In search of Paradise

Dr. Claire Eager (The College of Wooster, Ohio) visited the Heritage Library Hendrik Conscience in the summer of 2019. Her research concentrates on the works of the English poet Edmund Spenser (c.1552-1599), who wrote The Faerie Queene, and the similarities with the work of the Flemish poet Jan van der Noot (c.1539-c.1595). We interviewed her about her research.

Nottebohm travel grant awarded to Marlena Cravens and Elise Watson

Marlena Cravens investigates how Spanish texts and translations were used to transform the languages and cultures of the original population of the Americas. Elise Watson will investigate how Antwerp printers of the seventeenth and eighteenth century applied their presses to the benefit of catholic people in the Dutch Republic.

A Tale of Two Books: Two Sammelbände given to Antwerp by Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle

Assistant Professor Liza Blake examined two rare books which were donated to the Antwerp city library by the English noblewoman and author Margaret Cavendish, Marchioness of Newcastle (1623-1673). In this article she stresses the importance of this donation and explains why these particular copies merit further investigation.

Georges Eekhoud: the Belgian Maxim Gorki

The Belgian author Georges Eekhoud (1854 – 1927), who lived in Flanders but wrote in French, was one of the first authors who wrote positively about homosexuality. Eekhoud’s personal library is a key collection in the Hendrik Conscience Heritage Library.

Forgotten chansons de geste?

New acquisition of a rare 16th-century romance of chivalry

Recently a rare copy of a Dutch epic poem (chanson de geste) printed in 1576 in Antwerp turned up at an auction. With the help of the Patronage Fund for Books and Literature the Heritage Library Hendrik Conscience acquired this copy of the romance of Roncevale.

Travel grant to Antwerp awarded to two international researchers

Earlier this year, the Plantin-Moretus Museum and the Hendrik Conscience Heritage Library launched a fellowship programme for research into the history of the early printed book (15th-18th century) in Antwerp. Today this scholarship is granted for the first time.

New acquisition: Albertanus de Brescia, Liber de arte loquendi et tacendi

In December 2018 the Endowment Fund for Books and Literature acquired a rare Antwerp incunable, which it donated to the Hendrik Conscience Heritage Library. The Liber de arte loquendi et tacendi by Albertanus of Brescia was printed in Antwerp in 1485 by Gerard Leeu.

Podcasts Miraeus Lectures

Together with the Flanders Book Historical Society and the Antwerp Bibliophile Society, the Hendrik Conscience Heritage Library organizes book-historical lectures that place book history in the Netherlands in an international perspective. Browse our archive of a few past lectures and listen to the podcasts.

I found my Holy Grail

Marianne C.E. Gillion has a PhD in musicology. In her Miraeus Lecture on 27 March 2019 she will talk about the liturgy of the Antwerp Cathedral of Our Lady and St. James’ Church. In this interview she gives us a preview.