The KB possesses some 160,000 early printed books, ranging from incunabula to occasional verse and from songbooks to pamphlets.
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Incunabula
The collection of incunabula (books printed before 1501) consists of more than 2,000 volumes. The Kb has the largest collection of Dutch incunabula in the world.
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Post-incunabula
Book printed from 1501-1540 are called post-incunabula. The KB has some 3,500 of these, 1,000 of which were printed in the Netherlands.
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Core collection of the Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica
Books concerning the Christian-hermetic tradition. This gnostic-philosophical-religious body of ideas has Egyptian, Greek, Jewish and Christian roots (in Dutch).
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Popular prose
The popular prose collection (chapbooks) comprises c.2,000 mostly rare editions.
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Occasional poetry
17th and 18th-century occasional poetry on the marriages, births and deaths of private persons are represented by more than 4,000 editions.
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Pamphlets
The pamphlets collection (among others the ‘Knuttel’ collection) consists of more than 30,000 editions.
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State publications
The KB has some 30,000 different editions of laws and regulations issued by Dutch government bodies before 1801.
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Book sales catalogues
In the book sales catalogues collection there are hundreds of 17th and 18th-century auction and bookseller’s catalogues.
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French Protestantism (Roobol collection)
The Roobol collection consists of c.400 theological, church historical and philosophical publications in the field of French Protestantism from the 16th to the 18th century.
Songbooks
The collection of songbooks mainly stemd from the music library of D.F. Scheurleer (1855-1927) and contains c.3,000 titles.