Hello!

Are you interested in Crimean history and archaeology antique editions? Do you agree to use the scans? If your answer is "yes", we are pleased to present a collection of the late 19th - early 20th centuries periodicals and other rare books of our library stock. In 1893 Karl Kazimirovich Kostsyushko-Valyuzhinich (1847-1907), the founder of the archaeological museum in Chersonesos, settled to begin collecting books for a future library.

In one of his letters to the Imperial Archaeological Commission he wrote: " I cannot imagine a museum without a library" For a few years he managed to create an outstanding collection of books in history and archaeology, numismatics and arts, geography and other disciplines. These books are the precious core of our library collection. There are more than 30 thousands of volumes in the library holdings and almost a half is rare and valuable ones. Just a few people can get access to use these materials. According to the library status, publications are available only for Preserve of Tauric Chersonesos researchers and scholars collaborating with the Preserve within joint research agreements. If it were not hi-tech the situation would keep remaining the same for a long time. Several years ago, our library, in cooperation with the Institute of Classical Archaeology at the University of Texas at Austin (USA) and with the generous support of the Packard Humanities Institute launched a project of rare editions digitization and providing access to scans by Internet. We are also working on developing online library catalogue. It is an ongoing project and requires time, so we decided to make our library open at least for Internet audience and share with you already digitized materials. We promise to update the virtual collections with new publications. You are welcome!

On our help page you can find the detailed project description and resources user guidelines.

Your opinion, suggestions and questions are welcomed at library@chersonesos.org