National Library of Scotland
National Library of Scotland
National Library of Scotland / National Library of Scotland
The National Library of Scotland (NLS ), ( German National Library of Scotland, Scottish Gaelic Language: Leabharlann Nàiseanta na h- Alba ) in Edinburgh is a national library within the distributed system of the United Kingdom. It is the legal deposit library of Scotland with the task of collecting writings by and about Scotland and recorded.
The holdings are based on collections that are stored in various buildings in the city center. The head of the Library is located on George IV Bridge Street, between the so-called Old Town and the district of the University of Edinburgh. In a more modern library building on the south side of town in the Causewayside Street Special collections such as maps, music prints and manuscripts, and the Natural History Collections are kept.
History
The National Library of Scotland is a relatively young institution, which was founded in 1925 formally by an act of parliament. Previously, she worked as a legal deposit library of Scotland, part of the Advocates Library, which is part of the Faculty of Advocates. This predecessor was opened in 1689 and raised in 1710 by the Copyright Act for the National Library. This had the library as well as the British Library, the National Library of Wales, the libraries of the universities of Cambridge and Oxford, as well as the library of Trinity College, Dublin, the right to a mandatory copy of each publicized in the UK book. The library grew by buying books and manuscripts, as well as by the receipt of deposit copies.
In the 1920s it became obvious that such a significant collection could no longer be managed by a private institution. With a donation of £ 100,000 by Sir Alexander Grant, the library's collections were appropriated to the Scottish people. In 1925, the National Library of Scotland was officially established by the Act of Parliament in life.
Sir Alexander Grant provided an additional £ 100,000 for the construction of a new library building available. Government grants supplemented the total amount necessary for the construction. The work on the new building began in 1938, was interrupted by the Second World War and ending in 1956. The architect was Reginald Fairlie.
In the 1970s, the space for the storage of other library materials became more scarce, so that the need for an extension was obvious. The so-called Causewayside Building in the south of Edinburgh opened in two phases: 1989 and 1995 the total costs amounted to 50 million pounds..
Since 1999, the library is funded directly by the Scottish Parliament and passed through a group of trustees. She is one of six libraries in the UK and Ireland receives the required copies.
The National Library of Scotland has 7 million books, 14 million print media and over 2 million cards. The collection contains copies of the Gutenberg Bible, Shakespeare Folio, and numerous magazines and publications.
More treasures of the library are family manuscripts, which is one of the the year 1488 Sinclair clan reaching back copy.
A Letter of Mary Stuart was presented as a treasure of the library collection as one of the exhibits at the opening of the visit and Exhibition Centre in September 2009 to the public.