Your visit

The Herzog August Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel is not just a library and research centre for the medieval and early modern periods, it also houses a museum which presents its history and its holdings to the public. The museum rooms are located in the Bibliotheca Augusta and the Lessing House. You can find information about getting to Wolfenbüttel and about accommodation here. Access to the historic buildings for the disabled is described in the visitors' guide for the disabled. The list of current entrance prices and fees for guided tours is here. If you wish to book a guided tour, please contact info@hab.de.

Opening times

Exhibition rooms in the Bibliotheca Augusta	Tuesday - Sunday 10 am to 5 pm
Exhibition rooms in the Lessing Hause	Tuesday - Sunday 10 am to 5 pm

Please check for possible short-term changes to the advertised opening times here.

 

Bibliotheca Augusta

The exhibition rooms in the Bibliotheca Augusta offer regularly changing exhibits on the cultural and intellectual history of the medieval and early modern periods. On entering the main hall of the Bibliotheca Augusta the visitor is immediately aware of the monumentality of the ducal collections, which stretch up over three floors, filling all four walls. The book-wheel and the catalogue written by Duke August himself provide an insight into the work of the Duke as a collector. In the treasure room, an exhibition room which forms part of the library's safe, some of the library's most valuable objects can be seen. Among these alternating displays the Gospels of Henry the Lion can also be seen at certain times. Written and illuminated in around 1188, at the time of its purchase in 1983 the manuscript was the most expensive book in the world. The Gospels can only be shown for a few weeks every year. For this and details of treasures currently on show, please consult the exbition details. Downstairs from the main hall you pass through the Cabinet with its displays on book history, and on the left is the Globe Room with maps and globes from the early modern period. On the right hand side is the Artists' Books Room, where there are regular exhibitions on the art of modern book illustration. From here you have access to the Hermann Zapf collection which presents the work of the famous contemporary typographer and calligrapher.

The Lessing House

The museum in the Lessing House concentrates on the life and work of the German dramatist and essayist, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729-1781) during the last decade of his life, which he spent as librarian in Wolfenbüttel (1770-1781). The new exhibition rooms opened in April 2004. They place Lessing's work as a writer and scholar in the intellectual context of his times. When Lessing arrived in Wolfenbüttel, he was already a famous author - a poet, a critic, a dramatist and a scholar. It was here that he completed his drama "Emilia Galotti". In 1773 he founded a journal entitled "On history and Literature. From the treasures of the Ducal Library at Wolfenbüttel" in order to acquaint a broader public with the treasures of the library. In the winter of 1777 he moved into the Lessing House with his wife, Eva König, who was pregnant with their first child. Lessing's son was born at Christmas, but by the 10th of January both the child and his wife were dead. Lessing moved his study into the room in which his wife had died. It was here that he wrote his famous drama "Nathan the Wise".

Library quarters

A walk through the library quarters will round off your visit [plan]. The facade and vaulted main hall of the armoury building, which dates from 1618, are of special interest. This building now houses the modern research library with a reference library of secondary literature, the main catalogues and the reading room.