Look at all those books! If you have ever wanted to visit an ancient monastery reference library, then go to Austria right now. Just 12 miles from Linz, Saint Florian was consecrated in 1071, making it one of the oldest operational monasteries in the entire world. The library wing, added in the 1740s, is a gorgeous late Baroque design with a colourful ceiling fresco by Bartolomeo Altomonte and Antonio Tassi. The shelves are lined with a total number of 150,000 volumes, including 800 medieval works, an illuminated manuscript containing the Psalms in Latin, German, and Polish as well as one of the most comprehensive collections of Arabic literature between Berlin and Rome.
Saint Florian Monastery Library
