The engraving presenting a view of the interior of the Library of the Council of the City of Gdansk was made in 1687 – just like the other 56 engravings showing the city in Reinhold Curicke’s work Der Stadt Dantzig historische Beschreibung (Amsterdam and Gdansk 1687). The author of the article analysed the view in terms of its style, technique and iconography. Reaching back to 1596, she presented the circumstances in which the Library of the Council of the City of Gdansk was established in its initial location, referring to the political situation in the Commonwealth after Sigismund III Vasa, a supporter of the counter-reformation directed at the Protestant Gdansk, ascended to the throne. Analysing the artistic value of the view on the interior of the Library, the author accentuated the appropriate decorum, differentiating the engraving in question from Curicke’s other illustrations forming a part of his work. According to the author, the above resulted from the fact that the city authorities wanted to highlight the role of child-rearing, education and science in the development of Gdansk. The message was expressed in a baroquising style allegorizing the image of science. It is this intention which makes the view of the interior of the Library different from the other realistic views of the structures, fragments of the city and suburban areas of Gdansk.
W artykule omówiono poszczególne książkowe znaki własnościowe używane w Bibliotece Gdańskiej od końca XVI do początku XXI wieku. W pierwszych dwóch stuleciach istnienia Biblioteki Rady Miasta Gdańska jako znaku własnościowego używano trzech kolejnych miedziorytowych ekslibrisów. Powołana na początku XIX wieku Biblioteka Miejska w Gdańsku oznaczała swoje zbiory odbijanymi w tuszu pieczęciami o ośmiu (sześciu przedwojennych i dwóch powojennych), zmieniających się w czasie wzorach. Konsekwencją utworzenia w połowie XX wieku Biblioteki Gdańskiej Polskiej Akademii Nauk było stosowanie kolejnych siedmiu różnych pieczęci. Współcześnie w Bibliotece Gdańskiej nie ma zwyczaju używania ekslibrisów do oznaczania zbiorów książnicy. Jednak nadal powstają takie znaki własnościowe, o charakterze okolicznościowym; niektóre z nich zostały opisane w artykule.
EN
This paper discusses the individual book ownership marks used in the Gdańsk Library from the end of the 16th to the beginning of the 21st century. In the first two centuries of existence of the Library of the Council of the City of Gdańsk, three subsequent copperplate bookplates were used as ownership marks. Established in the beginning of the 19th century, the City Library in Gdańsk marked its collections with seals with eight (six pre-war and two post-war) different patterns changed over time; they were imprinted using ink. The founding of the Gdańsk Library of the Polish Academy of Sciences in the mid-20th century resulted in the use of a further seven different seals. Today, bookplates are no longer used to mark the collections of the Gdańsk Library. However, these ownership marks continue to be made to mark special occasions; some of them are described in this paper.
The Library of the Council of the City of Gdańsk was initially managed by the Collegium Scholarchale – a city authority responsible for the supervision of the schools of Gdańsk. Since the 1650s, one of its members occupied the prestigious position of the protolibrarian, i.e. the custodian of the Gdańsk bookery. For the next one and a half centuries the most eminent members of the city patrician milieu carried out the duty, caring for the institution that was entrusted to them to a greater or lesser extent. Some of them limited their work solely to supervising book purchases, while others engaged themselves in improving the conditions in which the Library was functioning – by acquiring additional funds, planning and supervising renovations or developing the catalogue of the holdings. The article presents the figures of the subsequent nineteen protolibrarians and – above all – the place of the Library curator in their cursus honorum. It also explains what kind of education and experience were required to be appointed to this position.
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