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The National Central Library of Rome, in collaboration with CERL – Consortium of European Research Libraries, and with the generous support of the Polonsky Foundation, is coordinating an ambitious project of digitisation and cataloguing of the incunabula of the monastic libraries of the ‘National Monuments’.

These libraries in Italy are attached to abbeys and monasteries of great age and historical relevance. They preserve very rare material and are often geographically difficult to access.

Right: Hieronymus, Epistolae {c. 1470].
Left: Francesco Zabarella, Lectura eximii doctoris domini Francisci Zabarelle super Clementinis …
(Impressa Rome : per venerabilem uirum magistrum Georium Laur de herbipoli, 1477
Holding institution: Biblioteca Statale Del Monumento Di Santa Scolastica

The library of the Benedictine monastery of Santa Scolastica was singled out as the first such collection to be included in the project since it was here in the period between 1464 and 1467 that two German printers, Conrad Sweynheym and Arnold Pannartz, introduced the Ars artificialiter scribendi to Italy and produced what were the first Italian incunabula.

The website of the project is now online, and it features a wealth of digital and textual content, blogs, and the entire incunable collection of Santa Scolastica (and some more materials) available at the click of a mouse!

Left: Guillaume Durand, Incipit rationale diuinorum officiorum editum per … Guilielmum duranti dei & apostolice fedis gracia presulem Mimaten. qui composuit speculum iuris & patrum pontificale (Impressum rome : per uenerabilem uirum magistrum Georgium laur de herpipoli, 1477 xvi mensis octobris)
Right: Gratia nus, Diuinus decretorum codex (Impressus Uenetijs : impendio ac liberalitate Johannis Colonie agrippinensis Johannisque Manthen Gheretzen, 1479). Holding institution: Biblioteca Statale Del Monumento Di Santa Scolastica

Highlights include:

All 206 incunables digitised, and described in MEI, TEXT-inc, 15cILLUSTRATION, and SBN-Libro Antico

Lactantius, Lucius Caecilius Firmianus, De diuinis institutionibus aduersus gentes libri septem, (In uenerabili monasterio Sublacensi : [Conradus Sweynheym & Arnoldus Pannartz], 1465
Holding institution: Biblioteca Statale Del Monumento Di Santa Scolastica