Collecties algemeen

Visitors are sometimes taken aback when they step into the museum galleries: isn't this the preeminent museum for the history of the book? It certainly is, but alongside books, the building also houses a surprisingly rich array of antiquities, coins, paintings, sculptures, and curiosities. We owe this remarkable combination to Baron Van Westreenen van Tiellandt, the man who laid the foundation for the collection.

As a quintessential nineteenth-century collector, the baron harbored a broad fascination with Greek, Roman, and Egyptian antiquity. Upon his passing in 1848, he bequeathed his entire collection, his wealth, and his home to the Dutch State. However, his will stipulated a strict condition: absolutely nothing was ever to be added to it.

To ensure that the evolution of the book after 1848 could still be documented, a decision was made in the 1950s to pair the baron’s legacy with a new, active collection: the Museum of the Book. Van Westreenen’s historical library has since formed the foundation of the national museum of the book, providing a stage to tell both the modern and contemporary story of the medium. To this day, it creates a unique duality within the walls of the museum: the baron’s original collection is forever frozen in time, while the modern museum collection remains in motion and continues to grow.