Runer has it

I spent today at Lund's University Library (not to be confused with Lund University Libraries network), in Swedish this is Universitetsbiblioteket, or UB for short. The UB has a long history. It was founded the same year that the University was established, in 1666. The reason for establishing a University in Lund was to mark the area (Skåne) as Swedish, as until 1658 it had been part of Denmark. Lund is Sweden's second oldest University, after Uppsala. The University originally used the cathedral library, in a building that still stands today. It then moved to another building which also housed pigs and grain! There is still a library (of philosophy) in this building.



Universitetsbiblioteket

 About 100 years ago, a new building was constructed for the UB. This has been extended several times to accommodate the ever expanding collection. The UB is a legal deposit library, like the British Library. This means it collects everything published in Sweden - not just books, but newspapers, magazines, leaflets (e.g. IKEA product information), posters (including billboard), literally everything! I was lucky enough to be shown around by one of the librarians who work at the UB - the sheer volume of material is overwhelming! They have several off-site storage units to house it all.

As well as being a legal deposit collection responsible for perserving Sweden's cultural heritage, Lund University also serves the function of lending this collection. This differs to the situation in the UK, as the British Library handles this. However, Sweden's equivalent of the BL, the Royal Library, only serves as a legal deposit library and does not lend its collection.

Together with the Royal Library, staff at UB catalogue the legal deposit materials. These are available to view on Sweden's national research libraries catalogue, Libris (UK's closest equivalent would be COPAC). Libris has the added fuctionality of being able to select specific libraries to search, meaning that it can be used as an institution's main catalogue.

Universities in Sweden have three main tasks - education, research and the public. This means that anyone over 18 can apply for a library card and the university cannot charge for this.

The UB used to provide quite a lot of user education but now that role is largely carried out by the faculty libraries. I'll be visiting one of these libraries tomorrow to find out more about what they do in this regard.

They have about 550 study places available in the UB, including group spaces/rooms, silent study areas, and a room for researchers. Many years ago, only researchers and gentlemen (without their staff) were allowed in the Library! As with many libraries, there is demand for more study space.

Another insightful day at Lund. I'll leave you with a couple of images of Sweden's largest rune stone, housed in the entrance of the UB.