News archive

The Bayerische Staatsbibliothek (BSB) and the Saxon State and University Library Dresden (Sächsische Landesbibliothek – Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Dresden; SLUB) have started the second phase of the "Fachinformationsdienst Musikwissenschaft" (FID Musikwissenschaft, "Specialised Information Service for Musicology"), a three-year project subsidised by the German Research Foundation (DFG) with around EUR 1.5 million. The objective of the project is to make relevant information services for cutting-edge research in musicology available professionally in Germany.

The app "Famous Books" presents a selection of 52 most valuable manuscripts, unique incunabula and printed works from the Occident and the Orient. The digitized works of high colour brilliance can now be browsed in their entirety with infinite zoom on both Apple devices and, as of late, Android devices.

The Bayerische Staatsbibliothek has digitized the total of the extensive personal papers of Count August von Platen, which have been preserved by the library since 1870 and include many thousand pages. This means that the complete oeuvre of the Romantic author, who lived from 1796 to 1835, is now accessible online.

The Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Munich and the University of Passau have launched the "Sprechender Sprachatlas von Niederbayern und dem angrenzenden Böhmerwald" ("Speaking linguistic atlas of Lower Bavaria and the adjacent Bohemian Forest region"), which has been developed in a cooperation project. The interactive service is directed at a broad public and is accessible as of now via the Bayerische Landesbibliothek Online.

The Munich Digitization Center has made the 1.2-millionth work accessible online by digitizing one of the most magnificent books of hours of the school of Ghent-Bruges (Clm 28345). The manuscript with 28 whole-page, 60 half- and quarter-page and smaller miniatures and 24 bas-de-page calendar miniatures can be browsed online in its entirety now.

As of late, ten red banners with quotes of well-known philosophers, authors, scholars and publicists have been gracing the pilasters of the gallery of our grand staircase. While being very different, the quotes "all have in common that they express something worth reflecting and something controversial from the manifold life worlds of the mind and culture", explains Director General Dr. Klaus Ceynowa, who has also selected them.

Titled "Martin Luther and the early Reformation in Bavaria. Supporters, adversaries, sympathisers", the cultural portal bavarikon presents its first virtual exhibition in 2017, the year of the Reformation's anniversary. The exhibition is unique, not only with respect to its volume, but also the approach taken: Twenty-one cultural institutions take part in the virtual exhibition showing 123 high-carat exhibits.

The new digital source collection has been licensed within the framework of the Specialised Information Service for Russian, East and Southeast European Studies with the support of the German Research Foundation. It pools documents on the activities of US intelligence services in connection with the Soviet Union, showing their successes and failures.

In the "Digital Collections", the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek now presents all music autographs by the German composer Heinrich Kaminski (1886 – 1946) held by the Department of Music. Kaminski, originally from Tiengen in the Black Forest area, lived in Heidelberg and Berlin after his years of studies, and later, as of 1914, in the small village of Ried in Upper Bavaria.

The "Bibliotheksmagazin" is published three times per year to report about the collections, activities and services of the state libraries in Berlin and Munich. The issue 1/17 of the journal will be presented in a new layout for the first time. The library journal can also be retrieved online.