Admont Abbey library hall in Styria, Austria, the largest monastic library in the world. A jewel of the Baroque era.
Admont Abbey (Stift Admont) is a foundation of the Benedictines on the River Enns in the town of Admont in Austria and is the oldest remaining monastery in Styria. It contains the largest monastic library in the world and a long-established scientific collection, and is known for its Baroque architecture and collections of art and manuscripts. The abbey's location on the borders of the mountainous Gesäuse National Park (the name Admont derives from the Latin expression "ad montes," "at the mountains") is of unusual scenic beauty. The library hall, built in 1776 to designs by the architect Joseph Hueber, is 70 metres long, 14 metres wide and 13 metres high, and is the largest monastery library in the world. It contains c. 70,000 volumes of the monastery's entire holdings of c. 200,000 volumes. The ceiling consists of seven cupolas, decorated with frescoes by Bartolomeo Altomonte showing the stages of human knowledge up to the high point of Divine Revelation. Light is provided by 48 windows and is reflected by the original colour scheme of gold and white. The architecture and design express the ideals of the Enlightenment, against which the sculptures by Joseph Stammel of "The Four Last Things" make a striking contrast.
Size: 4928px × 3264px
Photo credit: © Manfred Glueck / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
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