The National Library

The National Library of Ireland was originally the Library of the Royal Dublin Society which was founded in 1731. The library was made available to the Public in a very limited fashion. In 1836 a Select Committee of the House of Lords was appointed, 'to inquire into the administration of the Royal Dublin Society. The committee's report reccommended that the library should be opened up to the public and become the National Library of Ireland. The National Library of Ireland was established by the Dublin Science and Art Museum Act, 1877. The existing National Library of Ireland was designed by Thomas Newenham Deane and opoened in September 1890. The bulk of the collections in the possession of the Royal Dublin Society, were vested in the then Department of Science and Art for the benefit of the public and of the Society. An Agreement of 1881 provided that the Library should operate under the superintendence of a Council of twelve Trustees, eight of whom were appointed by the Society and four by the Government; this Agreement also conferred on the Trustees the duty of appointing the officers of the Library. This arrangement remained in place until the library became an autonomous cultural institution in 2005. The ownership of the library tranferred to the Free State Govenrment after the war of Independance and then transferred to the Department of Education until 1986, when it was transferred to the Department of An Taoiseach, and is now under the control of the Department of Arts, Sport and Tourism. The National Library’s contents constitute the most comprehensive collection of Irish documentary material in the world and offer an invaluable representation of Ireland’s history and heritage.