Collection of Old and Rare Books
The Split City Museum holds more than 2,000 valuable volumes within its Collection of Old and Rare Books. Dating from the 16th century to the mid-19th century, the books are connected to Split and its environs either through their content or their provenance. Most were published in Italy, with a smaller number originating in other European countries and in Croatia. The collection is dominated by works in Italian and Latin, while fewer examples are printed in German, French, Croatian, and English.
The Collection of Old and Rare Books is largely made up of the Capogrosso-Kavanjin family memorial library, comprising more than 800 volumes dating from the 16th to the late 19th century, including several works of exceptional rarity.
The earliest item in the collection is Biblia Sacrosancta Testamenti Veteris et Novi, iuxta vulgatam quam dicunt editionem, printed in Lyon in 1548 by Jacobus Giunti. The collection also contains two works by Marko Marulić, regarded as the father of Croatian literature: Institutione del buono e beato vivere, secondo…, printed in Venice in 1569, and Dictorum Factorumque Memorabilium libri sex…, issued in Antwerp in 1577. In addition, it holds the major work of Croatian historiography, De Regno Dalmatiae et Croatiae libri sex, by Ivan Lučić of Trogir, printed in Vienna in 1758. Of particular importance are also the publications by Robert Adam, Ruins of the Palace of the Emperor Diocletian at Spalatro in Dalmatia, Ernest Hébrard, Spalato: le Palais de Dioclétien, and George Niemann, Der Palast Diokletians in Spalato, all regarded as essential reading for scholars studying Diocletian’s Palace and the history of Split.