European studies blog

Exploring Europe at the British Library

Introduction

Discover the British Library's extensive collections from continental Europe and read news and views on European culture and affairs from our subject experts and occasional guest contributors. Read more

30 January 2025

European Collections: From Antiquity to 1800 – Uncovering Rare Books at the British Library Doctoral Open Days

What do a censored Spanish classic, a mathematics textbook from Tsarist Russia, and the first national education textbook from Poland have in common? They are all part of the British Library’s European Collections, spanning from antiquity to 1800. These fascinating books do more than preserve history – they provide valuable insights into the intellectual, political, and cultural dynamics of their era, offering opportunities for research and discovery.

As part of the Doctoral Open Day on 31 January, we are showcasing a selection of remarkable books. Each tells a unique story – of censorship, of scientific progress, of the development of national identity. Here, we explore some of the fascinating books you may encounter during the Doctoral Open Day.

Poland: Enlightening the Nation

In 1773, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth established the Commission of National Education (Komisja Edukacji Narodowej, KEN), the first state-run educational authority in the world. Its goal was to create a modern, secular education system that was accessible to all social classes, moving away from the traditional church-dominated schooling.

Pages with an introduction to ‘Botanika’ and a folding plate with botanical drawings

Krzysztof Kluk 1739-1796, Paweł Czenpiński, 1755-1793, Botanika dla szkół narodowych, etc. (Dzieło, ... podług Prospektu ... Pawła Czenpinskiego, ... przez ... Krzysztofa Kluka ... napisane; od Towarzystwa do Xiąg Elementarnych roztrząśnione, etc.)., w Warszawie 1785 (Warszawa, 1785) 988.d.29.

A prime example of KEN’s publishing efforts is Botanika dla szkół narodowych (‘Botany for National Schools,’ 1785) by Krzysztof Kluk and Paweł Czenpiński. This textbook was designed to teach practical botany, bringing Enlightenment ideas into the classroom. The book was one of many created by KEN’s Society for Elementary Books, which commissioned mathematics, science, and literature textbooks to standardize education across Poland.

Russia: The First Mathematics Textbook

The first Russian textbook on mathematics by Leonty Magnitsky, Arifmetika (‘Arithmetics’), was written in the early Slavonic language and published in 1703. Its first edition of 2,400 copies was extraordinarily large for that time and served as the primary mathematics text for instruction in Russia until the mid-18th century. The book was in effect an encyclopaedia of the natural sciences of its day. It emphasized the practical applications of mathematics, demonstrating how it could be used in various real-life situations, from laying a brick wall to calculating loan interest. The origins of the manual lie in Peter the Great's establishment of the School of Navigation in Moscow, and the subsequent appointment of Magnitsky at the school's helm.

Pages from ‘Arifmetika’ with an illustration of a brick wall and two cube-shaped objects on one page and mathematical formulas on the other

Leonty Filippovich Magnitsky, Arifmetika (Moskva, 1703) 8531.f.16

Hungary: The First Gold-Painted Book

This is the second work published about Hungarian history, although published outside the country. It tells the story of the Magyars from the earliest times to the 1480s and is illustrated with lavish hand-coloured woodcuts, that have retained their brilliance through the centuries. This Augsburg edition, printed on vellum, is the very first printed book in history known for using gold paint.

Cover of ‘Chronica Hungarorum’ with elaborate gold decorations

Johannes Thuróczy, Chronica Hungarorum (Augsburg, 1488) IB.6663

Romania: A Scholar-Prince’s Masterpiece

Among our most treasured Romanian books is Divanul sau gâlceava înţeleptului cu lumea (‘The Wise Man’s Parley with the World’, 1698), written by Dimitrie Cantemir, a scholar, philosopher, and Prince of Moldavia.

Printed in both Romanian Cyrillic and Greek, this was the first secular book published in Romanian. It discusses morality, philosophy, and the human condition, presenting a dialogue between reason and worldly desires.

