By the end of Catherine the Great’s reign, as a result of her passion for book collecting, dedicated palace rooms could no longer accommodate the numerous collections of books. Coupled with the ingrained Enlightenment ideas, these evergrowing collections became the reason to found the Public Library in 1795.

Opened in the early nineteenth century, the Imperial Public Library served both as a book repository and a museum, intended to receive rare books from the entire empire, as ruled by the reigning emperors. In 1861–1862 a decree issued by Alexander II moved the bulk of books from the Hermitage collection to the Public Library, finalising the development of the Imperial Hermitage as a museum of fine arts and of the Public Library as the foremost repository for books in the capital.

With 150 items on display, the exhibition is to present rare and most valuable publications from the Hermitage and the Public Library holdings, Western European and Russian manuscripts, books from Voltaire’s and Diderot’s libraries as well as collections of Pyotr Dubrovsky, Pyotr Frolov and Mikhail Pogodin.

This exhibition is organised by the State Hermitage Museum and the National Library of Russia.