Matskási István (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 94. (Budapest 2002)

Matskási, I.: Bicentenary of the Hungarian Natural History Museum

Library When the Camera Naturae et Artis Productorum was established in 1810, it counted a few volumes only. It was FERENC SZÉCHÉNYI who donated these volumes. The foundations of the specialised scientific library were laid down in 1870, with the formation of independent Departments. Mainly donations enriched the holdings of specialised departments. In the course of its history the botanical books and journals bequeathed by Archbishop LAJOS HAYNALD (1891) involved the most ample contribution to the library. The acquisition of ÁRPÁD DEGEN's offprint collection and KÁROLY GOTTHARD's, the landowner of Herény, classical botanical book collection in 1938 further enhanced the value of the book stock. World War II caused a considerable loss to both the book and journal stocks. Besides planned enrichment the library benefited from additional donations. The most remarkable among them was the collection of thousands and thousands of books and journals originating from the libraries of the Hungarian Adriatic Society and the Royal Hungarian Natural History Society after these two institutions had been terminated. Zoological and geographical volumes coming from nationalised church and noblemen's libraries also added to the stock. The fire of 1956 caused a severe trauma in the life of the library as well. Reference libraries of burned out collections were partly or - such as the extremely valuable libraries of the Department of Mineralogy and Petrology and the Department of Geology and Palaeontology - completely devastated. By losing its literature on ornithology and molluscs, and not to a lesser extent, the offprint collection of unparalleled value, the Department of Zoology suffered an irrecoverable loss. Seventy thousand volumes vanished altogether. Quite a few decades passed before at least the most important basic works could be procured again. In the 1970s and 1980s the enrichment of the stock lost momentum and often, due to the lack of funds, became haphazard. The successful bids of the past few years have triggered the build-up of the database of the holdings. Every new document has been processed electronically since 1991. Exchanging publications with partner institutions involves another major source of enrichment. This exchange is based on publications museums have issued. By its inherent nature, the library is a national research library. Within the scope of natural sciences it specialises in collecting mineralogical, palaeonto-