The copy comes from the collection of Frederick North, Fifth Earl of Guilford, a noted philhellene and collector of early printed Romanian books. The front cover is in its original binding, made of red goatskin over pasteboard. It features a panel design showcasing the coat of arms of Dimitrie Cantemir, with corner tools incorporating floral motifs and bird designs.

Pages from ‘Divanul sau gâlceava înţeleptului cu lumea’ with an illustration of two figures in religious attire standing under ornate arches

Dimitrie Cantemir, Divanul sau gâlceava înţeleptului cu lumea (Iaşi, 1698) C.118.g.2.

Italy: The Beauty of St Mark’s Basilica

A magnificent and exhaustive work documenting the Basilica of St Mark in Venice, undertaken with the support of John Ruskin, following disputed restoration work to the Basilica's south facade in 1865-75. One of 16 volumes, this volume contains 69 hand-coloured engraved plates that painstakingly represent every detail of the floor of the Basilica. Ferdinando Ongania was a publisher and editor who worked with John Ruskin on a project to document the Basilica of St. Mark in Venice. Ongania also ran an antiquarian bookshop in St. Mark's Square and supplied Ruskin with books.

Page from ‘Dettagli del pavimento ed ornamenti in mosaico della Basilica di San Marco in Venezia’ with an illustration of colorful tiles arranged in a complex geometric pattern

Ferdinando Ongania, La Basilica di San Marco in Venezia. Dettagli del pavimento ed ornamenti in mosaico della Basilica di San Marco in Venezia (Venezia, 1881)  Tab.1282.a./ Tab.1283.a.3.

Spain: Censorship and Forbidden Texts

Censorship was an everyday reality in Habsburg Spain, where the Inquisition closely monitored books. Even seemingly harmless works like Don Quixote were subject to scrutiny.

Our copy of the 1650 edition El Parnasso Español, y Musas Castellanas de D. Francisco de Quevedo Villegas was censored according to the Index of 1707, with passages inked out due to their “disrespectful references to the clergy”. Interestingly, Spanish censors had strict rules against religious criticism but showed little concern for nudity or crude humour.

Lost Books: Replacing What Was Destroyed

During World War II, a German bombing raid on the British Museum (where the British Library was then housed) destroyed many books. One of these was Zeeusche spectator over de boedel en het testament van capitein Willem Credo (‘The Zeeland Spectator on the Estate and Will of Captain Willem Credo’, 1734).

After the war, the British Library painstakingly reconstructed lists of lost books, marking them with a ‘D’ for ‘Destroyed’. Now, decades later, we have finally been able to replace this book and restore it to our collections, removing it from the list of war losses.

Title page of ‘Zeeusche spectator’

Gerard Bacot, Zeeusche spectator over de boedel en het testament van capitein Willem Credo onder toezigt van Gerard Bacot Predikant te Koudekerk en syn vrou Paulina Credo nevens een Journaal of DAg-Lyst van een bedroefde reis naa het vermakelyk Alphen (Amsterdam, 1734)

Why These Collections Matter

These books are not only historical artifacts – they are invaluable resources for research. By preserving both original texts and modern scholarship, the British Library provides a gateway to exploring the past. Whether you’re investigating the development of education, scientific advancements, or literary censorship, our European Collections offer a wealth of material to uncover.

If you’d like to explore these fascinating books and more, visit the British Library and discover Europe’s intellectual heritage, from antiquity to 1800! And if you are a new doctoral student whose research interest is more contemporary, why not join us for our session on Global Languages, Cultures and Societies on 14 February.

27 January 2025

A Balm on so many Wounds: Etty Hillesum’s Diaries 1941-1943


Black and white photograph of Etty Hillesum

Etty Hillesum in 1939 (Image from Wikimedia Commons)

This year to mark Holocaust Memorial Day we have been looking at diaries and other autobiographical documents. As my colleague Olga Topol writes in her blog post, “The diaries of these individuals are not merely archival records; they are powerful reminders of the human capacity for resilience and creativity in the face of adversity.”

