Biblioteka Narodowa - National Library of Poland

The National Library, subordinate to the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage , is the central library of the state and one of the most important national cultural institutions. It operates on the basis of Article 16, Section 4 of the Act on Libraries and the Statute of the National Library . Fulfilling the tasks of a large scientific library with a humanistic profile, it remains at the same time the main archive of national literature and the national center of bibliographic information about books, a significant scientific institution, as well as an important methodological center for other libraries in Poland.

The traditions of the Polish National Library date back to the early eighteenth century and are associated with the figures and work of Andrzej Stanisław and Józef Andrzej Załuski, the creators of the first large public and national library in Poland, which under the name of the Załuski Republic Library Zwana passed under the care of the state after the death of its founders. The tragic fate of its book collection – from the removal of the entire library to St. Petersburg, after the defeat of the Kościuszko Uprising and the loss of independence, to the destruction of the most valuable part of the recovered collections in October 1944 – has become one of the symbols of the losses of Polish culture, forever associated with the idea of the National Library.