Statsbiblioteket State and University Library, Aarhus Royal Danish Library

History and Founding

The State and University Library (Danish: Statsbiblioteket) was established by Danish law in 1897 as part of an effort to decentralize the cultural dominance of Copenhagen. The library opened its doors in 1902 in a building on Vester Allé 12, designed by architect Hack Kampmann. Its founding collection of 100,000 volumes was drawn from the estate of Royal Archivist Caspar Frederik Wegener, purchased by the Danish state in 1897. When Aarhus University was established in 1928, the State Library was designated as its official university library. In 2017, the institution merged with the Royal Library in Copenhagen to form the unified Royal Danish Library, though both sites continue to operate independently.

Collections and Holdings

The library holds millions of items in print and digital formats, including books, journals, sound recordings, videos, patents, maps, prints, and drawings. A landmark feature of its campus presence is the 14-storey Bogtårnet (Book Tower), designed by C.F. Møller, which serves as the primary document storage facility. Key collections include:

• State Newspaper Collection: All Danish newspapers from the mid-1600s to the present, comprising more than 24 million digitized pages.
• Danish Commercials: Cinema adverts from around 1955 to 1995, and all TV2 commercials from 1988 to 2005.
• Music and Sound: All Danish music publications and unique sound recordings, including the Ruben Collection of late-19th-century wax cylinder phonograph recordings — some of Denmark's oldest surviving audio.
• Netarchive: A digital archive of the Danish internet from July 2005 onwards, maintained jointly with the Royal Library.
• Special Collections: Timetables, funeral sermons, historical handwriting, old political documents, and materials in immigrant languages.

Notable Materials for Journalism and Media Research

The library is the primary national repository for Danish press history. Its newspaper collection spans from the mid-seventeenth century and includes digitized editions accessible through the national newspaper digitization platform. The audiovisual archive holds a multi-petabyte collection of national and local broadcast television and radio programs, managed in partnership with Preservica for long-term digital preservation.

Access and Usage

As part of the Royal Danish Library, services are available to students, researchers, and the general public. The library functions as the main inter-library loan center for Danish public libraries and provides access to collections for Aarhus University faculty and students. Online access to digitized collections, including newspapers and sound materials, is available through the library's digital portals.