The Massalany Estate Library in the deposits of the Hrodna State Historical and Archeological Museum

Abstract

The Massalany Estate Library of the Bisping family like other private libraries of Hrodna region were lost during the World War II. The history of this library dates back to 1853 when the estate was founded. The library was situated in the Bispings family palace in Massalany and, according to some accounts, had books on predominantly scientific topics most of them in Polish and French. As it transpired, this library survived partially in the Hrodna State Historical and Archeological Museum where it was discovered. For the time being there were identified presumably about 300 volumes bearing the estate library seal „The Library of Massalany Estate” or having other traits of this provenance. On the basis of the properties of these volumes we attempted to reconstruct the structure of the library collection and study its history. The preliminary results of these studies are presented in the article.