Departments Library
The library of the Zagreb City Museum was founded in 1926, as a professional library for the use of the institution. Because of the character of the library, its purchasing policy was directed towards collecting literature in the region of general national history, the history of culture, the history of art and artistic craft, and any works the subject of which was the city of Zagreb.
The stocks are procured by purchase and exchange, and a certain number of books have been obtained by donations from family bequests to the museum.
Today, the specialised library of the Zagreb City Museum has about 11,000 titles. Most of the stock is made up of monographic publications, but there is also a substantial periodical collection, while the newspaper library is the least well-stocked; however, apart from having complete years of certain papers (Vjesnik, Narodni list, Večernji list), it is complemented by cuttings from the city papers. There is also a reference section with encyclopaedias, dictionaries, lexicons, bibliographies and specialised manuals (biographical dictionaries and so on).
The library has a very large number of works about Zagreb, and the local collection (Zagrabiensia) is very important. Here are the works: Historical Memorials of Ivan Krstitelj Tkalčić, the Yugoslav Academy of Sciences and Arts editions from the areas of history, culture and art, political literature dealing with Zagreb topics from the very beginnings until the end of the 19th century, and somewhat older works from the 17th and 18th centuries (B. Krčelić, Historiarum cathedralis ecclesiae zagrabiensis, the Cithara octochorda, Jambrešić’s Lexicon latinum and Belostenec’s Gazophylacium).
There is an important collection of calendars from the end of the 19th century until modern times, reports from the city council, from various associations, institutes, a collection of various regulations, statutes and charters, albums and catalogues of various Zagreb art and other exhibitions, guides and maps of the city and so on. As well as works that deal with different branches of the life and development of Zagreb, the local collection is complemented by literary works the topic of which is the life of the city by Marija Jurić Zagorka, Katedralis, Zvonimir Milčec, and the works of our Zagreb writers August Šenoa, A. G. Matoš and others.
The arrangement and cataloguing of the stocks was automated using the MEDVEŠČAK programme at the beginning of 1999 according to international standards. The library has one qualified staff member, the Librarian.
The library is open to the public on Thursday from 10 to 12, and the material is for reference in the reading room only, i.e., it cannot be lent outside the museum. (Slobodanka Radovčić)
Library head: Milena Bušić
mbusic@mgz.hr