Library Stuff

“The Vatican has been going high-tech lately, and its next step is digitizing the entire Apostolic Library — all 40 million pages of it. The project will take nine years and be made possible by a 2.8 petabyte storage donation from EMC, a company that specializes in information security and data storage. The library holds nearly 90,000 documents, including rare pieces like the Gutenberg Bible, one of the first Western books printed on moveable type.”

via The Verge

AP – “The Vatican will display 100 select documents from its Secret Archives at an unprecedented exhibit next year that includes previously unpublished papers from its World War II papacy. “Lux in Arcana: The Vatican Secret Archives Revealed” opens in February at Rome’s Capitoline Museums and marks the first time such precious documents, manuscripts and parchments have been allowed out of the Vatican vaults for view by the general public. The occasion is the archive’s 400th anniversary.”

BBC – “One of the world’s oldest public libraries, the Vatican Library, has closed for rebuilding. It is not expected to reopen before September 2010. (via)