One remarkable example of that resilience are the diaries written by Etty Hillesum in Amsterdam. She acknowledges the horrors of the Second World War and the Holocaust, but manages to rise above them and does not let the horror dominate her writings. She records the growing evidence of “the interrupted life” around her. She writes it all down, starting on 9 March 1941 and ending on 10 October 1942 with the wish “One should like to be a balm on many wounds.”

She writes very openly about love, sexuality, about her struggle to find God, to root out hatred, including hate towards Germans. More than anything else she wants to serve others. She gets a job at the Jewish Council helping Jewish citizens navigate the laws imposed on them by the German authorities. When the deportations of Jews to the Westerbork transit camp started, she volunteered to accompany them.

Black and white photograpgh of Dutch Jews carrying cases and bundles

Jewish citizens of Amsterdam obey the order they received in the post to come to the Olympiaplein in Amsterdam South to be transported to Westerbork. Image from an edition of Het Verstoorde Leven: Dagboek van Etty Hillesum, 1941-1943 (Bussum, 1983) Blog post author's own copy

Jewish people were told they were going to work in Germany, so many went. Those who didn’t were either taken from their homes or had to go in hiding. Many people did not have the means to hide, and Etty felt she could not abandon them, so she voluntarily went to Westerbork, out of solidarity.

Black and while aerial photograph of Westerbork Transit camp

Aerial photo of Westerbork Transit Camp, Drenthe, Netherlands taken in March 1945 (Image from Wikimedia Commons)

At Westerbork she worked as a social worker, which allowed her to travel many times between the camp and Amsterdam. She had ample opportunity to go into hiding to save herself, but she refused to do so. Inevitably, on 7 September 1943, Etty and her family, who had arrived in Westerbork a while earlier, were put on a transport to Auschwitz. One of Etty’s friends who saw her off writes in a letter to friends that Etty was “her normal cheerful self, having a word of encouragement and kindness for all she met”. Etty wrote a postcard to another friend and threw it out of the train. It was found by farmers and posted. It says that “they had left the camp singing”. As soon as they arrived in Auschwitz on 10 September, her parents were sent to the gas chambers. On 30 November the Red Cross reported Etty’s death. Her brother Mischa died on 31 March 1944, and her other brother Jaap died on his way back to the Netherlands after having been liberated from Bergen-Belsen.

Before Etty went to Westerbork she gave her diaries to her friend Maria Tuinzing, who passed them on to a writer, Klaas Smelik. He and his daughter Johanna, who transcribed the diaries, started looking for a publisher for them in 1947. No-one wanted to publish them; they were considered “too philosophical”.

It was only in 1981 that the diaries were published in Dutch as Het verstoorde leven (An Interrupted Life). Since then, interest in and research into Etty Hillesum and her work have only grown. There are conferences, books and two museums; one in her birth town of Middelburg which opened in 2020 and one in Deventer. Translations of the diaries into French, Italian, English, German, Danish and Finnish followed.

Photograph of a stack of notebooks containing Etty Hillesum's diaries, with one opened to show her handwriting

Etty Hillesum’s diaries with a page of her handwriting. Reproduced in Judith Koelemeijer, Etty Hillesum: het verhaal van haar leven (Amsterdam, 2022) YF.2023.a.27.

Why not let the diaries speak for themselves?

The sky is full of birds, the purple lupins stand up so regally and peacefully, two little old women have sat down on the box for a chat, the sun is shining on my face — and right before our eyes, mass murder. The whole thing is simply beyond comprehension. (8 June 1943)

And if there were only one good German, then he would be worthy of protection against the whole barbaric gang and because of that one good German one should not pour one’s hatred onto a whole people. (15 March 1941)

And if God does not help me to go on, then I shall have to help God. — The surface of the earth is gradually turning into one great prison camp, and soon there will be nobody left outside. … I don’t fool myself about the real state of affairs, and I’ve even dropped the pretence that I’m out to help others. I shall merely try to help God as best I can, and if I succeed in doing that, then I shall be of use to others as well. But I mustn't have heroic illusions about that either. (11 June 1942)

Despite everything, life is full of beauty and meaning.

