Monasteries have libraries – sometimes more, sometimes less flashy. But often suitably grand environments for books that deserve the best. In Prague, the Strahov monastery has a couple of nice library halls, one for philosophy from the late 18th century, and one for theology from the 1670s (philosophy on the below left, theology on the right).
Below is a facsimile featuring the historical silhouette of Prague in 1493 (left) and an excessively ornamented cover of the Strahov evangeliary worked on between 9th and 16th centuries (below right).
Below left a medieval gothic Saint Catherine later used (after 1498) as an inside cover of an early printed volume (incunable), and a pontifical with an illustration showing kneeling Emperor Charles IV and bishop Albrecht (right).
The monastery was founded in 1140 when some Premonstratensians were invited from Germany to set it up (the medieval appearance is below left). As monasteries go, the cloisters is not particularly impressive (below right).
The current church interior is baroque (below left and right).
The winter (left) and summer (right) refectories were more elaborate than your usual workplace canteen.
The library has had some setbacks in its history, as the Hussites burned the books and artefacts, and the Swedes looted everything again during the Thirty Year War. It was moved to the National Library in the 1940s and returned to the re-established monastery after 1989.
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