian the Less, afterward emperor. Undoubtedly there were many other private libraries of which we know nothing, for Seneca says: They acquired books, not that they might enjoy them, but simply for show. . . . Formerly a library gave a home an air of culture, one is now put in, like a bathroom, simply as a nec- essary part of the equipment of a home. The chief work of the medieval libraries was to transcribe and preserve. The Benedictine monks started many famous libraries in Europe, while the Augustinians and Dominicans were also distinguished for their care of libraries. Charlemagne established libraries in his cloister schools at Aix- le-Chapelle and Tours. In England, the first library was that of Christ Church, Canterbury, founded in 596 by the Benedictines. They also established the libraries of Saint Peter of York, Saint Cuthbert at Durham, and those at Petersbor- ough, Wearmouth (647), Bury Saint Edmonds, Reading, and Saint Alban. In Europe, they founded the libraries of Monte Cassino, Bobbio, Flemy-on- the-Loire (650), Corbel (662), Hersfeld, Ratisbon, Corvei, Reichnau (724), Fulda (774), Saint Gall (820), and Clugny (910). The largest of these monastic libraries contained only two thousand volumes. Page twenty

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APRIL INDEX FOR NINETEEN HUNDRED SEVENTEEN Latin manuscripts. Later, it purchased tlie Barbecini library of four hun- dred thousand printed volumes. Since the pontificate of Leo VIIL the Vatican library has been freely opened to the public. Italy also has the Ambrosian library at Milan, founded in 1602, the Vittorio Emanuela at Rome, the National library, founded on the Maglia- bechiana and Palatine libraries, at Florence, and the National of Saint Mark at Venice. The Bibliotheque National at Paris is the largest library in the world. In 1368, Chas. V started to gather a library in one of the towers of the Louvre. During the war with England, its nine hundred and t en volumes were scattered. Louis XI attempted to revive it, and Henry IV gave it a home and a librarian in the College de Clermont. Although two of the librarians were guillotined in the Revolution, the library itself escaped des- truction, and in 1666 was moved to its present buildings. It contains four million volumes of printed books, five hundred thousand maps, one hundred and ten thousand manuscripts, and one million prints. Paris has also the Arsenal library, founded in 1755; St. Genevieve, in 1624; the Mazarin, in 1642; besides those of the universities and other educational establishments. In 1915, the libraries of France, outside of Paris, contained over thirteen million volumes. The library of Lyons, established 1527, has four hundred fifty thousand volumes, while other large libraries were established at Aix in 1705; Rouen, 1809; Bordeaux, 1738. The British Museum is second in size to the Paris National library, but probably surpasses it in value. In 1700, it was founded with the Cottonian collection of manuscripts as a basis. Soon the Harleian and Sloane libraries were presented to it. It was opened to the public in 1759. George II gave it the royal libraries of the kings of England, and in 1823, it received the private collection of George III. The building has been greatly enlarged, but in 1881, the natural history department had to be moved to a building near the South Kensington museum in order to make more room. The de- partment of printed books is the largest and has grown from Sir Hans Sloane ' s fifty thousand volumes to between three million and four million volumes. Great Britain also has the Patent Office library and the Natural Art library in London, the Bodleian at Oxford, the University library at Cam- bridge, Trinity College library at Dublin, John Rylands at Manchester, Mitchell library at Glasgow, and the library of the Faculty of Advocates of Edinburgh. The first large library in the United States was presented to Henrico College, which was established by the colonists of Virginia in 1621 and destroyed by fire the next year. Harvard University library was founded Page twenty-two