Marja Kingma, Curator Germanic Language Collections, specialist Dutch.

References/further reading:

Etty Hillesum, Het verstoorde leven: Dagboek van Etty Hillesum, 1941-1943, 18e druik (Amsterdam, 1986) YA.1988.a.1992 (English Translation by Arnold J. Pomerans, An Interrupted Life: the Diaries and Letters of Etty Hillesum 1941-43 (London, 1999) YC.2004.a.8709.

Etty Hillesum, Drie brieven van den kunstschilder Johannes Baptiste van der Pluym (1843-1912): met twee reproducties, uitgegeven en van een toelichting voorzien door A.C.G. Botterman-v.d. Pluym. (Apeldoorn, 1917 [i.e. Haarlem, 1943]) Cup.406.b.78. (Letters written to David Koning from Westerbork in 1943 and published clandestinely the same year.)

Philippe Noble, ‘De dagboeken en brieven van Etty Hillesum in Franse vertaling: Het dubbele filter’ In: Filter: tijdschrift over vertalen, Vol. 9, nr 3 (2002) pp. 37-48. YF.2007.a.229

Oord, Gerrit van, ‘Het dagboek van Etty Hillesum in Italië’ (Nijmegen, 2002) In: Filter: tijdschrift over vertalen, Vol. 9, nr 3 (2002) pp. 49-56.

Veel mooie woorden: Etty Hillesum en haar boekje Levenskunst,edited by Ria van den Brandt and Peter Nissen (Hilversum, 2017) YF.2018.a.20211.

Spirituality in the Writings of Etty Hillesum: Proceedings of the Etty Hillesum Conference at Ghent University, November 2008, edited by Klaas A.D. Smelik et al. (Leiden, 2010). Supplements to The Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy, vol. 11. YD.2012.a.877.

Klaas A.D. Smelik, Reading Etty Hillesum in Context: Writings, Life, and Influences of a Visionary author (Amsterdam, 2018) YD.2018.a.3834

The Lasting Significance of Etty Hillesum’s Writings: Proceedings of the Third International Etty Hillesum Conference at Middelburg, September 2018, edited by Klaas A.D. Smelik (Amsterdam, 2019) YD.2021.a.1416. Also available online free of charge.

Etty: de nagelaten geschriften van Etty Hillesum, 1941-1943, edited by Klaas A.D. Smelik, Gideon Lodders, Rob Tempelaars. 2nd ed. (Amsterdam, 1987) YA.1989.a.8106.

24 January 2025

Beyond Traditional Monuments: Commemorating the Lost Jewish Community of Kaunas

For centuries Lithuania was an important spiritual and cultural centre of Jewish life. The biggest Jewish communities were in Vilnius (‘Jerusalem of the North’) and Kaunas, the second biggest city in Lithuania. Before the Nazi invasion in June 1941, around 240,000 Jews lived in Lithuania; only several thousand – around 5% – survived the Holocaust.

In the interwar period Kaunas, a temporary capital of Lithuania, had a flourishing, vibrant and dynamic Jewish community. At one point a third of the inhabitants of Kaunas – 33,000 people – were Jewish. The city had around 40 synagogues and prayer houses, including the Slobodka yeshiva, one of the largest and best known yeshivas in Europe.

Painting of the Old Synagogue in Kaunas

Gerardas Bagdonavičius, The Old Synagogue in the Old Town, 1930. Reproduced in Aliza Cohen-Mushlin, Synagogues in Lithuania: a catalogue (Vilnius, 2010). YD.2011.b.2062

The Jewish educational network consisted of numerous Yiddish and Hebrew schools. There was a flourishing artistic and music scene. The city had a Yiddish and a Hebrew theatre, several daily Jewish newspapers, sports clubs and youth organisations. Jewish political organisations were thriving. Social welfare organisations and charitable societies took care of those less fortunate; the Kaunas Jewish Hospital cared for both Jewish and non-Jewish patients. In 1920 the Central Jewish bank was established in Kaunas, leading a network of 85 Jewish banks.

