Anna Amalia Library in Weimar burned
Comments: 4
The damage to the library’s main building is reported to be as devastating as that which occurred in Baghdad. The Telegraph has a story:
A 1534 Bible belonging to Martin Luther, the founder of Protestantism, as well as travel notes by the naturalist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt, were salvaged along with around 50,000 other books as staff, firemen and Weimar citizens formed a human chain to carry the treasures - books, paintings and sculptures - to safety.
Some staff were in tears as firemen were prevented from re-entering the inferno as the flames took hold of the library, listed as a Unesco World Heritage site.
The IHT also ran news:
The archive includes 2,000 hand-written medieval documents, 8,400 maps and a Bible collection.
Knoche noted that the fire was particularly tragic as the collection was to move to another site in late October.
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Posted to Oh, the Humanity • 2004.09.04 (Sat) • 14:29
Comments
Posted by Kristen 2004.09.04, 21:54
Oh, the loss. It ties my stomach in knots and brings tears to my eyes.
Posted by mademoiselle a. 2004.09.05, 02:03
I stared at the news in disbelief - and decided that I can feel very sad without having a bad conscience in regards to Ossetia and Iraq and Sudan, because it’s a different thing, and I don’t feel less sad at the humanitarian catastrophies. As for Weimar, it was one of my targets for research for my M.A. thesis paper. The Weimar tragedy shows that still not enough money is spent on cultural heritage here. A crying shame!!
Posted by Aegir 2004.09.08, 05:20
Thank you for mentioning this. There’s been no news of it on the BBC or Sky News, which is a travesty.
Posted by Matthias Ripp 2005.03.02, 22:26
For the UNESCO World Heritage Sites we are all together responsible. The safeguarding of our cultural heritage lies in our hand. So get involved in the protection of it!
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