France
France
Formal Name:
Bibliotheque nationale de France (BNF) - National Library of France
Name of Librarian: Jean Pierre Angreny
Address:
Quai Francois Mauriac, 75706 Paris
Phone: 0153795379 Fax: 014707734
History & Collections
The Bibliotheque Nationale is an outgrowth of the Royal Library, which dates back to the reign of Charles V (1364-80). Appreciating the manuscript treasures he inherited from his royal ancestors, he put them in the Louvre and appointed a scholar, Gilles Malet, to catalogue them; the first catalogue of the Bibliotheque Nationale is a manuscript dated 1380. The library was dispersed. but was enthusiastically rebuilt by Francis I (reigned 1515-17), who, with the help of his ambassadors (notably in Germany, Venice, and the Middle East), bought numerous manuscripts. He housed them in Blois, then in Fontainebleau, and named Guillaume Bude Maitre de la Librarie du Roy ("Master of the King's Library"). The King's Library comprised around 2,000 volumes; only 300 were printed books.
Bude's successors continued to buy collections, to receive gifts (for
example, that of Gaston de France, duc d'Orleans [1608-1660]), and to seize
private libraries, among them the libraries of Nicolas Fouquet (finance
minister of Louis XIV, imprisoned for embezzlement). La Valliere (a mistress
of Louis XIV who fell into disfavor), and of the Jesuits, who
were the object of frequent attacks in France. Nicolas Clement drew up
a classification scheme in 1684 that is still in use today. Jean-Paul Bignon
separated the collection into five departments in 1720: Manuscripts, Printed
Books, Titles and Genealogy. Prints, and Coins. He also opened the King's
Library to the public. The library found a permanent home on
the Rue de
Richelieu in 1743. Bignon published its first catalogue in 1739.
The King's Library possessed 300,000 volumes in 1789. The revolutionary government renamed it the Bibliotheque Nationale. Major improvements in the building and its reading room were made from 1856 to 1868 by the architect Henri Labrouste. A new building in the Rue Vivienne, almost 190,000 sq. ft. of office space, opened in 1985.
The Library is funded through the Ministry of Culture. It also relies on gifts, legacies, and the sale of documents. In 1991 the budget amounted to 334,000,000 French francs, of which 25,000,000 francs were for acquisitions. The staff comprised 1,245 persons, 235 of them professional librarians (conservateurs), 232 assistant librarians, and 394 stack attendants.
Sources:
World guide to libraries. New York: Saur, 1998.
World encyclopedia of library and information services. 3rd ed.
Chicago: American Library Association,c1993.