Royal Library: Books, Knowledge, and the Palace as Archive

The Royal Library showcases bindings as art, scripts as craft, and catalogs as infrastructure that keeps knowledge retrievable.

Contents

• Binding 101
• Scripts and Hands
• Catalogs and Order

Binding 101

• Leather types and dyes hint at period and region.
• Tooling: gilt, blind, and onlays reveal budget and ambition.
• Spine labels act as a miniature taxonomy and routing system.

Scripts and Hands

• Look for letterform contrast and axis angle to place a script in time.
• Marginalia add glimpses of past readers and court routines.

Catalogs and Order

• Early cataloging practices shaped how courts thought about knowledge.
• Modern systems overlay but rarely erase earlier logics.

The library is a map of knowledge — bound, labeled, and alive.