Libraries, books, people. Prints with the provenance of Żagań monastery library in the collection of University Library in Zielona Góra

Abstract

The introduction of the article provides a description of the range of special collections gathered in the University Library in Zielona Góra. The range consists of old prints, 19th ­century books, primers in various languages, artistic books, old maps, bibliophile prints and valuable iconog­raphy. The special collections consist of over 22,000 items. The most valuable resources contain old prints – the texts published before the end of 1800 containing various marks of ownership (provenance index numbers of non­existent private, noble, school and monastery (library) book collections). The subject of a further description in this paper is the history of the non­existent monastery library of St. Augustine’s Canons Regular in Żagań, Lower Silesia in the context of the monastery libraries in Melk and Sankt Florian, Austria. The University Library in Zielona Góra possesses in its special col­lections three old prints from the old resources of St. Augustine’s library in Żagań. Their editorial and content values are analysed in the further part of the paper. The prints prove that despite political and religious changes, Żagań remained a bastion of Catholicism in Lower Silesia until the St. Augustine’s Canons Regular monastery annulment in 1810.