The project encompasses more than 400 early printed books originating primarily from collections secured in the western and northern territories of Poland after 1945. The collection includes works from renowned European libraries and institutions, including the Berlin City Library, the Royal Library in Berlin, the Friedrich Werder Gymnasium Library and the castle library of the von Osten-Bismarck family. The diversity of the collection highlights its international character and its importance for research into book circulation and the development of culture in Central and Northern Europe.
About the Collection
The collection constitutes a valuable testimony to the intellectual culture of the Enlightenment era. The selected prints reflect the principal currents of the eighteenth century, including empiricism, rationalism, deism, didacticism, as well as the development of science and critical reflection on the world. At the same time, they illustrate the process through which individual fields of knowledge emerged and evolved, making them an important source base for interdisciplinary research in the humanities.
The collection is dominated by literary, historical and theological works, as well as travel publications, biographies, and legal and administrative materials such as acts, edicts and regulations. The preserved provenance marks, manuscript inscriptions, and traces left by former owners and readers, which make it possible to reconstruct the history of individual copies and historical book collections are of particular value. Thanks to these features, the collection is not only a repository of texts but also a valuable source for studies on the development of reading culture and the history of the book.
The collection is a valuable research resource for historians, literary scholars, linguists, philosophers, cultural researchers, and all those interested in the history of the book and European heritage. Making it available in digital form will significantly enhance opportunities for research at both national and international levels, integrating the collection into the global circulation of scholarly knowledge.
Project Activities
The project includes activities related to the preservation, cataloguing and digital dissemination of the collection. It continues previous projects undertaken by the University of Lodz Library and devoted to the cataloguing and digitisation of seventeenth-century printed works. The project encompasses the fumigation of prints, bibliographical cataloguing in accordance with the MARC21 standard, the introduction of records into the NUKAT catalogue and the local SYMPHONY system, the digitisation of selected objects, and the archiving of digital files.
The educational and outreach dimension of the project is also its important element. By making the collection available through digital libraries and organising a travelling exhibition, the most valuable items will be presented to a broad audience, including the academic community, cultural institutions, and members of the public with no professional connection to academia. In this way, the project contributes not only to the preservation but also to the dissemination of the cultural heritage of the eighteenth century.
The implementation of the project will help safeguard unique written heritage artefacts and make them accessible to a wide audience, including researchers, students and all those interested in the history of the book and eighteenth-century culture.
The project is financed from the state budget funds awarded by the Minister of Science and Higher Education under the programme “Społeczna odpowiedzialność nauki III” [Social Responsibility of Science III], pursuant to agreement no. SBP/SP/0046/2026/01.
