SHARRYLAND
Ancient Library of the Bishop's Seminary of Padua
In search of the Cardinal's forbidden books
Where is
What it is and where it is
There is a hidden place in the Major Seminary of Padua. From the outside it looks like a normal building, but upon entering, a cloister isolates us in a world of its own, shrouded in its own silence. It is the grand ancient staircase that takes us to the upper floors, and here, holed up in the belly of the building, we find the Library. Ancient bookshelves, secret passages, books from hundreds of years ago and no, not all devoted to the topics we might expect in an Episcopal Seminary.
Why it is special
Between the 18th and 19th centuries, the Major Seminary was one of Padua's scientific forges. A place that could serve as a monument to the difficult coexistence of Science and Faith, and to the intense relationship that, like it or not, exists between the two. Despite its proximity to the Basilica of St. Anthony, the Seminary library has collected, guarded, studied and even reproduced in its typography, books indigestible to the Church, such as the Encyclopédie and the Koran. Forbidden books, such as the Dialogo sopra i due massimi sistemi, with handwritten notes by Galileo Galilei, which had been placed on the Index as early as 1633.
Not to be missed
When science became part of this library, books acquired new companions. Thus it is that in the different rooms we also find an archaeological collection, documents by Giovanni Antonio Rizzi Zannoni, one of the greatest Italian cartographers of the modern age, a celestial globe and a terrestrial globe from the 18th century, and much more! Another example? An autograph Letter of Francesco Petrarch from 1370. Room after room, there is always a treasure to be discovered.
A bit of history
The seminary was established after the conclusion of the Council of Trent (1563), and in 1670 it was transferred by Cardinal Gregorio Barbarigo to its present location, where it is still the place where future priests of the diocese of Padua are trained. It was he who wanted the library we are now admiring, equipped it with an in-house printing press, and routed it toward what were his great passions beyond theology: the sciences and mathematics. One of the last gifts he made to the collection in this regard was precisely the Dialogo sopra i due massimi sistemi, which the Cardinal bequeathed to the Seminary.
Curiosities
As eager as the eyes are to explore every nook and cranny of the Ancient Section, sooner or later one has to get out and back into the world. Not too quickly though. To do so, one passes through the Theological Faculty's Modern Library, which mixes a more current environment with less ancient but still lived-in books.
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