N. Kósa Judit - Szablyár Péter: Underground Buda - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2002)

Library half-sunk underground - the National Széchényi Library

decided that the library would be housed in the building, storerooms and auxiliary rooms had to be arranged. This could be done in the belly of the hill: the two original interior courtyards of the palace were sunk and an eleven- storey steel storage block was raised above each. Some of the existing rooms behind the buttress were also converted into storage facilities, while others were transformed into restorers' workshops or offices. The storeys above and below the entrance opening from the 5th, courtyard, level are connected to one another by lifts and stairwells. The books are conveyed to and from the reading room in a separate tele-lift. Freight is moved via the Csikós Courtyard on the third floor of the complex opening from Palota út.

When it was designed in the sixties, it was believed the library would have sufficient storage facilities for at least half a century. But then the new building was not to be opened before 1985, and the collection also grew faster than expected. By the turn of the millennium, the storage rooms had been filled, and the construction of a new underground store-house became urgent. The southwest corner of the palace was identified as the likeliest location, but difficulties with laying the foundations has prevented the large-scale construction from being started.

■ The itore-roomi of the library below the frontier palace yardi

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