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The
National Library of Naples
 A national
library in Italy is one designated by the government
as one that contains items of importance to the entire
nation in a vast array of disciples—science,
literature, art, music, history, theater,etc. They are
not public lending libraries, an institution that
still has not taken much hold in Naples (but see "Community Libraries").
Before
the
unification
of Italy, each state on the peninsula, obviously, had
its own libraries. After unification, Florence was
designated as the first city in Italy to hold a
national library; then, when Rome was added to the
national patchwork in 1871, it, too, had a national
library. Today, many Italian large cities have
something called a national library. The one in
Naples, in quantitative terms, is the third largest in
Italy (after Rome and Florence) and is one of the 3705
libraries in Italy currently hooked into SBN (Servizio bibliotecario
nazionale), the nationwide library catalogue
data base.
The National library is housed in the large east wing
of the Royal Palace in Naples (the photo, above, is of
the southern façade, facing the sea). The
entrance is not obvious; that is, both gates (one of
which is the Russian
Horses gate) to the large gardens on the east
side of the San Carlo opera have been closed for
years. Entrance is from Piazza Trieste e Trento (aka
San Ferdinando) from the side of the main west wing of
the palace, at which point you wander back through the
grounds until you find the entrance to the library. As
strange as it seems, it works better that way. You
don’t want tourists and other ne'er-do-wells flooding
through the gardens while you are trying to read.
The origins of the National Library are in the late
18th century, when the Bourbons
ruled the kingdom of Naples. The book collection in
the royal palace of Capodimonte
was moved to the old university building (the site of
today’s archaeological museum.
The nucleus of that collection was the Farnese book
collection, property of Charles III, the first Bourbon
ruler of Naples. The library was opened by Ferdinand
IV in 1804 as the Royal Library of Naples. During the
subsequent nine years of Bourbon absence
and—importantly—anti-clerical French presence under Murat, the collection was
augmented enormously as monasteries throughout the
kingdom shut down; a thousand years of manuscripts and
books held in monasteries throughout the south became
property of the state. That situation was repeated
throughout Italy after the unification of the nation
in 1861 under the anti-clerical Italian government.
("Anti-clerical" doesn’t mean that most Italians were
not good Catholics; in this context, the terms refers
to the age-old power struggle between the nation and
the “temporal power” of the Roman Catholic Church. See
this entry on The Papal
States.)
 Various
private collections and important archaeological finds
such as the scrolls of the Herculaneum
papyri found their way into the Naples library
such that the old university building was too small to
contain everything. Except for the dilapidated and
never-finished old Royal
Poor House, the only single building in Naples
that could house it all (and it really doesn’t, since
some collections are still dispersed at other
locations in the city) was the Royal
Palace. Benedetto Croce
was instrumental in getting the city to move the
library to that location in the 1920s. (The library is
in the east wing, itself a Bourbon extension from the
late 1700s. The older west part of the palace contains
an art museum and a series of royal apartments.)
Both WWII and the 1980 earthquake damaged the library.
(The damage included a particularly mindless episode
of cultural vandalism on the part of retreating German
forces in 1943—they decided to burn as many books as they
could before leaving; see this entry on the National Archives.) The
library has come back and since 1990 is part of the
above-mentioned SBN. The library hosts cultural
activities, seminars, lectures, and even an
American-literature discussion group. Besides the
obvious cultural “biggies” such as the Herculaneum
papyri, there is a significant collection of material
relevant to the history of southern Italy; as well,
there are important collections at secondary branches
in other parts of town. There is also the usual, large
selection of old journals and newspapers and a
workshop/laboratory for the preservation and
restoration of books. The Italian Ministry for Culture
lists the holdings of the Naples library as
1,480,747 printed volumes; 319,187 pamphlets; 18,415
manuscripts; over 8,000 periodicals; 4,500 incunabula
(i.e. printed material from before 1500); and the 1,800
Herculaneum papyri.
The National Library, like any institution housed on ad hoc premises
(they weren’t meant to be a library and don’t look
like one) can be confusing. You really can get lost.
You don’t wander in and just browse since the shelves
are not open for you to simply take stuff down and
read. It’s not that kind of a library; you should know
what you want and have armed yourself via the internet
with the appropriate reference numbers or you will go
blind trying to decipher old hand-written index cards
in the catalogues. There are pleasant exceptions. I
was looking for something on the dynastic change when
Murat left Naples and the Bourbons returned in 1815. I
thought there might be something in the Giornale delle Due
Sicilie from that year. I also thought that
it would be impossible to find, or at least impossible
to consult even if I found it. I was directed to the
Lucchesi Palli collection, upstairs; this meant two
right turns, a trip to the wrong floor in the ad hoc
elevator, then back down to the basement, where I
actually wandered into book stacks and got lost (it
was lonely...I could have been murdered by the Phantom
of the Library at any time and people would still be
wondering what had happened to me...), then back up
and out onto a long balcony and back in at the other
end, thus by-passing a blocked door. I finally found
the room. While I was standing there waiting for
someone to help me, I glanced on the shelves and saw
the volumes of the Giornale
delle Due Sicilie. I found the one I wanted,
pulled it out, sat down and started to read. (The
results are here in the entry on
Murat.) That’s all there was to it. There can't
be more than a dozen or so complete bound copies of
that Bourbon journal in existence, and I had walked in
and pulled one from the shelf, no questions asked.
(So, after I finished tearing out the pages I
wanted... you see, you have to sneeze every time you
rip a page in order to cover the sound...no, please,
that's a joke...don't write me...)
The
personnel
has always been helpful to me, the more so the
stranger the request. They take pride in meeting
perverse requests, even when I asked for information
on via Toledo di
notte, a musical drama by Raffaele Viviani from 1918.
I had no catalogue number—nothing. Just, "What
have you got?" The kind lady could have told me
to take a hike over to the music conservatory.
Instead, Kind Lady disappeared and—just when I had
convinced myself that she had gone done to readjust
the intruder alert—reappeared with the original (!)
conductor's score of the musical. Handwritten. The
only copy. "Here," she said. "This?"
Yeah, I thought.
That'll do.
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