Gallery
Photo credits: AA. VV.
The Palatine Library (formerly known as the Royal Parmense Library, the National Library, the Bibliothèque Imperiale, the Bibliothèque de la Ville de Parme, the Ducal Library) came into being on the 1st August 1761 when the then Duke, Don Filippo di Borbone, Duke of Parma, Piacenza and Guastalla nominated the Theatine monk from Turin, Paolo Maria Paciaudi, as “Antiquities superintendant and Librarian”. The decree nominating Paciaudi manifested the political will to endow the Duchy with a library which would benefit and be used by the public following the ambitious and enlightened project promoted by the highly cultured French Prime Minister of Parma, Guillaume Du Tillot.
The intention was to establish a library which would serve for instruction in every branch of learning in a territorial area where culture was in great decline. Such an institution had to be created from scratch as the corpus of the previous Farnese library together with the Archives and all artistic treasures had been transferred to Naples in 1736 by Don Carlos di Borbone, elder brother of the present Duke.
History
The XVIII Century. Paolo Maria Paciaudi and the establishment of the library
Paolo Maria Paciaudi arrived in Parma in 1762 after lengthy journeys in France where he met politicians, courtiers and intellectuals, and where he visited libraries and examined how they were organized. An attempt to purchase the already established collection belonging to Cardinal Domenico Passionei in Rome and the less substantial one of the Pertusati family in Milan did not succeed but Paciaudi obtained thousands of books through editorial and antiquarian catalogues and his erudite bibliographical knowledge was enhanced by the exchange of news with his vast circle of friends, over 1000 correspondents throughout Italy and Europe.
He organized the series of books acquired according to subject, dividing them into 6 principal categories: “Theology, Nomology, Philosophy, History, Philology and the liberal and mechanical Arts”. The volumes were placed on neo-classical wooden shelving designed by the French architect E. A. Petitot in the ‘Petitot Gallery’, the long gallery within the Pilotta Palace complex. Paciaudi drew up the Catalogue of Possessions, introducing for the first time in Italy an exciting innovation for the time, as the catalogue was no longer written up in ledgers but on moveable file cards which contained, as well as the name of the author, the title and typographical information, also bibliographical information about the author and the value of the content of the edition. He also added indications as to the physical location of the volume and its logical position within the scheme of knowledge.
Particular care was reserved for manuscripts for which he prepared learned prefaces, often bound with the codex itself, particularly the prized printed editions for which, with the true bibliophile’s taste, he demanded rich, gilded decoration on carefully selected hides. For the special libros “Bibliotheca Regia Parmensis” he required the three Bourbon lilies to be gilded on the cover. For the binding needs of the Library and the printing works run by his friend Giambattista Bodoni, Paciaudi invited the Frenchman Louis Antoine Laferté to court. This craftsman was a master book binder, who also produced xylographic and marbled paper.
The Parma Library, which enjoyed printing rights from 1768, was officially inaugurated in May 1769 in the presence of Joseph II, Emperor of Austria, brother-in-law of Don Ferdinando Borbone who had succeeded his father to the Ducal throne in 1765. The fall of Du Tillot in 1771 involved Paciaudi as well in so far as the atmosphere at court had become extremely hostile to the monk and he asked to be relieved of his duties. His successor for a few years was the Benedictine monk Father Andrea Mazza, until in 1778 Paciaudi was recalled and re-instated in his former role where he remained until his death in 1785. The next director of the Library was the Parma local, Ireneo Affò. Under his guidance, in 1791 the Library expanded into the Gallery of the Incoronata communicating with the Petitot gallery and decorated by Drugman in a more severe style.
Affò died in 1797 and was succeeded by the former Jesuit, Matteo Luigi Canonici who had little impact on the development of the Library as he was more involved with his own collections of manuscripts and rarities.
