The State Public Historical Library of Russia was founded in 1938 under the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

as the State Public Historical Library of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic or State Public Historical Library.

History

The collection and basis of the State Public Historical Library was the private library of a famous Moscow based collector, Alexander Dmitrievich Chertkov who opened up the first public use library in Russia in 1863. The library contained valuable collections of antique and Russian coins, ancient Russian and Egyptian antiquities, painted Etruscan vases and mirrors, natural science collections of minerals, insects, butterflies and herbaria. The collections of this library also became the basis of the

State Historical Museum The State Historical Museum () of Russia is a museum of History of Russia, Russian history located between Red Square and Manezhnaya Square, Moscow, Manege Square in Moscow. The museum's exhibitions range from relics of prehistoric tribes that li ...

of which it became the library. By March 20, 1938 the museum library had grown and changed significantly so that the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks passed a resolution for the library to merge with the Joint Library of the

Institute of Red Professors The Institute of Red Professors of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) () was an institute of graduate-level education in the Marxist social sciences located in the Orthodox Convent of the Passion, Moscow. History It was founded in February 1 ...

and a number of other small libraries to form the State Public Historical Library of the

Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (Russian SFSR or RSFSR), previously known as the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and the Russian Soviet Republic, and unofficially as Soviet Russia,Declaration of Rights of the labo ...

. The Library's functions were defined: # to act as the central historical library of the Russian Federation # to be a state repository of domestic and foreign historical literature in printed or manuscript form # to serve as a research institute in historical bibliography and library science. By 1970 its collection numbered around 3 million items which included over 30,000 rare historical books. It contained a general reading room and three respective research rooms for the topics of the history of the Soviet Government and the Communist Party, general history, and eastern history. After the

collapse of the Soviet Union The Soviet Union was formally dissolved as a sovereign state and subject of international law on 26 December 1991 by Declaration No. 142-N of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. Declaration No. 142-Н of ...

the library was renamed to the State Public Historical Library of Russia. Despite the collapse the role of the Historical Library remained relatively unchanged continuing acting as a repository and information center for historical materials. It now has over 4 million books in its collections in over 65 languages.

References

{{reflist Libraries in Moscow Libraries established in the 1930s