In the exceptional Fétis collection, preserved at the Royal Library of Belgium (KBR), two previously unknown organ works by Johann Sebastian Bach have been discovered. These pieces, recently authenticated by the Bach Archive Leipzig, were presented on 17 November during an exceptional concert in the Thomaskirche in Leipzig.
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The conference, co-organised by the IIPC and KBR, the Royal Library of Belgium, will be held […]
Continue reading "The call for proposals for the 2026 Web Archiving Conference (WAC) is now open"
KBR preserves 279 manuscripts from the prestigious Library of the Dukes of Burgundy. Thanks to an ambitious digitization project, this exceptional collection is now fully available online. Zoom in on the finest details of the most beautiful miniatures and admire art of the highest calibre.
Continue reading "The Library of the Dukes of Burgundy: Centuries-old splendor now digitally accessible"
KBR is part of a broad network connecting all European national libraries. As Belgium’s national scientific library, international collaboration is not only a legal mandate on paper but also a key part of our daily work.
Continue reading "Strengthening Knowledge Exchange: KBR Welcomes Colleagues from the National Library of Latvia"
Our PhD researcher Fien Messens looks back on a year and a half of the Navez Project, the comings and goings of interns, and the reasons why this approach works so well.
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On January 7, 2025, U.S. President-elect Donald Trump announced his intention to issue an executive order […]
Continue reading "The Gulf of Mexico. Today’s politics and yesterday’s maps"
Brett Kostrzewski, postdoctoral researcher at KU Leuven, guides you through the world of late-medieval music manuscripts from the Low Countries.
Continue reading "From one to many voices: the rise of polyphony"
On May 23rd, 2025, the KBR museum reopens its doors with a new musical experience ! […]
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The KBR Museum, the place where the manuscript collection of the Burgundian dukes shines, will reopen its doors on May 23, 2025. Thanks to a unique musical experience, visitors will now be able to enjoy the magical polyphony of the 15th and 16th centuries in the museum.
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150 years ago, in February 1875, the first issue of the Belgian Bibliography was published. To mark this milestone anniversary, we delve into its history, evolution, and future perspectives.
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Thanks to a collaboration with the Zentrum für Ostbelgische Geschichte (ZOG), BelgicaPress has been expanded to include roughly 171,000 pages of newspapers from the German-speaking Community.
Continue reading "The BelgicaPress portal of KBR now includes newspapers from the German-speaking Community."
Nearly a kilometre of scores, archival documents and musical works from the library of the Conservatories will be temporarily added to the KBR collections.
Continue reading "KBR welcomes showpieces from the Royal Conservatories library"
KBR offers you access to Global Newsstream, a complete database of current news from around the world.
Continue reading "Electronic resources: international current events in one click with Global Newsstream"
Delve into the fascinating history of Belgian geological cartography, from the 19th century to the First World War, with original documents from the KBR collection.
Continue reading "Geological journey through the cartographic collections of the KBR: from the 19th century to the First World War"
KBR adds a new drawing by Léon Spilliaert (1881-1946) to its collection. The work was recently […]
Continue reading "Exceptional drawing by Léon Spilliaert entrusted to KBR"
ARTSTOR, the database of photographs and images of artworks from museums around the world, can now be found on JSTOR.
Continue reading "Electronic resources: migration from ARTSTOR to JSTOR"
The past comes alive at the KBR. The cultural and historical heritage we preserve testifies to our history, and gives a picture of what life was like in the past. Several showpieces from our extensive collections are now featured in “Een Geschiedenis van België in honderd voorwerpen” (A History of Belgium in 100 Objects) published by Lannoo.
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Researchers at KBR are inviting you to dive a bit more into the world of Digital Humanities and how KBR uses to reach its mission of making information accessible to all, studying, preserving and promoting its collections.
Continue reading "How and why does KBR work with Digital Humanities? 5 projects to know more"
By 2027, more than 4 million pages will have been digitised. As a result, the current offering in BELGICA PRESS will double, and be systematically extended to the period 1951-1989.
Continue reading "KBR launches new and major project to digitise Belgian daily press"
A collaboration that will double the supply of works from the KBR collections accessible online by 2026.
Continue reading "KBR and Google Books formalize their partnership and will digitize more than 100,000 books in three years"
Eugène Ysaÿe’s somewhat forgotten score for the ‘Ouverture sur des thèmes d’Atala’, dedicated to his deceased brother, was discovered by two employees of the KBR and Bozar purely by coincidence. The score was immediately handed over to the KBR for study and preservation.
Continue reading "Score of “Ouverture sur des thèmes d’Atala” by Eugène Ysaÿe discovered at Bozar and preserved in the KBR"
A look back at the works of authors who died in 1952 and whose work entered the public domain in 2023.
Continue reading "Sound recordings, prints and tickets in the public domain"
Intern Jasmine Vo takes a closer look at the Hans de Winiwarter Fund. Discover an extraordinary collection of more than 1,100 Japanese books, the catalogue of which is now accessible online.
Continue reading "Illustrated Japanese books of the 17th-19th centuries: Hans de Winiwarter Fund catalogue online"KBR highlights the work of the Internet Archive as part of its commitment to Open Access.
Continue reading "Internet Archive: the digital library accessible at KBR"
A few months ahead of the “James Ensor. Inspired by Brussels” exhibition, KBR and the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium (RMFAB) have each acquired a drawing by the artist from Ostend, James Ensor.
Continue reading "KBR and the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium have acquired two of James Ensor’s unpublished drawings"
KBR has been advocating for open access since 2016 and supports and promotes Open Access Week 2023.
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An exceptional acquisition of the KBF and a unique score now preserved and open to the public at the KBR.
Continue reading "Score ‘Poème nocturne’ by Eugène Ysaÿe on loan to the Royal Library of Belgium"
Discover a selection of e-resources before the AIFBD Congress.
Continue reading "Access to information at the heart of development: a selection of e-resources"
The “Histoire des Idées et Critique Littéraire” database is now available at KBR. It features more […]
Continue reading "Introducing a new electronic resource: Histoire des Idées et Critique Littéraire"
We list 10 unusual oddities for you, from toothbrushes to bananas.
Continue reading "Top 10: unusual and bizarre pieces from the KBR collection"
The luxurious “Rijmbijbel” from Brussels is the oldest known illustrated manuscript in Dutch that has been completely preserved. Meet an international masterpiece from the Middle Ages!
Continue reading "The “Rijmbijbel” of Jacob van Maerlant"
Merel Swemle is studying Dutch language and culture at Leiden University. In this blog post, she takes a closer look at a curious book: the collection manuscript of Johannes de Altre.
Continue reading "The manuscript of Johannes de Altre: a varied collection of knowledge"
The name Titus Livius (known in English as Livy) is a well-known one today. But how did the work of this Roman historian end up in the Library of the Burgundian Dukes?
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Exceptionally admire Margaret of Austria’s “Basses Danses” manuscript on 3 and 4 December.
Continue reading "Unseen: a “black” manuscript at the KBR museum"
This month, BelgicaPeriodicals reached a symbolic milestone: more than one million digitised pages of Belgian periodicals […]
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Physicist Arno Keppens consults rare and first editions from works by Copernicus, Kepler and Newton kept at KBR.
Continue reading "The history of physics at your fingertips"