Black and white photograph of a pillar covered in posters advertising cultural events in Lithuanian and Yiddish

Posters advertising cultural events in Lithuanian and Yiddish, image from Hidden history of the Kovno Ghetto, general editor Dennis B. Klein (Boston, 1997). LB.31.c.9499

Black and white photograph of a football match

Football match in the Kaunas Maccabi Stadium between the Kovas Club of Šančiai and the Maccabi Sports Club, April 25, 1926, image from Žydųgyvenimas Kaune iki holokausto (Vilnius, 2021). YF.2023.a.2399

Black and white photograph of the Jewish Central Bank in Kaunas

Central Jewish Bank. Image from Wikimedia Commons

During the Nazi occupation the Kaunas Jewish community was almost completely destroyed. How to commemorate those who perished in such tragic circumstances?

The 11th Kaunas Biennial, which took place in 2017, explored the theme of monuments. What is a monument? Is our understanding of monuments changing? Is there a need for different kinds of commemoration? During the biennial the participating artists created, among others, a number of site-specific performances and installations referencing Kaunas’ Jewish past.

The artist Jenny Kagan, whose parents survived the Kaunas Ghetto, in her installation Murmuration, using a video projection and LED lighting, evoked the memory of the lost Jewish community. A brightly lit up building of a former Hasidic synagogue (the lights followed the rhythm of street lighting) on closer inspection turned out to be empty and derelict. The emptiness of the building is reminiscent of an empty sky from which starlings, known for their murmurations, quickly disappear, their numbers drastically declining.

Colour photograph of an old synagogue at night, lit from within

Murmuration, from Yra ir nėra = There and not there: (im)possibility of a monument (Kaunas, 2018) [awaiting shelfmark]

Colour photograph of a derelict synagogue door with one panel open at the bottom

Paulina Pukytė curated several performances and installations for the 11th Kaunas Biennial. One of them was At Noon in Democrats’ Square. Every day at noon, from 15 October to 30 November 2017, in the Vilijampolė district of Kaunas, a singer stood facing the empty space which once was Demokratų Square. The singer sang two songs in Yiddish: Yankele and My Yiddishe Mame. The performance lasted 7 minutes.

Colour photograph of a woman singing in a city square

At Noon in Democrats’ Square, from Yra ir nėra

Vilijampolė, also known as Slobodka, on the right bank of the Neris River, was the site of the Kaunas Ghetto where thousands of Jews perished during the Holocaust. On 29 October, 1941, the day of the so called ‘Great Action’, around 27,000 Jews were forced to assemble on Demokratų Square. Men, women and children stood there for hours while a selection took place. Those deemed strong enough to work were temporarily saved; the rest, 9,200 of them, were executed the next day in Fort IX, part of the city‘s fortifications turned into a temporary prison.

At Noon at Democrats Square was a commemoration of those who perished as a result of the ‘Great Action’.

Paulina Pukytė, the chief curator of the 11th Kaunas Biennial, is an interdisciplinary artist, writer, curator and critic, and lecturer at the Vilnius Academy of Arts. She will talk about the (im)possibility of monuments at the Holocaust Memorial Day event, held at the British Library on 27th of January.

Ela Kucharska-Beard, Curator Slavonic and East European Collections

References and further reading:

Paulina Pukytė, Kas yra = Something is (Vilnius, 2021) [awaiting shelfmark] 

 Arūnas Bubnys, Kaunas ghetto 1941-1944 (Vilnius, 2014). YD.2016.a.992 

 Martin Winstone, The Holocaust Sites of Europe : an Historical Guide (London, 2015). YC.2016.a.6368 

 Nick Sayers, The Jews of Lithuania: a Journey Through the Long Twentieth Century (London, 2024)