Rajah's Collection | General Collection

The Book section is functioning to maintain the printed books both Rajah's collection and modern general collection books. The Book collection of the library exceeds 52,000.

Catalogues - Card catalogues are prepared according to Title, Author and Subject for each language books. Books are issued only for reference under closed access system. The Book catalogues are being computerised for easy storage and retrieval system.

This Library is not only having manuscripts but also rare books. Serfoji Maharaja made the rare book collections during his lifetime. In his collection there are more than 4500 books in French, English, German and Danish languages. Collection of books presently made from 1918 onwards is by way of donation and purchase.

The old books in European languages in this Library are mostly collected by Maharaja Serfoji. Maharaja was a Scholar and patronised many Scholars. He was taught by Danish Missionary Father C.F. Schwartz. He learnt English and many other languages. In his collection there are more than 4500 books in English, French, Italy, Danish languages. These books deal with many subjects including Musical Notations. The catalogues reveal the zeal and avidity with which Serfoji II collected books on various subjects i.e. Classics, Journals, Periodicals, Lexicons etc., and will win the admiration of book lovers. Some of them are rare in the first and the second editions highly valued by book collectors. In almost all of them we find the autograph of Raja Serfoji in his bold and fluent hand recording the years of acquisition. One is delighted to find the comments of the Rajah in the margin of the pages in some of the books, which prove his deep scholarship and erudition and clear understanding of the subject. The earliest printed book collected by Raja Serfoji was world Atlas in French language printed in 1692.

The general collection of this Library has been started from 1918. This general collection comprises rare books in six major languages Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu, Marathi, Hindi and English. The earliest printed books, mostly the first editions are available in this collection. Books are added to this Library by the following ways: -

Now the reference section has 54,009 books in various languages. Card catalogues are prepared according to Title, Author and Subject for each language books. Books are issued only for reference under closed access system.