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The World Digital Library Is Now Open

By November 15, 2017Culture, Libraries

Have you always wanted to search through 16,982 items from 193 countries between 8000 BCE and 2000 AD? The World Digital Library offers ways to do just that.

With help from the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) the Digital Library has been available since September and is free for all users.

The library boasts an extensive range of books, along with manuscripts, videos, artworks, maps, and audio, and in seven different languages. Users can search for content in various ways: through simple searches of type of item, topic, etc, or with the interactive maps and timelines.




The interactive timeline is a favourite part of the site with World History taking us from rock paintings at 8000 BC, past Marco Polo’s voyage to China, all the way to the decolonisation of India and Pakistan and their eventual independence.

 

Browsing by ‘Type of Item’ may suit our Reading Addicts more as then they can delve straight into ancient books, manuscripts, and journals. With over 1,939 books alone there will be plenty to explore…

The only downside to digital archiving is we aren’t able to smell that familiar vanilla-and-almond old book scent. Some of the books are so old it would be a privilege to hold one. One of the oldest texts in the library is a Greek text written on papyrus. It consist of 7 lines of the play Orestes and was written around 200 BC in Hermopolis, Egypt. Fascinating stuff!




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