Virtual Reading Room of the Russian State Library

The Russian State Library (RSL) is a unique repository of authentic dissertation theses defended in our country since the year of 1944 in all subjects and specializations. You are welcome to look through the list of the digitized theses and author’s abstracts on the RSL digital catalogue.

The collection stocks printed editions that have been published since 1830 in Russian, in languages of ethnic minorities of the Russian Federation and in foreign languages. It represents a wide range of sources on the culture and history of Russia and adjoining territories which retrace the development of Russian statehood. There can be found pieces of Russian classical literature (18 – 20th centuries) and books on library science.

Users are welcome to plunge into a wonderful world of knowledge. Here one can find monographs, collections of research works, textbooks and manuals published within last 10 – 12 years. There are also represented classics of scientific works the value of which cannot be overestimated. The collection has been created on the basis of contracts with authors and right-owners authorized to digitize the works and let them enter the RSL Digital Library.

The collection represents Slavonic old-printed books published before the year of 1831 at first Slavonic printing houses. Here users are welcome to view the very first issues of most important legislative acts and regulations of the 18th century. Another point of interest could be electronic copies of books of high cultural, scientific and historical significance.

The collection includes manuscript works dated by 10 – 18th centuries. It is destined to open for readers a captivating world of Slavonic word, to demonstrate the process of development of the Slavonic written language and culture. It also gives a bright insight on book–writing schools and workshops, on stages of development of the Church Slavonic language. In addition, the collection contains digitized inventory lists of the items of the RSL Manuscript Department.

The collection represents an assembly of digital copies of musical works of special historical, cultural or scientific value. Its core is a selection of music publications of mid 18 —19th centuries.

The collection of the RSL periodicals covers the time limits beginning with 1725 – and till the present moment! Here one can find about 200 names of Russian magazines of diverse fields, that including art magazines. Among the items of a particular value there are to be distinguished the editions of the 19th century, the magazines issued in the first half of the 20th century, that including the modernist ones of the so-called Russian ‘Silver Age’. Besides, here are represented the magazines published by the Russian State Library itself.

The collection includes pictures and drawings, posters issued in Russia and in the Soviet Union within the last – century term, engravings by different masters with historical, mythological or religious plots, a selection of Russian folk prints, pieces of pre-revolutionary and Soviet applied graphics, as well as a whole set of photos having been made since the 17th century and up to the modern times.

Here one can find geographical maps and atlases, handwritten plans and drafts of different epochs considered to be true cultural achievements. The collection is universal in geographical coverage and thematic scope. It reflects the main stages of development of national and world cartography. The map and atlas collection of the Russian State Library is the largest in the Russian Federation, and it remains one of the most significant collections of the kind in the world.