User:Waysider1925/Drafts 6

Draft for Biblioteca Marciana

This article is about the library in Venice of which the nucleus is the collection of books first left to the Republic of Venice by Cardinal Bessarion in 1468 and which exists today as one of the major libraries of Italy. It also relates to the buildings in which the library has been held from time to time and in particular the renaissance building fronting on the Piazzetta in Venice which was designed by Jacopo Sansovino and built between 1537 and 1588.

Scope of the article

The Italian word Biblioteca (like Library in English) means (1) a collection of books and (2) the building or the room or rooms in which such a collection is held and (3) the organisation which holds and arranges the books and administers the collection. Biblioteca Marciana (the Library of St Marks) bears all of these meanings at different times. The confusion is increased by the fact that the same title is also used for the building (often called the Libreria Sansoviniano), which was erected in order to house the books but now only holds a small part of them, and to add to the confusion, in modern Italian, libreria normally means a bookshop rather than a library.

The article is divided into three main sections:

• Biblioteca Marciana: the books and the buildings

This deals with the legacy and the history of the collection and the various buildings where it has been housed.

• Libreria Sansoviniano: the renaissance building

This deals with Sansovino's building in the Piazzetta.

• Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana: the library today

This describes the present position.