The current embodiment of the Archivio Storico Civico e Biblioteca Trivulziana is the result of the acquisition by the City of Milan of the Trivulzio collection in 1935 and the decision to incorporate it into the pre-existing civic archive in the rooms surrounding the Rocchetta Courtyard of the Sforza Castle. From that moment the two collections, whose genesis and development were completely unconnected, became inextricably linked.
Although depleted by the bombings of August 1943, the Historic Civic Archive still holds a sizeable collection of documents of the City of Milan from 1385 until 1927.
The Biblioteca Trivulziana started out as the private collection of one of the most important patrician families in Milan, which collected manuscripts and printed books of immense value from the second half of the fifteenth century through to the early twentieth. The Trivulziana’s most antique codex dates back to the 8th century (Codex Trivulzianus 688) while the library’s most famous possession is the autographed notebook of Leonardo da Vinci (Codex Trivulzianus 2162). Particularly noteworthy is also a collection of manuscripts comprising Dante’s texts, including a codex of the Divine Comedy dating to 1337 (Codex Trivulzianus 1080) and a precious 14th century manuscript of the De Vulgari Eloquentia (Codex Trivulzianus 1088), while among the incunabula there is a complete collection of the 15th century editions of Dante’s Divine Comedy.
In 1978 a restoration workshop for antique books, documents and bindings was created within the Archivio Storico Civico e Biblioteca Trivulziana allowing for timely and professional conservation interventions as well as systematic cycles of restorations guaranteeing the integrity of the archive and library.