Notizie sopra l’origine ed avanzi della Biblioteca della Sagra Religione Gerosolimitana: an unknown work by Agius de Soldanis

Abstract

The study discusses the process of the setting up and expansion of Malta’s first public library during the second half of the eighteenth century, in the light of the newly-discovered description of the establishment and functioning of the library written by its first librarian, Giovanni Pietro Francesco Agius de Soldanis (1763-1770). The presence of the Order of St John on the island resulted in the library acquiring a considerable and impressive collection of books covering a wide variety of subjects. The de Soldanis description sheds new light upon such aspects as the presence of prohibited literature in the library and its role in disseminating literature through the selling of second copies. As in the case with many eighteenth-century libraries, it also amassed and exhibited an artifact collection, which was to form the nucleus of Malta’s museum, set up as a separate institution in 1903.