The Budapest University Library [antikvár]

The Budapest University Library is the oldest among the big research libraries in Hungary, lts holdings, collected since the end of the 16th Century, consist at present approximately of 1.250.000 volumes of books and serials, and 45.000 manuscripts and other rarities. The basic task of the Library is to collect the books and serials required in the educational and scientific work of the Loránd Eötvös University and to make these available to readers for use in the reading rooms and at home. It serves first of ali the students and the staff of the University, as well as other scholars; but it is accessible to the general public too. The Library Building The present building of the Library was designed by Antal Skalnitzky and Henrik Koch in an eclectic style, and built in 1873—75. The beauty of its façade towards Reáltanoda Street is quite lost in conséquence of the narrowness of this street. The vestibule has two colonnades, and walls covered, similarly to the façade, with sgraffito; a durable wall décoration which is rather rare in the interior of buildings. The show-cases of the vestibule make visitors acquainted with the recently ac-quired books; but occasionally they are also used for exhibiting jubilee or com-memorative material. The impressive main staircase leading up to the first floor is also worth seeing. The greater part of the Károlyi Street wing of the building is occupied by the glass covered main reading room, measuring 228 square métrés. Its mirror vault is decorated with frescoes by Károly Lotz, representing allegorical figures of the sciences and arts. The Acquisition Program of the Library kept being continually adapted to the range of sciences taught at the University. The books acquired in earlier times — which in our own days do not retain but a historical value — embraced theology, philosophy, law and politi-cal science, medicine and the natural sciences. In the 20th century, but particularly owing to the efforts made by the Government in the last 15 years, the acquisition program of the Library has corne in an increasing measure to be coordinated to the acquisitions not only of the big Hungarian research libraries, but also to those of the rapidly developing book collections of university departments and institutes. Today the principal range of collection of the Library includes philosophy, psychol-ogy, universal history of the Middle Ages and partly that of the Modem Age, scientific atheism, history of religion and Church history. In these fields the Library aims at acquiring as fully as possible recent foreign literature too. In other branches of the social sciences it generally acquires ail works written in Hungarian,