“Greedy for books on natural science”. Lviv teacher Jan Smetanski and a fragment of his collection in the Silesian Library in Katowice Cover Image

"Chciwiec na wydawnictwa z zakresu przyrodoznawstwa”. Lwowski nauczyciel Jan Smetański i fragment jego kolekcji w Bibliotece Śląskiej w Katowicach
“Greedy for books on natural science”. Lviv teacher Jan Smetanski and a fragment of his collection in the Silesian Library in Katowice

Author(s): Weronika Pawłowicz
Subject(s): Cultural history, Cataloguing
Published by: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego
Keywords: Jan Smetański; Lviv; Katowice; Przemyśl; collections; private collections; the Silesian Library in Katowice; bibliophily; book collections

Summary/Abstract: Jan Smetanski (1881-1959), a Lviv natural historian and a high school teacher, was an avid bibliophile. He assembled a rich collection of 40,000 volumes, which was removed from Lviv after the war and located first in Przemysl and then in Katowice. After the owner died, the collection was dispersed. Some of the books were purchased by the Institute of Zoology of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw, a part by the Silesian Library in Katowice, a fragment of the collection remained in the possession of the family. The article discusses a fragment of Jan Smetanski’s collection kept in the collections of the Silesian Library.

  • Issue Year: 13/2019
  • Issue No: special
  • Page Range: 235-250
  • Page Count: 16
  • Language: English, Polish