Belarus, National Library. Libraries of Belarus

The new building of the National Library of Belarus is so beautiful, original and unique that it rightly serves as the visiting card of the country. This book depository can be proud of any capital of the world - the richest funds are combined not only with the one-of-a-kind design and unusual architecture of the building that the Republic of Belarus built. The National Library is a multifunctional specialized scientific center that meets the latest word of science and technology in this field.

The first library

In the tsarist province there was no national library at all, and although the republic continued to be formed until 1926, the first national library of the Republic of Belarus was created already in 1922 at the State University, which was first called the "Belarusian State and University Library" (the republic itself had the abbreviation of the BSSR) . The initial fund was 60 thousand volumes. But it was quickly replenished with the efforts of the whole country and private libraries.

The first room

The history of the National Library of Belarus began in the Jubilee House, a building built in 1913 to mark the 300th anniversary of the Romanovs' house, where the Church Archaeological Museum was formerly located as part of the bishop's courtyard. This building was erected in a retrospective-Russian style, which is rare for the city. It should be noted that the main library of the republic has always been located in original notable buildings.

In 1926, the storage fund grew to 300,000, and the number of readers increased five-fold. The library becomes an independent institution, and for its needs decide to build a special building, which also entered the history of the republic by its uniqueness, originality and purposeful purpose - the library becomes the center of not only scientific thought but also cultural and national construction.

Specially constructed building

From the presented works the project of George Lavrov was chosen. He proposed a completely new building for Minsk, in which he wanted to translate the mathematical coordinate system - to emphasize the contrast between the length of the reading rooms and the height of the book depository located in the depths. The main building was ready for the 10th anniversary of the republic - it received readers in 1932. The project was so good that even in our time in the restored architectural monument of the era of constructivism, which remains very little, especially in Belarus, the Council of the Republic of National Education is located.

Funds are growing

Great attention was paid to the main book depository of the republic by Belarus. By 1941 the National Library had in its storehouses about 2 million copies of books. The heavier was the loss - Belarus lost about 83% of the funds. Priceless old manuscripts and scrolls were stolen, much burned down with the building. But already in 1943, with the joint efforts of the country, the funds of the Belarusian library began to recover. By the mid-1950s, the building of George Lavrov ceased to cope with the influx of readers. But only in 1989 a competition of projects for a new building was held.

The National Library of Belarus

After the "parade of sovereignties" of the BSSR, the Republic of Belarus officially became known. The National Library could and should become the hallmark of a renovated country. By the "building of the century" came more than seriously (in the construction was involved 5000 people and 200 organizations), although the country had enough other problems. To implement the project of architects Victor Kramarenko and Mikhail Vinogradov, who won back in 1989, started only in 2002. They worked with great enthusiasm, because the project "Belarusian Diamond", symbolizing its form of pricelessness, wealth and inexhaustible knowledge, won everyone over.

Unique project

Everybody was fascinated by the super modern design of the building, the central building of which is a complex geometric figure - the rhombo-cuboctahedron, and its faces are represented by 18 squares and 8 triangles. This extraordinary structure is covered with a reflecting mirror glass, put on a stylobate, a kind of stand-podium. Construction was going on at a rapid pace - worked around the clock, and often at the construction site was up to 3,000 people at a time. The building, whose opening with a grandiose, completely justified pomp, with the participation of the president, was held on June 16, 2006, justified all costs, satisfied all ambitions. This is a masterpiece that the whole of Belarus is proud of. The National Library is not only unusually beautiful, it is one of the few modern world book depositories that are simultaneously a research, information, socio-political and socio-cultural center.

National Library - national symbol

The sculpture of Francis Skaryna, the Belarusian printer, rises in the foreground, in front of the main entrance, made in the form of an open book. It depicts stories on the development of writing, the utterance of Francis Skaryna himself about man's striving for perfection, to the likeness of God, translated into 19 languages of the world. The best artists and sculptors of the republic worked on the design of the central entrance. The whole complex is located in the central park of the capital. The National Library of Belarus (photo attached) is a real diamond. Of modern, the same unusual, but beautiful buildings immediately at the memory comes only the Opera House in Sydney. You look, and the spirit captures.

Some sizes of amazing structure

The structure and size of the library is spoken by such data - 20 reading rooms give an opportunity to learn 2000 people at the same time. In addition, they have 1500 automated workstations designed to work with the electronic catalog. The storage facility is designed for 14 million copies, and the total area of the entire library is 113,669 square meters. M. The figure is impressive and without comparison with the area of the entire Vatican, the fourth part of which it is equal. The library is a national treasure of the republic, for the purpose of popularizing knowledge, excursions are constantly made here.

Belarusian Diamond today

"The diamond of knowledge," is also called the library of Minsk, today it has about 9 million copies of books, manuscripts, micro-copies of documents in 80 languages. And although everything that was exported by the invaders has not yet returned to the depository funds (the search is ongoing, at all levels), the catalog of rare manuscripts, old printed books, ancient unique publications is more than 70,000 copies. Only newspapers here contain 4.7 thousand names, and magazines and other periodicals - 3 million copies. All this is on the 10 storeys floors. From a huge fund of about 500,000 units is freely available - reading rooms and subscription.

In special places equipped with modern equipment it is possible to access digital storages. The Electronic Library of Belarus has a catalog, which is the main information retrieval system of the entire national book depository. Replenishments are constantly, in regular mode.

Other Libraries

In addition to the "Diamond of Knowledge", there are other book depositories in the country. Large libraries of Belarus are represented primarily by the repository of the State Technological and Agrarian Technical Universities. Very large funds are owned by the Belarusian Public Association and the book depository of the Belarusian State University. The Presidential Library of the Republic of Belarus, which has existed for about 80 years, is very large. With every major university there is also a decent book depository.