Public library of the University of Basel, Collections, Academic library in Basel, Switzerland
The public library of the University of Basel, Collections, is an academic library in Basel, Switzerland, holding printed books, manuscripts, maps, diagrams, and visual documents. The collections are spread across a main building and several locations around the city.
The library was founded in 1471, making it one of the oldest academic libraries in the German-speaking world. In 1559 it began cataloguing its collections in an organized way, a practice that helped it grow steadily over the following centuries.
The library holds one of the most complete sets of documents from the Council of Basel, a church gathering that shaped the city in the 15th century. Visitors who consult these manuscripts in the reading room get a direct connection to medieval Basel.
The main reading room offers around 200 work stations with access to digital resources, so a longer research visit is easy to manage. Visitors aged 14 and older are welcome, and the ground floor reception area is a good starting point for orientation.
The library holds the second-largest collection of Friedrich Nietzsche research materials in the world, with only the archives in Weimar holding more. Nietzsche taught at the University of Basel, which is why the city became a natural home for so much material related to his work.
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